I survived
even with a cold, not enough Sudafed in the world… and cramps.
jeebus.
more later.
Flame Azaleas
Crossing Whitetop Mountain Road
Fern on the AT
AT:THU
6/14
Woke to less rain this morning.
No discernible breakfast, not even tea. Hadn’t even had a jones for coffee at this point. I packed up the tent and re-loaded my pack as fast as I could and set off with Almanac and a few others to go help filter water at Thomas Knob shelter as well as use the privy (Bears do it in the woods. Fredlet is not a bear.)
Otter was in the shelter with his wonderful dog Mac, who thumped his tail at us a couple of times to say “Hi! Hi! Hi! I need to stay here by my sick human.” I’m surprised mom showed serious restraint not going over to commune with the puppy since I know she was having puppy withdrawal (as I was have the same without a cat to play with). Anyway, Otter wasn’t feeling well, so we tried to be quiet, but you know after a while that 12 chicas are going to be noisy while filtering water. Ah well, we got out of there fairly quickly.
Tooter’s camelbak had failed (remember, that is a generic term, I don’t know what brand she had) so we gave her two teeny little bottles washed out after containing food things. Mom would have given her the 3L we had, but there was a chance that I had a sip from it and neither she nor we wanted to chance the cootie transfer.
Typically if someone is cranky or out of sorts, it is because they are somewhat dehydrated. “Bite and suck!” lets them know to drink. The thing is Tooter is one who drinks something on the order of 5-6L of water a day and this tiny amount was really affecting her. We just kept an eye on her and things worked out ok.
It was somewhat level for the first hour or so, but then we got into some serious climbing. It wasn’t shaping up to be as long as the day before, but the grubby factor was starting to wear on me a bit.
Tricky was sweep today, so I chatted on and off with her (on when the climb was uphill and off when mom kept her standard pace on the level or the downhill and I channeled Speed Racer.)
I felt a tiny hunger twitch about mid-morning, but it was curious rather than insistent and went away before lunch. Frankly, when I did eat it made me kinda queasy and lethargic, so I wasn’t terribly upset.
Deep Gap and Elk garden passed in a blur. I do have pictures, but not nearly as many as I normally take owing to the fact that I was desperately trying to reinforce that Tricky and Almanac’s decision to let me stay with the group wasn’t a mistake or resent the bejeezus out of me for slowing them down.
In fact, I did end up hiking pretty clippily on the level/moderate rolling hills/downhill sections. I was even alone for about an hour at one point.
Occasionally, I would catch a glimpse of the Wanderer/Flame/Hollywood bunching only to lose sight of them around a curve.
It was QUIET.
I really liked it, though often I would steadily grow paranoid about channeling Chicken John and losing the trail. For the most part, the trail is easily discernible, clear and obvious, but I did lose the trail once with Almanac (going across rocks on Wilburn Ridge where a tree obscured the blaze from me and Almanac was behind me and caught it.)
I did manage to keep to the trail on my hour or two solo jaunts. My paranoia meter spiking then resetting to zero after seeing the next blaze in the distance. I think I’d be ok on my own, but I’d probably need someone to talk to once in a while.
Mom said the same thing about her solo forays when she would walk ahead, stop for a break, then resume when she could hear me and Almanac coming up from behind on the trail.
The weather was still very good; cool and low humidity. I drank an entire 2L camelbak a day and sweat it all out as well. It made for cold rest stops when I took off my pack (my back would get really cold with the quick dry shirts I had on and if I put on my jacket I would just get all over soggy.) So I tended to put my bandanna (both still pee free*) over my back or sit (or even stand) with my pack still on.
I think I was more irritated and tired if I took my pack off rather than when I did like everyone who flopped down on the ground sans pack. Really, breaks were kind of unnecessary for me on the longer scale that everyone else wanted. I liked taking a short breather after a hill or a set of steps (the things that really kicked my ass were when I had big steps up) then continuing. Lunch was in irritant (none of that pesky food for me, thanks ever so…). Taking off shoes made my feet hurt and anything longer than 5 minutes made me antsy and stiff. I as a study in contrariness-but nothing unusual there. I never have liked what works for other people.
As we made it to Elk Garden we ended up at the top of a hill surveying the wild animals (OK…cows) and a road.
Roads close to the trail kinda freaked me out. You’d be walking along in that lovely little silent and insulated trail (with very little sound-even the birds and other forest-y type animals were quiet) and the roar of a V6 comes to you as a car drives past that you can’t see. Tres disconcerting.
About halfway through lunch, a troop of boy scouts (well, we assumed they were boy scouts) were deathmarched through our picnic area at the top of the hill.
When their pack leader said hi to Tricky, she asked about their trip and it turned out they were planning to stay on Whitetop Mountain tonight (just like us)… actually, just in the clearing just below Whitetop Mountain (just like us).
