Day 10, 6-24

It was a long and arduous day, but with great reward at the end. Our titanic struggle of the day was Albert Mountain. It didn't actually climb that far, but it climbed very steeply. So we only had about 500' of elevation gain, but it took...a while, because it was crammed into maybe 1/4 mile. We gutted that out, and find an observation tower on top. This was glorious, it was wonderfully tall and gave us this incredible view of the surrounding countryside. We took a series of pictures from it that you could string together and get the idea of being up there...it was pretty incredible. The valleys just opened up before us, with the rippling mountains testaments to what we had earlier clambered over, and what we had ahead of us. Really neat spot.
The next event of our trip was looming up on us: a hitchhike into Franklin. We were going to be on a very well traveled road, but one that had a decent speed limit associated with it. We needed to find a spot that would let drivers see us, have the thought to pick us up, then have a place to pull over in order to pick us up. I'll talk a little more about that in the planned post on hitchhiking. So we stick our thumbs out, and wait. Driven by many times (it happens), we got a thumbs up from one truck, but they were just being ignorant and 'joking with us' (they didn't stop, but turned and laughed at us as they continued on), waved at several times, then a guy swung in. We scooted on over and tossed our bags and ourselves in, and off we were. We had heard of a place that had good hiker rates, so we asked to be dropped off there, and he said he didn't know where that was. Which was bad. But he offered to show us the PO first, so we said: sure. As we were rolling along, we spotted the hotel of which we had heard. So he showed us the PO (a stroll down from the hotel), and then dropped us off. We signed in, got our room, and were a little taken aback by how...very...very...70s it all was. But that was ok, because the shower worked! And we scrubbed very well. Oh, how well we scrubbed. And then we washed our clothing in the sink. Although there was a laundromat, we were wearing all the clothing we had, so no laundromat for C and I. After that, we strolled around, wandered down to Ace Hardware to see when they opened the next day, bought some water (a gallon) and (glorious!) a pint of Ben and Jerry's Vermonty Python Ice Cream of Joy and Ecstasy. Then we walked the other direction, dropped our stuff off (freezer compartment in the fridge in our room!), and walked to Dominoes. Ordered a 3:5 dealie, 3 medium pizzas for $5 each. I asked the guy, 'I'm assuming this is the best way to get the most pizza for the least money?' To which he said, 'Yes'. To which Caleb and I said, 'SWEET!' One Pepperoni, One Sausage, and One Cheese, back to the room, and a present was handed to us there. 'Enter the Dragon' was on TV, and had just started! So we tucked into Pizza. Each of us killed about a pizza, so we had what amounted to one left over. Then we cracked open the Vermonty Python, and grabbed our respective Sporks of Power. We started eating, and both of us confessed afterwards that we thought the other was getting more, so we kept increasing the amounts we grabbed. But the joy! Ben and Jerry, how I love both of thee! They are glorious people. Really. Very much so. So we wrapped up the movie and tried to go to bed, but I had a really hard time sleeping. It was much lighter than we were used to (streetlights lit the room, even through the shades), and very much louder. The AC had to be on, or it got unbearable (the most uncomfy a night had been until that point), and that was loud. The cars outside, they were loud. The bed...well, my hammock is pretty much the best thing ever, and it trumped that bed. Also, I had a bellyful (quite quite full) of pizza and ice cream that had lots of chocolate/caffeine in it, which I had not had in a while. So after a while, eventually, we got to sleep.

Albert Mountain. See Caleb? He's not that far away, horizontally, but he's about as far away in that direction as he is vertically...ridiculous.
















The trail. It was that steep.


















A cool flower. Because it was there.













Incredible view from the Observation Tower














Another neat view, and part of the tower itself.













We were running that ridge...and that was the climb of death.












Hey, it's me and mountains













Its a long way down from this thing...













Me, in a green tunnel way down there.













A misty mountain shot. Where's Bombadil? Smaug? Lonely Mountain?












C, looking out.













C, post shower, and I, pre shower. Notice the greasy hair.

•

–Post Shower! Wonderful! I feel good!

•

–

The shower that did it all. Note the fashionable green tile.



















The sink we washed our stuff in. My bandannas in there now...after the picture, stuff ended up hanging everywhere. It was great.

