I didn’t sleep well last night since it was hot, I was hungry, and we were fighting. Bunny got up before me—a somewhat rare event, but not unheard of. She packed her stuff up and decided to help out by retrieving the bear bags. I’m not saying she did anything wrong, but by the time I got involved, there were sticks intertwined with the carabiner and bags that, I’m pretty sure, hadn’t been there when I hung them last night. The bags were stuck hanging about 10 feet in the air. If home is where you hang your food bags, then we have a new permanent address.
After everyone else left, I suggested we move the picnic table off of the covered deck so I could climb up and retrieve the bags. I’ve been told I create some problems for myself by not keeping my mouth closed, and this could have been one of those times, but after the third “can’t” out of her mouth, I referred back to my MexiCAN joke which was the original start of round 1. Once the bags were down, she took off down the trail while I was still packing my stuff up and eating, true dat.
Except for the half mile back up to the trail from the shelter, today was an easy ridge walk. We did cross the eastern continental divide where the water sheds split between the Mississippi River (ultimately the Gulf of Mexico) and the Atlantic Ocean. I was taking my time because I was not feeling well, it was hot, and I was pissed at Bunny for leaving me. I caught up with her at Niday Shelter. Unfortunately, so did everybody else on the trail. This was the most crowded I have seen a shelter yet. There were almost 30 people there trying to get out of the heat. So much for a quiet nap in the shelter (which I desperately needed).
Forty minutes later after trying to sleep on the ground and stretch on the picnic table, I gave up all hopes of rest and recovery. It was another hot day. Even last night when Super Dave dropped us off at 5:30, it was still 85 out. Sweat was pouring out of us. We had already drank several liters of water and neither one of us had peed yet. Not only the old folk were complaining about the weather, but the young whipper snappers were whining as well. That’s the only thing that kept us going, knowing that it wasn’t just us. We were so ticked off that we hadn’t had a spring that we both said we wanted to quit hiking.
Even if we did want to quit, we still had to walk out of the middle of the woods where we currently were. We had one bright spot still in front of us—the Eddie Murphy Monument. Imagine our disappointment when we climbed to the top of the next mountain to find out that is was the Audie Murphy Monument. Audie was the most decorated American soldier of WW II that died in the 70’s. Eddie is the beloved comedian who started out on SNL in the 70’s. We were expecting a holographic Eddie Murphy with his Beverly Hill’s laugh but got a monument detailing Audie’s amazing exploits of saving lives of fellow soldiers and being injured multiple times. The letdown only added to our sour moods. (For those reading this and believing the presentation as factual, please remember our new indicator of “true dat” not being present after the description—I am, by no means, trying to downplay one of the greatest American War heroes of all time—true dat).
The heat, the arguing, the lack of water, the wanting to quit, the uncertainty of what was happening to Sam, and the disappointment of not seeing an Eddie Murphy monument, all led to us calling for a shuttle to come pick us up at the next road crossing. The trail adventure was coming to a premature end, and, quite possibly, so was our marriage. We still had an hour’s walk ahead of us to get to the road.
We got to the road and all of the people that had been at the shelter at lunch were camped out there. They had decided to not push on to the next shelter since the water was difficult to get to there while we were right next to a nice creek here. They invited us to join them, but we declined because we had a shuttle on the way. We waited for almost 2 hours for the shuttle to show before we gave up. We were down in a valley without cell signal and had no choice but set up camp next to everyone else. They were all in bed by the time we set up our tent at the late hour of 9:30. That damn shuttle not showing up may have just saved our marriage, but by god, I was not hanging a bear bag tonight to completely test fate. We slept with the food in our tent and under our heads—this may be our last chance to see a bear.
EFG