“Race ya!” I think Hollywood said.
Tricky looked startled, but didn’t really say much else. After lunch though she switched to lead position from sweep so that if we needed to find an alternate site, she could use her knowledge of the trail to pick out a good spot.
Hollywood’s boots had given up the ghost at this point and during lunch (while Touque made freakin’ phone calls on her Canadian cell phone – while the American ones had NO SIGNAL. We suck!) we wrapped Hollywood’s feet in bags the strapped her Tevas on to keep her socks dry since it looked like it was going to rain. I loaned her my Mistral gaiters and the looked like spats on her feet. I have called them ‘spats’ ever since.
We finished up lunch and walked down the hill, crossed the road, (past the boys-yeah, we could totally take ’em.) and back into the deep forest.
The boy scouts passed Almanac and myself about halfway up the climb to camp in the afternoon portion and we looked at each other with a bit of trepidation since we didn’t know if they were going to take our camping spot.
Funnily enough, they kept the same pace all the way uphill and didn’t look the worse for wear. But mom told me later that while she was in one of her solo jaunts she rounded a bend and came up on them during a rest break. When they saw her, they sat up from their previous hang-dog slumped over posture to sitting upright looking like they just were casually resting from a stroll int he woods.
They did end up making camp just a little farther north of their original location…and looked a little bit squished in that spot.
It was very nice of them to do so.
Last chance at a trash can for a while – and this one curiously looked like a teeny tiny hatch from “Lost” that we unceremoniously dumped our ziplocs o’ refuse, then started the uphill climb to Whitetop Mountain.
So much for keeping up with the group. The first part of the day was nice; I was generally *right there* with the group but back to peanut-ing nontheless.
Almanac, despite the sneakiness on my part for adding my GPS to my load, would ask (when I would ask to gain perspective on our ETA) what the GPS said. It was very useful. I did tell Almanac that with me, realistic estimates was better. If you tell me its just a little bit more and you keep saying that for 2 hours, I will be cranky. If you tell me it is difficult and will take more than an hour, I set my expectations and just deal. Happily, she kept to that.
I was actually surprised at how quickly we got to the camping spot despite the fact that the altitude or whatever seemed to really be affecting me. Still no whining on my part though. I kept my sense of humor (no sarcasm-which can descend pretty quickly into a rant) and was still enjoying myself. Obviously, not having a cold would have been better, but I still loved being out on the trail.
Campsite off of Whitetop Mountain
It did rain on us while we put up our tents this evening. I was already sweaty/wet from the solid uphill we had all afternoon, so by the time I got my shell on after pulling the tent out and putting my pack under it for a measure of dryness, was cold and clammy. Mom and I put up the tent and did camp things til they were done, then we both decided to get inside the tent and got inside our bags to warm up. It took a little while for me to get warm. I changed into warmer things in stages as they dried (or more realistically, when I was ready to move.)
I ended up in my rain pants, long undies (hooray for SmartWool!) a drier shirt, two pairs of socks, the hood up on my Marmot jacket and my hat with the little ear flaps pulled down for warmth. I may have even put on my gloves.
I felt a little better at least.
Everyone was crowded under a tarp we put up to cover the cooking area, so I sat around the edges against a tree while it poured down rain. I did get a bit wet, but I had an idea. I went and got my pack cover and put it over my shoulders and then sat on the bottom part then hooked the strap around my waist…an Osprey Turtle. For sitting on the wet ground and leaning against a tree. Kept me dry at least and held in place reasonably well.
We ate – or rather, everyone else ate and I drank a cup of soup and had 7 M&M’s (I counted).
I was feeling especially craptacular and the really cold weather didn’t help much. I didn’t want anything in particular except a shower. I was probably rancid at this, however, happily *I* couldn’t smell me.
Everyone else was dreaming of cheeseburgers or Starbucks, but I still wasn’t hungry. Hot water and a scrub brush, thankyouverymuch.
We had pitched the tent on a downhill slope… it was the best we could do for the site… but it was a noticeable one and it kept us skootching back up onto our sleeping pad all night.
I tend to wake up to roll over or re-position (some nights I just woke up due to the screaming of my muscles) but this night was the worst night for sleeping of the whole week. It was cold, it rained incessantly (though we did stay dry) and I kept having to haul my ass back up to the top of the tent. I thought it might be helpful for draining the sinuses a bit, but it did nothing and made sleep impossible.
A few people moved their tents to the meadow up the hill, and while I thought that sounded like a good idea in theory, I don’t know that you could have prised me from my sleeping bag for anything. Mom said “screw that” as well and we stayed put. The rain didn’t bother us too much (or the drippings from the trees) but the flat of the meadow might have been nice.
Skootch.
Skootch.
Skootch.
