The girls next door started talking loudly about 6a. I almost got up to say something but Patches pointed out that maybe they didn’t want to stay up as late as we did last night. 9p is the equivalent of 2a for normal people. It did help get us rolling. We managed to hit the trail by 8:30.
In reality, we only had one meal yesterday, but we still managed to consume a large amount of calories. Hikers believe that calories are all that matter, but not all calories are equal. Beer might have calories to fuel your body, but it is not a zero emission fuel.
The first shelter was 7 miles away and 3,000’ up. 3,000’ on the AT is not the same as 3,000’ on the GR10. Through the power of switchbacks, the trail flew by. We made it up to the shelter in time for lunch. We checked the shelter log and saw that Lucky 59 and Pepper Pot was there two days ago and Hot Sauce was there the day before that (and left some artwork on the wall).
Ideally, we wanted to make it 16 miles to Brown Fork Gap Shelter which would leave us just 13.6 miles to make Fontana Dam tomorrow. By 3, we were certain that Fontana Dam is out of the question for tomorrow. With the additional climbing in the afternoon, we were just plain beat before we made it up Cheoah Bald. We met a young solo hiker, Powerhouse, at the summit that told us about a camping spot in just a couple more miles.
By the time we caught up with her at Locust Cove Gap, she already had her tent set up. We tried to call ahead to see if we could stay at a hostel in a couple more miles, but couldn’t get an answer. In the end, we decided to camp. I set up the tent, threw up a bear bag rope, and went to fetch water. What did Bunny do? Good question. She made the bed and pre-warmed it.
When I got back up from getting water, two more guys had shown up: Ringo and Reboot. It was getting cold. There is an inverse mathematical relationship with Bunny and temperature. As the temperature drops, complaints go up. But now that I’m thinking about it, as the temperature increases, complaints increase. I guess there’s just a sweet spot at 62.3 deg F where complaints drop (excluding rain—that’s the complaint wild card).
As the sun started setting, the temperature started dropping, the complaints started increasing. I hung up the bear bag and boiled a quart of water to make me a hot water bottle. Rumor has it that we are going to get down into the teens tonight. I made sure Bunny was in bed and under cover before the sun went down.
EFG
I remember camping at Locust Cove Gap with a slew of other hikers in ’81.
I don’t think I’d like hiking with the bubble