Day 9, 6-23

We set out and did pretty well this day, covering about 16-17 miles or so. After several hours of hiking, we met up with a couple that we thought we had left in the dust a long time ago, Mark and Gretchen. They didn't have trail names yet, but they were wrapping up their trip. They had planned to make it into Franklin on day 10, about 100 miles from Springer. It would have worked out to about 10-10 miles days. Not impossible for just starting, but they didn't have anything like walking sticks, which help so very much. We spoke with them for a while. They had taken a ride into Helen, and found it much the same as Caleb and I found Hiawassee: crowded, busy, dirty, and gross. We wandered on from that point, and attacked 'Standing Indian Mountain', a rather formidable edifice in front of us. While the climb was not steep, it was very long. About 2-3 miles of steady uphill. Even though it was a gentle incline, that long gets a little long. At this point, we're running a little low on water, and we're both not the happiest with this situation. We get to the top and run into a grandfather (maybe?) and two kids, with backpacks on, but school type, not backpacking type. We spoke with them to a bit, and they seemed to be really excited about the prospect of finding Ruby in the rocks there. Apparently they had loaded up their packs with loose rock, and were going to try and harvest rubies. I have two problems with this. 1: The outdoors are for enjoyment. Leave it there for others to enjoy. Don't take anything, leave no trace, all that. Those principles are very important to me. To every backpacker. 2: The kids. The older guy didn't have a pack. The two kids did. They were apparently the ones that were carrying...who knows how much rocks in their pack. I'm sure the thought went to through my head at least once: man this pack feels like a ton of bricks. For them, that's what they were carrying. Does that fall under child labor?
Anyway, we're on top, and I'm starting to get a little loopy. More than usual. Caleb noticed it as well, and so we spend a total of 2 seconds on top of things, then head off. Our water was really low, so we look around, but after bushwacking for way too long, figured that we'd be better off getting to the trail and getting to the next water a bit down the way. So we get back, I stumbling along, and Caleb, who was probably worried about me getting dehydrated, passing out, and making him carry me to the next water, doing his thing. We get to a nice little spot with water purportedly nearby, but we can't hear it. That's a big thing...so he goes left, I go right, and we're wandering down this trail, looking for water. It was a neat intersection of two trails, with lots of nice open flat space there, perhaps the ideal spot for a camping area. I found a damp area that gradually increased to a trickle, and from that to a pool. I hobble back to the intersection, unpack my camelbak, and Caleb and I wander down with our 1 c measure for scooping. Since we were drinking from...a small pool of water in a ring of stones, we needed to dip water from it. So we dipped for quite a while...filled a Nalgene, then poured it in a camelbak, and repeated until everything was full. Then we drank some, dipped more to replace that, ate a energy bar, and kept on till later that night. We swung by a shelter that had a very sad entry with it. Someone was getting ready to leave the trail, they were done with the rain and were leaving as soon as they hit a major town (Franklin in a few miles). I wrote a lengthy entry about why I backpacked and why I was on the trail in the first place. While I didn't really need the reminder, it was nice to have a solid something or other to grab onto.

Caleb by the 'NC Tree', a gnarled Oak that is the unofficial border to NC.

















I'm sitting on a neat branch/tree, after watering and feeling better, showing 1 and 5 fingers, signifying the 15 miles we had pulled down at that moment.










Cool flowery things I needed a picture of.













A neat looking stream bed. The flash didn't work out so well, and the no flash didn't either, but looked better than the flash version, so that's what this is.
















If you squint really hard you can see Caleb cleaning his toes and looking beefy. Because he's ripped.