AT:WED
6/13
I woke to more rain.
“Sounds like rain.” said mom.
“You think?” I said in a sleepy voice and went back to sleep for a bit, because, really, what was the point of getting up.
Of note was the fact that it wasn’t thundering or lightning.
When we finally did get up and get packed, the guides, mom and I huddled briefly.
“Well? What’s the verdict?” I asked.
“You did great yesterday. Do you feel any better today? Not really? OK, well, let’s get to Massie Gap and see how that goes.” said Tricky.
“Works for me.” I said and off we went for the day.
I was pleased and nervous at the same time. Apparently, I had been ok yesterday and it seemed that they really did want me to continue (phew). We had a big day ahead of us (well, in the grand scheme of thru-hikers, we were doing absolutely minimal mileage).5.2 miles from Wise shelter to Thomas Knob shelter (a meadow just to the north of it.) Most of it was hard climb including Wilburn Ridge. But it was also shaping up to be the neatest day on the trail (IMO) with Rhododendron Gap, the wild ponies and really nice views.
We packed off and I basked in the fact that the first bit of the day was rolling hills rather than uphill.
I had been looking around me, but I was focusing on keeping moving. The woods nice to be in, some sunlight dappling through. Toward midday, the clouds started to cover the sky, but that was when we hit the open area at Massie Gap and moved on to the ridge.
These are the famous wild ponies of Wilburn Ridge (although they are amenable to being approached carefully…) and they aren’t as skittish as I expected. Mom was in heaven.
[And as a side note, in the August 2007 edition of Backpacker magazine p. 31 (no useful links, just to their base site) there is an article about Mike Magnuson doing this part of the AT south to north and taking pictures of the ponies that we saw this day.]
Actually, we messed with Almanac while we were hiking up to the ridge. When we had out pack shakedown, Almanac had talked mom out of bringing apples for snacks and really talked her out of wanting to give some apple to any ponies she saw on the trail (Leave No Trace philosophy and protecting the ponies’ ability to keep foraging on their own for food.). So while we marched along, mom in front, then me, then Almanac as sweep we were talking about the ponies.
Almanac:”So, we’ll be seeing ponies soon!”
Mom (Rocky):”Hey, kid, got the carrots?”
Me:”Right here!” (no, I didn’t…but I am a good straight man.)
Almanac:”WHAT??!?”
Me:”Just kidding!”
Hee…
Mom did get to commune with the ponies after all.
Just over the hill from that set of ponies was a mother and baby wandering around in a clearing by the trail.
We had lunch just past a series of rock steps (and this is how mom got her trail name… “Rocks are HARD.” (said with a straight face…hence she is Rocky.) ) which would make a believer out of anyone in the absolute wonderfulness of trekking poles. I had left off my knee brace this day (on the left knee Monday, the right knee on Tuesday and without even a twinge either day, I decided that wearing neoprene sounded supremely icky and so I left it off but put it in an outside pocket if things got bad.) and even through the brutality of those damn rock “stairs” (some of which were a bigger step up than my leg… I did a bit of crawling up with my pack and all… grace, you know.)
and with lunch (and my arrival 10 minutes behind the rest of the crowd) the question of me not being able to keep up was suddenly moot. Never really was mentioned again, I still felt like death warmed over and I was balancing the sudafed doses, because having your heart race uncontrollably is uncomfortable. Add that sensation to hard physical exertion and its truly awful.
The thing is, I was having a great time.
I am a masochist, aren’t I?
The weather was good and I was noticing the great scenery. The first few days, I was more concerned with me being sick as a dog and being upset over my lack of speed (and other things) but the weather was actually really nice out. The parts of the trail under tree cover was nice and cool (the elevation didn’t hurt) and it really only rained a few choice times conveniently when tents were assembled or when we had a tarp to run under like little chicks under their chicken mama. The only time we caught it on the last ten minutes of the day’s hike (this day as a matter of fact) but really everything was just peachy.
We were almost to the ridge that was the dangerous part (it wasn’t a ledge or anything, but it was a clearing on the top of a mountain-this set of pictures gives a good perspective of the ridge area almost two years exactly before we were there) and the clouds were starting to move in earnest toward us.
So we moved along at a pretty good clip and as fast as I could on the other part of the saddle while the clouds kept moving.
We made it with no problems, no thunder or lightning, it didn’t rain, but it was overcast. And we also started seeing the rhododendrons off the trail. Rhododendron Gap was just ahead through a tunnel called Fat Man’s Squeeze. I thought it was really cool, but I hear a bit of grumbling from other folks who seemed to be slightly unnerved by it. You had to rest your hand on one side of the cave while you held your trekking poles in the other, but it wasn’t bad walking through at all. Here’s Flame and Wanderer working through the cave.
