Before we went to bed, St Nick warned us that he snored and has even been known to “ventriloquist” snore. When Bunny woke me up snoring, I almost woke her up but decided to throw one of my boots at St Nick—it worked. A little bit later, he was so convincing that I thought I woke myself up snoring so I threw my second boot. When I got up in the morning, both of my boots were still by my bed, but Lotus’ boots were missing; we both have Merrell Moabs.
When we made our breakfast, we got a surprise 9th tortilla in our package of 8–a great hiking omen! The biggest surprise of all, though, was that Bunny and I were not the last ones to leave the shelter and we were on the trail at a very impressive 8:45. That’s 8:45 in the morning! Until now, Bunny didn’t realize they had such early times in the Eastern time zone.
Hiking was smooth and easy for us. It looked cloudy, but it was warm and we had heard the outlook for the day was no rain. Living large in Georgia. We knocked out the first mile and a half in about 45 minutes. That’s where we ran into our first “Trail Ambassador” from the Georgia Appalachian Trail Club. He told us this is the first day they are on duty. We stopped and talked with Jeff for about 15 minutes. He told us 15% of thru-hikers quit by Neel Gap and another 10% quit before getting out of Georgia. He also told us to expect trail magic ahead.
Beer last night, an extra tortilla this morning, no rain today, and even more trail magic ahead. In about 5 minutes we caught up with Patches, Bullfrog, and Lotus chowing down on grilled cheese sandwiches provided by Fresh Grounds and his “Leap Frog Cafe.” Fresh Grounds told everyone they would have to wait for their next sandwich until the new comers got some. His goal is that all hikers eat as much as they can handle. The only limit is you’ve got to stop once you throw up so others have a chance. Patches ate 3 grilled cheeses, I had two with Doritos and a Coke to wash it all down. Bunny T only had one sandwich, chips, and a Coke. While we were there, the sun came out!
Once we got going again, the temperature had gotten all the way up to 65. The extra food forced Bunny to brown blaze today (think about it—we follow white blazes all day). While we were stopped, we had a wardrobe malfunction. Nothing exiting—no appendages or accoutrements popped off, or out, of Bunny. We were just overheating and decided to shed some thicker layers. I switched to my short sleeve shirt, but Bunny switched to her size 6 shorts (fortunately very stretchy size 6, but 6 they are).
While we were putting our packs back on, a guy with two dogs came up. That reminded me that today is Ilana’s 12th birthday. I know she is happy staying at grandma’s house since grandma never lets her miss a meal. If Iliana can’t have the same food they do, she’ll scramble her some eggs. She’s in heaven at grandma’s.
We caught up with Patches and walked with her for a while, but she got ahead of us at Woody Gap. We were wondering around in a daze admiring the trash cans and luxury outhouse when a woman came up to us and asked if we were thru hikers. Cecilia had just done a 12 mile trail run and had a few extra protein bars and offered them to us. This not bathing thing has its perks.
We soon caught back up with Patches and walked with her the rest of the afternoon. We decided to just camp for the night and do a respectable 8 miles. Patches was going to hike on, but changed her mind and joined us. We had a “quasi” campfire after we set up camp, filtered water, and had dinner. A spectacular day filled with generosity and fun.
EFG
Looks like you are having a great ymtime and wonderful luck. Nice people out there with you. Thanks for the updates
The people have been, and continue to be very generous