Day 8, 6-22

This was an interesting day of firsts for Caleb and I. We set out that morning with the realization that we needed to get a ride into Hiawassee at Dick's Creek Gap, and we had never needed to hitchhike before. We needed to send some mail, get some food, and then get back to the trail, and this would be after getting to the town.
So we set out, we hit the road, and then we look around. There are a few cars in the lot across the street (highway, but it was inglorious enough to be called street), so we walk across (besides, we needed to be on that side anyway, because we needed to go that direction to town. As we get there, there's a guy and his wife descending the mountain. We talked with them for a while, and I don't know if Caleb had thought this, but I certainly had them giving us a ride in mind. So we talk, and we drop hints about how nice it would be to get into town without having to hitchhike, and before we know it, we're smelling up an SUV and on our way to Hiawassee. Which worked out nicely. Turns out that the guy does Geocaching, which is...I don't know. It seems, frankly, ridiculous. A game that was created for people to play with their GPS systems. Anyway, I wasn't complaining, they gave us a ride. So we swing into an Ingles Parking Lot, and they're off quickly. I don't think she really wanted to give us a ride in the first place...she was not as voluble as he, and was for dropping us off about 3 miles from town. That's the worst place to be...in town, you're just heading back to the trail. At the trail, you're heading to town. In between...you could be sketchy, and your pick-up-likelihood drops. But we hoped and prayed desperately, and an Ingles appeared! We swung in, picked up the few things we needed, and then two small things of Ben and Jerry's 'Cherry Garcia'. Tasty. Nowhere near my fav, but tasty. And thus began our infatuation with the lovely Mr Ben and Mr Jerry. Swung by the PO to drop some mail off, swung by a general store for bandannas, and we were off again. Once more with Frood Fellow status. Someone please tell me you get that reference...
Only to confront actual factual hitching. I'll do a separate post on the trials and tribulations of hitchhiking. It's an experience, I'll say that much...anyway, an old guy in a truck gave us a ride, and we bombed out, Caleb in the bed, I in the cab talking with the guy. Good vibe, so we were cool with it. Dropped us off, and once more we were in the woods. It felt really good. So we started putting some distance between us and the road, and that was very nice.
Then another first for us. NC! We crossed a state line! We were totally pumped up. That was our goal for the night, we wanted to get there, and camp, even if we were camping on the State line, we wanted to make it over. And we did! There was a campsite there, not the most forgiving for hammocks, but good enough, and we set up alright. Then I made the first Oops blunder of the trip. Oops is my trail name, and for various reasons, but so far, on this trip, I had been doing well. We had even toyed with switching my name to 'little bit', cause I kept saying that. Then this happened.
Caleb and I cook with a tiny little denatured alcohol stove. Best thing ever. It boils H2O, and that's all you need. So we carry our denatured alcohol in a 500 mL Nalgene bottle. I'm looking for places to toss the bear line, and find a splendid branch. Way up on this tree that doesn't have any branches close to the anything, until this one, about 20 feet off the ground. Super great. I take Caleb's parachuter cord and flake it out (unravel it on the ground so when I toss it, it flows well, and not in a snarl. The term is from climbing, and you always do this, because you don't want to be in a knotted-rope situation if there's someone on the other end who needs to be held immediately. So you start and one end and play the rope out onto the ground until you get to the other.). So it's flaked out, and I need something to throw. So I grab the Nalgene with the denatured alcohol in it. Tie it on. Lean back, heave it up. Great throw, right over the branch. Just as it's clearing the branch, I grab the rope. All the forward momentum gets transferred to continuing the arc, and the bottle gracefully loops over the branch again. And there's what we should be using shortly to cook our dinner, hanging 20 long feet above the ground. Drat. I shake the line. Nothing happens. I shake it harder. Nothing happens. I call Caleb over. He looks at me with a combo of anger and amusement. 'You get to keep Oops'. 'I know buddy. I know.' So we shake and plan. Eventually, we decided to throw a rock over the branch, which would help uncoil the rope enough to let the bottle down. So that's what we did. But Caleb made me practice first. And I did. And it worked...and dinner was tasty. And I never grabbed the line again, until the weight hit the ground. And it was always a rock. Never our fuel, never again.
New Bandannas!













We're awesome. We have new bandannas. What then?












Awesome flower. Magnolia?













A great shot of something or other.













NC/GA! One state down, a lot more to go!

Day 7, 6-21

We woke up this morning, stumbled into breakfasting, tanked up on water and did our second water-toasting, and then packed up. Everything on, and away we went. After a while of trucking along, we realized that I had forgotten my bandanna. Probably somewhere at Cheese Factory. Once again, the assessment voted for moving forward. So no more bandanna, and I lost my status as a frood fellow. Which is never good.
We took it easy today, I'm not sure how far we went, but it wasn't that far. Maybe this was our 9-10 mile day. At about lunch time, we sack out and start to eat. Right before we move on, a lady named Sue swung into where we were eating, sacked out, and started munching on stuff. She was a school teacher from Fl (there were a lot of people from Fl hiking...I don't know why that is.), and was just taking a week or so to bum around. This was her second day in. We talked movies and literature a little, and meandered around the conversational spectrum until her co-hiker showed up. We spoke a little with them, but at this point, C and I were feeling ready to go, so we went.
This was a good day of conversation for Caleb and I. To this point, we'd kept each other entertained with each others lives, opinions, etc, and that was fun. It took a turn for the serious on this day with careers, future possibilities, etc taking the foreground. Good stuff.