Just beyond that, the rhododendrons started to bloom in earnest. You could hear bees buzzing all over and see those big, fat clumsy black bees lilting around the blooms.
I saw Hollywood, Flame and Wanderer just before they disappeared into the rhododendrons at the sign and then I entered in myself. It wasn’t like what I built up in my head, but as nothing ever is, I still enjoyed the view.
A few more climbs and then we moved on to a flat part on the trail…where it started raining. I had put my pack cover on that morning (fit nicely over the thermarest Z-lite I had strapped to the top (and help keep me from scraping my sleeping pad up as I tended to do with it up there.) and stayed put with the help of an elastic band that snapped under my shoulder and back padding of the pack. Mom, Almanac and I stood under a tree to get out of the rain, but it kept getting harder, so I took off my pack and put my rain jacket on.
I really didn’t want to, I was sweaty and a bit too warm, but I figured I’d be wet one way or another and staying warm was better than freezing my arse off in the cold rain.
I didn’t realize we were right on top of camp. Five minutes later, I see everyone under a tarp (still in the process of being put up) and Tricky telling everyone to put warm things on so no one would get hypothermic.
I almost regretted stopping for 3 minutes to put my raingear on as I would have been able to get into camp at the same time everyone else did… priorities, you see.
It slacked off raining after about 15 minutes and we put up our tents attempting to chase the sunshine to dry them off a bit.
A bunch of folks went to tackle the Mt. Roger’s trail to the summit and some of us stayed in camp with promises to put all the stuff left out to dry in the remaining sun in case it started raining again.
Mom tried to start a fire again, but was having a hard time of it as everything was so soggy. 
She sent me off foraging for tinder and wood to very little luck. Eventually, mom snagged some of the firestarter from Tricky and managed a fairly smoky fire.
We had a raven near us the previous night near Wise shelter, and someone said it was bad luck to have a shapeshifter so near… however, ravens are part of my personal totem crowd and I was thinking that it was a lucky break. The raven was back tonight and yelled and squawked at us all during dinner.
Speaking of dinner, I actually wanted it this evening.
I wasn’t hungry, per se, but the thought of spaghetti noodles was really interesting to me.
I ate as much as I could then the rain started again lightly while we cleaned up and put our bear bag up and packs under the tarp for the evening.
I suppose that having a stuffed up nose on a weeklong backpacking adventure might not be considered to be the optimal thing, but frankly, it meant that I couldn’t smell others (or myself) as we ripened during the week.
Mom and I did break out the baby wipes after the storm started really going. There was thunder and lightning and everything (some rather close by… less than 1 Mississippi); we wiped of 3 days of sweat, and in my case a great deal of the trail all over my legs (how do I get that grubby? goodness.) helped to make us feel somewhat less grubby and then got into our sleeping bags and listened to the rain.
Good day.
Better night’s sleep.
AT:TUE
6/12
The morning dawned somewhat dewily on the tents.
I got up and got mom some coffee back in the tent and organized our stuff out of the bear bag (actually more accurately named “the mouse bag” as it was to keep the rodentia out.) and moved the rainfly off to a sunny patch to let it dry.
I tried to eat a Larabar (normally my favorite thing) and had to quit halfway through it since swallowing brought tears to my eyes. I put it away for later.
The lead guide came over to talk to me this morning about me being sick.
She was concerned that on the day we crossed Wilburn Ridge that my being seriously slow could be a problem if weather got bad. Exposure out on the ridge if there was lightning was a seriously dangerous prospect. People have died… and neither she nor I wanted that.
I understood her point of view. The danger was real, my cold was potentially going to get worse and she needed to know if she needed to get me out.
I told her that I would go and go and go. I wouldn’t stop, I wouldn’t be as fast as everyone, and realistically I couldn’t promise any speed increases, but I wouldn’t ever stop or give up or whine about it. I also told her that despite all that, if she thought I might put someone in danger that she should tell me. I wasn’t about to ask anyone to get hurt on my account.
We decided that we’d see how I did that day (it was a shorter day) and that there were still places for me to hike out that weren’t exposed in front of us if worse came to worse.
Needless to say I felt even more horrible after this talk.
What if I were ruining everyone’s trip-especially mom’s? I know how much she looked forward to this (I had, too.)? What if I became that problem child that no one ever wants to deal with? The guilt of yesterday hit harder, my cold wasn’t better, I felt worse everyday, and now, I was a problem.
Glorious.
I also knew that my mom was concerned. She blames everything on me being overweight (middle east strife, global warming, etc.) but I’ve always been awful on uphill stuff even when I was in somewhat reasonable shape, so while me losing weight wouldn’t be a bad thing, it most likely wouldn’t make me any faster slogging up a hill.
The good news was, Tricky, the lead guide wanted me to continue (as did I) and was pretty positive about me doing it. I didn’t think she’d lost faith in me yet. (and there was no way I would be the one who said quit. They really would have to kick me out bodily. I’m stubborn as hell, yo.)
We packed up after gathering in a circle to do stretches all around and moved off to the area near Wise Shelter.
Tricky and Almanac switched duty each day for lead/sweep. So today, I had custody of Tricky. It was kind of nice to be able to have the guide all to myself (even if I wasn’t able to hold up my side of the conversation as well due to breathing.)
While I was making the climb of the first hill, she gave me some pointers about tackling hills and general trekking pole usage (I was getting the hang of them, but I was still learning, so pointers were much appreciated).
Basically, I needed to slow down and conserve my puny resources. So I started to retrain myself on my pace.
Mr. Potato Head is pretty ingrained and muscle memory is not an easy thing to redo, so I spent the day working up new walking song… or rather, a walking uphill song.
I ended up with a mishmash of imagery.
The accompanying sound is a combo of a drastically slowed down baby elephant song that sounds like a foghorn.
PEAAAAAAA-Nut.
Repeat ad nauseum.
But, by the next hill, I only stopped once to drink, because regardless of whether I can still breathe while going uphill, I’m still a klutz and will fall down if I try to drink from my camelbak tube, use trekking poles and walk at the same time.
Let’s be realistic here. Some things you can’t solve with PEANUT.
At times, I was even in front of mom. (To be fair, she was stopping every 5 seconds to Hoover up the wild strawberries along the trail. I’d give her even odds with a hungry black bear duking it out for the strawberries. I can’t win here.)
It became even more clear to me that breaks were irritating. I’d show up at the group break about 5 minutes after they flopped down (drastic improvement here, folks-still with the snot and the cold and the cramps, that was persistent) and not want to stop.
Still not hungry, though. I’d watch them eat and I’d drink some water and take pictures then we’d go.
Granted, this was an absolutely easy day on rolling trail, but I kept up, I didn’t stop and I made it to camp right about the time everyone else did.
We set up camp just north of Wise Shelter (oh yeah, did I mention we were hiking North to South? No? Oh, well now you know.). The meadow was surrounded by rhododendrons, there was a river running just north of us (that we crossed over on a very cool bridge on the way there), took advantage of the privy and mom and I sat down in the tent for a bit.
Well, she sat for a bit. I passed out and woke up about 2 hours later when I got cold.
I had a fever at that point, even I could feel it, so I took out the sleeping pads and bags and went back to sleep.
I have two pictures of this part of the day… one of the alien from inside the tent and the other one of the roof of the tent. There is evidence of me walking around, but I was generally as elusive as Sasquatch.
I could hear all the fun going on all around me, and I sort of enjoyed the half day vicariously listening to everyone talk about the snake they saw at the river, mom coercing Sassy into finding firewood for a fire, Almanac starting dinner and the following gem of a conversation.
(Rustle, rustle, rustle)
Miscellaneous people: What’s that rustling? Is that a bear?!
Almanac (in mom voice): Who’s there!
Sassy: Its just me, Angela. (she was in the bushes looking for firewood)
Teabag: Oh, all bears say that!
And forever more, all bears are named Angela.
Then, additionally, Sassy flushed a couple of robin babies.
One looked sort of like a 20 year old boy refusing to leave home (effectively ready to go, but not yet kicked out) and the other one had the crazy baby robin feathers and not quite ready for prime time.
Mom:Its a fledgling.
[I couldn’t ID the voice]: looks like a baby.
Mom: its a fledgling.
[I couldn’t ID the voice]: a what?
Mom:A FLEDGLING.
(I could hear the “whatever” in the silence.)
I emerged briefly for dinner, and while it tasted fine, it was black beans and rice, and my throat was seriously trying to kill me for eating this. I barely managed to swallow the little I had and keep it down. That was an unpleasant meal. I wanted more of the chicken soup.
I took more drugs and went back into the tent.
After they started a fire (I could hear mom grousing about being talked out of packing marshmallows – “But they are light!” she grumped.) and a game with the group of “2 truths and a lie” I went to sleep.
There had been a brief discussion about my continuing the next day and we decided to to let the weather decide. I had reiterated that I wasn’t quitting, and that short of a thunderstorm, I would go until they told me I couldn’t. There was one last place I could hike out at Massie Gap and we’d see how that went.
Jeebus what a horrible night.
I dreamed that they kicked me out, I dreamed that they magically found a horse trail that I was able to skirt the ridge, I was half mourning Rhododendron Gap that I had built up in my head as a magical fairy place (must have been all the drugs, I’m not usually sentimental over bushes.)…
I’m sure that this was brought on by the sudafed/tylenol cocktail that I had been pushing trying to make myself somewhat less comatose, but the sentiment remained.
And then it started to rain.