Awesome view. Don't know of what...













We're sad. No bandannas...we don't know where our towels are...












But we have carrots! And that makes our life happy.












Caleb's Heels. He always gets those blisters, and I don't know why. But with some TLC they cleared up a lot, and I don't think they ever bothered him excessively on the trail.










Back of my knee. I'm not sure if it was from the leg brace rubbing, or if I stumbled into some poison ivy, but it wasn't the greatest. Oh well. It got better fairly quickly once I was able to let it breathe more.

The Weird Couple

•They were odd. They didn’t introduce themselves the first night, but that was ok with Caleb and I. They did have a tent set up in the shelter, but were in the middle of taking it down when C and I rolled up, because the 4 girls (I’ll talk about them a little later) were going to be spending the night in the shelter as well, since their tents leaked. The guy was a scruffy looking fellow with what appeared to be a Confederate Hat on, pretty unshaven. His wife/partner was kinda chunky, coke-bottle glasses, and long dark hair. They both smoked a lot, but didn’t have actual cigarettes. Instead, they had loose tobacco and papers, which they rolled using this thingy that made them look like proper cigarettes. The smoke was annoying. Since C and I set up relatively close to the shelter for lack of energy to look for a better spot, and the fact that it was raining, we kept smelling smoke as we were drifting off to sleep. Urck. The morning came, and the Uncle and Nephew, then the 4 girls rolled out. C and I were taking down/getting ready to take off, and the couple: sitting there, listening to a portable radio they had, and smoking. They weren’t thinking of moving. They had lots of stuff up on clotheslines tied to trees, and they definitely also had a little sled thing made from lashing together branches, so they could haul a lot of this crap around. After talking to other people we met farther down the trail, it was discovered that they were probably living on the trail. I don't know how common this is, but apparently there are always one or two people just living in a shelter somewhere. As we discovered shortly thereafter, there's a road to a town not too far from where the shelter was, so they could roll into town whenever they needed something, and either bum food or...well, I don't know. Maybe they were collecting unemployment at a PO somewhere along the way. This couple were two of only...maybe 3 people that weren't cool on the trail. The other guy was named Kim, and he had a dog with him named - inspiredly - dawg.