AT:MON
6/11
We got up medium early. I was not the first one up today; I was starting to be really tired… of course, it still didn’t register that I was this tired.
I was stuffed up though and I started taking a serious amount of Sudafed trying to clear out my sinuses.
I’m glad I bought a bunch of it before I left (and a side note to the buttmunch who decided to pass the legislation limiting the only sinus medicine that works on me; I hereby curse you to the hell where you can’t breathe unless you take Sudafed incessantly. Rules of three don’t apply here because I am already living it. Feh.) because I was desperate to not let it get into my lungs. Once it got there, I’d be more useless than I already am.
So, I put the roll of toilet paper (sans center cardboard in a ziploc) into my pocket for easy access and got my stuff together in my pack.
Breakfast was put out, but as I’m not typically a breakfast eater, I only had a bit of tea and a few sliced strawberries. I wasn’t terribly hungry.
There were some last minute additions to a bunch of folks’ packs, namely rain covers. We had brought several extra garbage bags (of the forceflex ilk for sturdiness) and mom stayed with that (it suited her theme-she had gotten her pack for $12 at the used gear sale at REI- well, add in a new clip for the closure (about $1.50) and thread for sewing the strap where it was coming loose-so ‘free’ fit right in) and I went over and succumbed to the siren’s song of a pack cover at MRO.
All hail the Osprey XL.
I vote it the best $40 I have spent, but more on that later.
Two vans loaded us up to take us to the trail head at Fox Creek.
Packrat was our driver (he is pictured in the book “A Walk for Sunshine“) and he regaled us with tales from the trail of his own. He’s been a ridegrunner, helped people out from the trail when they were hurt (carried their packs out then went back and carried *them* out), in short a dear man who was entertaining the whole drive up.
We arrived at Fox Creek and while we were there (adjusting packs, adjusting hiking pole lengths, etc) out popped a hiker from the trail.
Hikers and other hikers say hello and talk. Its what you do on the trail, there’s a nice community and an immediate sense of solidarity between people out there. I like it.
He talked about the weather, the fact that his shoes were disintegrating and Packrat offered to take him into town, but he declined the offer and said he’d survive until he saw his dad…the next week. Heh. I hope things went ok for him. I sensed a great deal of duct tape in his future.
We took a ‘before’ shot of the group-12 of them to be exact-one with every camera in the group– and then set off about 12:30p.
We started moving uphill immediately. I wasn’t terribly steep, but it is uphill. Combine my snot levels and the fact that even on a good day I am slow on the uphills, I decided to let the speed demons move on ahead and I stayed back with one of the guides playing ‘sweep’ that day. (I’m sort of nostalgic about that term as it was one of the positions I played in field hockey in high school.)
Now, I have an annoying tendency to try to walk the same speed in every situation. Uphill, downhill, level, in bad shoes, etc. My internal marching song is something like a theme song to a 50’s tv show (nothing in particular, and no, I won’t sing it for you) with “Mr. Potato Head. Mr Potato Heeee-aaad.” being the lyrics.
And of course, it kicked my ass.
Lack of oxygen is un-fun.
I started to seriously lag behind the group, and while Almanac was exceedingly kind about the whole situation, I was not pleased with myself.
Our first break was Old Orchard Shelter (elev. 4050′).
You will be pleased to know that on a trail, which by the way is the most un-wheelchair-accessible trail I have ever seen, that the government has seen fit to make the privy there 503c compliant. 3 feet wide, handles for balance and fully wheelchair accessible.
Your tax dollars well spent.
The group stopped for lunch at Pine Mountain… and by the group, I don’t mean me. I was behind at that point. By the time I slogged up there, they were almost done. I wasn’t worried about me eating, I wasn’t hungry-a precursor of things to come, I suppose- but I didn’t want Almanac to give up her lunch/rest time just because she was stuck with me.
Frankly, I’d almost prefer to make breaks very short and slightly more frequent. Long sit downs make me creaky and cold. Not to mention the whole ‘take off your shoes’ thing. I suppose folks who wear GoreTex need to let their feet breathe. But I wear ventilated shoes and smartwool socks to prevent my feet from getting too hot in the first place. (I really expected my feet to be more of a problem actually. I’m ecstatic they weren’t). My other paranoia was my knees. I wore the knee brace on my left knee the first day, it had twinged a few days previously, so I thought I’d head that off at the pass… especially since we were climbing so much.
In fact, I think my broken knees are ‘broken’. My former super power of being a walking barometer has failed me repeatedly over the last week. In WV, I couldn’t feel the impending storms, later on when it was about to pour- I got nothin’.
Not even a tweak. Sigh and yay at the same time. Only took me 20 years of work to get them back into some decent shape.