Day 6, 6-20

So, our filter had broken earlier, and the trail swami at Neel's Gap had pronounced it beyond repair. He had said, Rock Dancer had said, third guy in Neel's Gap had said: unfiltered H2O is safe, as long as you're smart about where you get it. So we went with it. We found some water, filled up straight from the water, and looked at each other. 'Greg, this could be really dumb'. 'I know. I know. Are you ready?' 'yeah'. 'First, a toast. To not getting the runs!' And we clunked our Nalgene bottles together and drank our first unfiltered water together. It was really tasty. I enjoyed it.
But I get ahead of myself. We left the shelter, and found that the odd couple had set up pretty well. We left before they did, but I don't know if they ever left. We never saw them again, and I think they were living on the trail. There's a post on them. And then we got water shortly down the trail.
Around...lunchtime maybe? We make it to Blue Mountain Shelter, which is right before the infamous Unicoi Gap. We had been hearing of Unicoi Gap for a long time, ever since we started. Everyone seems to have started from that point. It was a bit crazy. So getting close to it was something of an achievement, because that meant we were finally getting ready to surpass the myriad hordes of Boy Scouts that were hiking on the trail. More on Boy Scouts later. So anyway, we make it to Blue Mountain Shelter, where the 4 girls and uncle/nephew are, and dry out all our stuff in the wonderfully toasty sun.
The 4 girls were from all over, and I'm pretty sure that 3 of them were sisters...lets see if I can remember names...Anita, Jackie, and...two others, names to come later. The uncle and nephew were there as well. The uncle had sort of folded the girls into his protective umbrella, which I thought was kinda funny, since they were all upper college age and were doing better than he was. After it all dried out, we set out again. They seemed a little sad to see us go, I think perhaps the assumption was that we were going to nab a ride into Helen (the town connected with Unicoi Gap) with them tomorrow. But we needed to get a little farther that day, so we did. After going about a mile or so down into Gap, I realize that Caleb looks a little different. No bandana. We deduced that he must have left it at Blue Mountain, and we contemplated going back for all of 3 seconds. But we would have had to ascend that last mile we had come down, and there was no way either of us were going to be ok doing that, so on we went.
We blasted the ascent coming up Unicoi, both of us were feeling really strong. We only paused to talk to this guy about the trail. He asked, 'Where does this thing end?' We kinda laughed and said: Maine. He meant for the night, and so we told him what we knew of what was coming up. There were a few grandkids with him, and he wanted to take them out for a night or two.
A bit longer, and we made it to 'Cheese Factory'. Apparently this guy in the mid 1800's built a Cheese Factory in the middle of nowhere on the bet that a lot of the mountainous terrain around would soon be turned into farm land, and he could begin producing Cheese. All the farmers came, looked at the mountains, and left. So he folded after a few years, but apparently 'produced a superior cheese' for the time he was open. There isn't anything there now but a nice open area, a great water source, and some rocks that may have once been part of a wall. But they look like small rocks now. There were a few people already there, so Caleb and I set up, scope out the water (wonderful source - straight out of a rock), and made dinner. The group continued to grow, but they were all cool, so that was nice. One of them, the unofficial leader of the trip, had Thru-Hiked in 05, so we talked with her for a while. Then we scored some serious trail magic.
'Hey, we've got some extra food, would you guys like any?' That question doesn't need to be asked, really. Of course we would. They had brought some tasty muffellata sandwiches on impressive bread, some hummus mix, and some carrots. It had been a while since I'd seen a carrot in its unadulterated state...so we gorged. It was great. They gave us the bag, and it was a wonderful thing.
Us, pre-C losing his bandana.













After the Unicoi Climb. Note the knee brace: still creaky, but getting much better.












Caleb, after the Unicoi Climb. Note the missing bandana. Sad times. He's no longer a frood fellow, he doesn't know where his towel is. (points if you get that reference)
















The Trek Poles of Joy and Knee-Saving Happiness.


















This was a cool tree that we had to take a picture. It was mostly decayed and falling apart, but still clinging tenaciously to the side of the trail.
















This is Caleb. He's lost his bandana. So sad.


















This is us, resting before finishing up the day. I like this shot a lot.












That's Albert Mountain in the distance, I think. Its a heinous climb. If it's what I'm thinking it is. But it may not be...