The day was almost all uphill: Fox Creek to Old Orchard Shelter then to Pine Mountain; save the final stretch to The Scales (our sleeping point that night) and that was rolling trail… and I was lagging behind the group in larger and larger amounts.
I’d try to make up for being slow then lose my breath and have to stop.
I was distinctly unhappy, but definitely determined not to whine about it. I felt like death, I couldn’t breathe (and if I breathed too deeply, then I would start to cough) and I felt guilty as hell that Almanac, who was sweep, had to slow her own pace to match my snail’s pace.
From Pine Mountain, I was able to recoup a bit of the time that I lost on the uphills. It was rolling trail which meant I’d go super slowly on the uphill bits and haul ass on the downhills.
I made it to The Scales not as far behind as I’d been all day, dropped my pack, sat for a minute then helped mom put up the tent.
Part I of the Hollywood shoe saga:Hollywood was having trouble with her hiking boots, apparently I missed the sole falling off of one of her boots during the day’s hike. I donated a crapload of Gorilla tape (this stuff is the best… skip the normal duct tap and get this stuff.) We taped it as best we could and she trounced off with her sole more intact… for a while. I really like Hollywood, she is an exceptionally cool person.
The Scales are a meadow near the Grayson Highlands park. It was named for the times that the cow folk would herd all the loose bovines into the area, weigh them and then sell them off.
Its a VERY nice place to camp. No great inclines, privy (which you come to recognize as one of life’s great luxuries on the trail) and normally you would have water available to filter. We made due with our remaining water in the camelbaks and a gallon from the park keeper for our appetizer, a concoction of chicken soup mix/chicken bouillon/miso soup mix that I came to look forward to each night. There’s wisdom in the saltiness of it to replace all the stuff you lose sweating on the trail (and that was part of the danger for me, if I didn’t eat and just drank water I could suffer from hyponatremia but the appetizer worked its salty magic each night.
Heh heh. That sounds dirty, doesn’t it?
Hi, I am 12.)
Southern Virginia had been experiencing drought conditions and we had to walk about 3/4 of a mile or so down a road to find some running water larger than a mud puddle. It took us about 45 minutes to fill all the camelbaks (and I will be referring to any water system as such by that name, kinda like I call everything that I blow my nose on a ‘kleenex’. All you copyright lawyers can just chill.) and to get the group water bucket full then haul it all the way back up the hill.
Dinner was set up, a culinary masterpiece of the backpacking variety, that I summarily skipped due to the tomato content (oh my ulcer, she no like the tomatoes, but she loved the chicken soup). I put an unmeasured amount of cheesy potato mixings in the dregs of my soup with some more hot water and some mushrooms and had a good meal. It turned out more like potato soup, but that was fine by me as well.
I’m sure some people will look at this week and freak out over my food situation. It was actually a pretty good food set. I wasn’t hungry, but I still ate some, my stomach didn’t hurt due to food (it would due to stress later on in the week) and as far as my stomach went, it was a pretty good week. So drop it.
I slept pretty well that night. We’d been warned that there might be wild ponies wandering around nibbling on tents and generally wreaking pony havoc (and then I thought, “well, hell, mom is going to sit out all night trying to see the ponies, isn’t she?” because mom is a horse freak of the biggest variety.) but no ponies. Well, actually I think we saw one off in the distance up the hill to the west, but it was subject of debate.
I think I scared them away with my snorking. I took more sudafed before I went to bed as well as raiding mom’s Tylenol (mine seems not to have made it into the pack-ye gods. THAT will NEVER EVER happen again.) to quell the shrieking of my muscles… My calves were a tiny bit sore, my quads weren’t bad, my knees were fine… but my hips (the connect-y part between where my hip bone is to the top of my quad – brownie points if you can find it and name it (Eden? Hawk?)… I didn’t after a cursory Googling/Wikipedia-ing) screamed every time I moved and when I sleep in a sleeping bag, I move a lot trying to get comfy.
Despite all that, I slept ok.
The rest of this entry is classified as TMI… read at your own risk…
Continue reading AT:MON
AT:SAT/SUN
SAT 6/9
We rolled into Damascus, VA around 2:30pm with the ideas in our heads that we were supposed to be there by 3pm.
After actually reading our letters again, we realized that it was supposed to be 5pm, but I was OK with that.
I’d been reading about Damascus, the trail town, for so long that I wanted to see what the place was a bit before we got into group activities. (We had signed up with a group to go on this portion of the AT to get a feel for the trail itself, to be certain that we weren’t going to choose a bad section of the trail for our knees and also because it seemed like a cool thing to do.)
So we walked through Sundog Outfitters, went to a new coffee place that apparently had just opened up (Mojoe’s Trailside Cafe), did a drive through the town that took 7 minutes and then made our way over to Mount Roger’s Outfitter’s after a while.
We were still early, but it wasn’t a big deal.