Day 5, 6-19

This was a hugely important day for Caleb and I, for several reasons. You see us in the first picture on top of Blood Mountain. There's a really awesome stone shelter there, I'm not sure how old it is, but thats alright. It was awesome.
The huge event of the day was Neel's Gap! We made it to this point in the early afternoon, met Gretchen and Mark there, as well as Old and Fat (an old and fat guy section hiking), and ‘the old guys’, as C and I were calling them at this point (4 guys that were also section hiking, and were older than us). We had a moment when we realized that D and J would have taken off at this point. We wandered through the store, and couldn’t find a water filter. Ours had broken earlier, and we were worried about water, because water is important. We asked the guy about it, and he told us: ‘well, I would recommend the Aquamira, but don’t waste it’. We looked confused, so he explained: Protected Streams (ones that humans can get to above you, and that remain in National Wilderness Areas) and Springs (coming out of a rock, filtered by the mountain) are safe to drink out of straight, without filtering or treating the water. Caleb and I were nervous, but Rock Dancer had told us the exact same thing, and so we figured we’d try it. We bought the drops, just in case we came across something that didn’t look good, and mailed some stuff back home. The now-broken filter, extra clothes, and some other stuff we wouldn’t need. All told, 4 lbs. We were hoping to lose more weight, but no such luck. Then we set out, with the goal of maybe going a mile or three, and then camping for the night. I was feeling great, and Caleb and I were going at a good clip. We may not have broken 3 mph, but I think we were at least doing 2.5, which is pretty good out there. It starts to rumble, so we put on rain stuff and kept on, looking for a place to sleep. But nothing was presenting itself, so we kept walking and kept looking. Then it started pouring. After a while, we just decide to head to a shelter farther up the trail. We still had several miles to go at that point, so we haul. And its wet. Pouring rain. I love rain, when I can stay out of it and not get soaked. This was rain with a vengeance, rain that was looking at us as affronts to the wilderness, and wished to wash us away. The trail, because its been worn down by many many feet passing over it, is lower than the area. So any sort of incline, and the trail turns into a muddy stream. For a while, I tried to keep my shoes out of it. Then I gave up. There was no way. Water was running down my legs, right into my shoes, and getting me wet. Nothing to do about that. So we're slogging along, soaked, and I start looking for a blaze. You always do, its instinctive after a while, you look for a blaze, see it, accept the affirmation it gives you, and keep rolling. 15 minutes go by, and there's no blaze. I ask Caleb, who is leading at this point: 'have you seen a blaze in a while?' He hasn't. There aren't any other trails to turn off onto, so we knew that we hadn't gotten lost. But we weren't sure where we were going. This was not comfortable. 15 minutes after that, we sight a blaze and continue on our trek. We get to the sign for the shelter, and we’re pretty wet at this pint. We say to each other: I don’t care how uncomfy it is, I just want to get to the shelter, eat dinner, and sleep. In the shelter. Our hammocks are a million times more comfy, but I just wanted to crawl into my sleeping bag and sleep. We roll up onto the shelter trail, and spot a tent, with girls coming out of it and heading towards the shelter. Oh well. Two people, they'll have one end, us the other, cool. Then we see the area around the shelter. Someone's strung up clotheslines all over and hung lots of stuff on them. We reach the shelter: full. Packed. Overflowing. An uncle and nephew, 4 girls, and a weird couple. Caleb and I ended up setting up our hammocks near the shelter, ate dinner standing in front of the shelter under the awning, and then slipped off to bed. Sleep turned out to be a little hard to come by that night...oof. More on the weird couple later.

This is C and I on Blood Mountain. The rock we're sitting on took this picture. I thought it was very thoughtful of it.











Caleb. And the dark spot to his right, our left? The trail. I had to enlighten him about text-based games. 'Into the foliage!'











A side shot that I really like of us. Just sitting on a log, taking a break.












This big rock was held up by two little nubs of rock. We had to get a picture. It looked like you could push it off or something.











Us, windy and a little smelly. Fun times.

Day 4, 6-18

We made it 12 miles this day and considered it really good, which is ironic later, but for now, 12 starting out is very good. I had the first of a few days of knee scare of my own. I had tweaked my left knee fairly badly in a half marathon last December, and it had started to act up a wee bit on general principle. I strapped on the knee brace and kept favoring it. It improved a lot after a few days of the knee brace, but for a while Caleb and I were worried that we were going to have to leave the trail. The plan at that point was to hitchhike home rather than call anyone, to continue an adventure although it would have been a different sort of adventure from what we had set out to do. It was a day filled with cathedral-esque trees.

Caleb and I ran into this great guy, whose trail name was Rock Dancer, during the latter half of this day. We stopped and talked with him for about a half hour or so. Earlier that day we had passed Mark and Gretchen, then passed these two college guys, but they all passed us as we talked with this guy. He gave us a lot of really good advice on hitchhiking, water, and other general trail stuff. We figured that it was ok to trust his word, since he was wrapping up his second thru-hike in a few days. We were pretty impressed. His legs looked huge, like he could walk through a brick wall and not notice.

That's Caleb in the picture there. You can see the crocs. I thought this was a really awesome picture. That's what the trail looked like some of the time. Others, it was really overgrown, but never impossible to find.









It was like this, for the trees, for this entire day. Pretty awe-inspiring. I loved it.





























Some mountains in GA that wouldn't fit in one picture. I'll have a lot of these when I get to the Smokies...gorgeous area, that.



C and I. I don't know where we are, or why we're happy, but we are. And it's great.












I'm tired. And this Tree is growing out of a rock. Both pretty neat.












C and I as Babushkas. We were at a shelter way far off the trail, and so it was pretty rarely frequented. It was really windy though, and it started to get a little chilly.



Dinner...some sort of quick pasta with pre-flavoring. Yum. But it isn't bad, and on the trail, you eat anything and everything.