We were scheduled to stay in the hostel across the street until Monday morning when we would be shuttled over to the trail head.
That’s a really nice feature about trail-centric towns; they tend to have lots of hiker features (shuttles, trail angels, hostels, cheap food stores, outfitters, etc) to replenish your stanky-hiker self along the way.
Don’t for a minute think that it isn’t VERY appreciated.
I got some shopping taken care of (I discovered during mom’s and my informal pack shakedown at the house the night before that I left my spork at home and needed a new one). So we asked the guys at MRO if anyone in our group had arrived yet and they said, “Oh you! We’ve heard about you!”
Infamy already. Sweet.
They pointed us to the place across the street and after my initial confusion (for some reason I was making things harder than it really is, nothing new there) we managed to cross the street without gross bodily harm and walked into the hostel.
Very nice place actually.
The sign I really like was “No nude activity in the area.” (Hmm, what about nude inactivity?) and met Jan, one of the guides for the group.
Mom and I were first to arrive and so we picked out our room and unloaded the car.
People arrived in dribs and drabs and by the time everyone had moved in, we walked over to dinner at The Mill to get to know each other.
Now, I have an alarming tendency to say the wrong thing, however, I try to mitigate that hoof in mouth disease by saying (frequently) “Oh crap, that sounded bad, what I really meant was…” So, true to form I made an ass of myself but tried to be silly about my own silliness.
We all seemed to get along ok (no overt uncomfortable silences at the table) and we bonded over chocolate (all girls, you do the math) and giggling over the guy who was our server.
After dinner we all walked home (the entire block and a half home and then we lounged around for the rest of the night talking about backpacking things.
SUN 6/10
Sunday morning, extremely atypically (especially since I was still on Pacific time) I got up early.
7am early and made coffee (4am? WTF?) for the group with the crack coffee mom and I had gotten to stock us up with on the trail. My nose had seriously stuffed up overnight and even though I was awake, I was kinda tired all day. I blew it off as a side effect of all the wacky timezone shenanigans, travel and early morning, but I never could shake it off.
We spent the day seeing the various backpacking equipment available, getting all of our packs ready, sorting out the right amount of food for each person, getting to know our tents (putting them together on the lawn at the hostel and being the town amusement. ‘Girl scouts?’ was a frequent question and there are probably 30 pics of us putting together our tents and inventorying stakes and poles on the web by now.)
We did pack shakedowns and all weighed our packs (we were aiming for 30 pounds after we put group gear and filled our water systems).
I have backpacked before. I wasn’t a total newbie, but I did learn a lot of cool information (and I got to play with more equipment from the demos-excellent…) and I managed to get in at 26 pounds on my pack before my 2L camelbak was filled (and right before I added my GPS unit to my belt.) I probably hit 31 pounds when all was said and done..
I was taking a bit of extra food that other folks weren’t taking. My stomach has been wonky lately due to all the stress and add that to my normal baseline wonkiness, I was guessing that group food would just not work for me.
Now, what I don’t like to do is drag everyone down with my weird food requirements. Most people would be seriously bored with my food intake, so I worked it out with the guide (I had recently added more to the ‘bad food list’ and didn’t manage to tell our guide that before we all ended up in Damascus. She was a little put out with me (yea, I deserved it), but mom also forgot to tell her that she couldn’t eat fish. Mom and I apologized and mom had a point when she said, “We aren’t trying to get you angry, but sometimes when you live with something daily, it just becomes part of the noise and doesn’t register as something to mention.”
Kind of like the drive home from work, you don’t see all the details that don’t change, just the noteworthy stuff.) I think we managed to smooth it over. I did understand her position though…not being able to take care of one of her flock upset her. Sigh.
So, it came to pass that I loaded up with some of my own supplemental food and I would just get a cup of water when it got boiled at the beginning of the meal each night.
I was not unhappy with this arrangement, actually. I had dried mushrooms, cheese sauce package nicked from macaroni&cheese mix, a bag of cheese mashed potatoes and a case of Larabars (amongst other snacks.) I can eat interesting food, but mushrooms, string cheese and cheesy mashed potatoes-YUM! Sounded good to me.
We sat around a bit today, getting to know each other, making occasional forays to MRO and the Dollar Store for last minute additions or changes. The bartering and sharing of gear was kind of fun actually. Mom and I bought new camp shoes (Nothinz on half off) and she re-read “A Walk in the Woods” with me asking occasionally where she was at in the narrative.
I was flitting around, seeing what everyone else was doing (pre- and post-pack shakedown), comparing who hit the sale at REI the previous weekend (there were at least 4 of us with the Rosa sleeping bag which turned out to be a good choice.), trying to be social and fun (trying, mind you, I am clumsy at it, at the best of times.), helping out, fixing things… watches, cameras (to limited success), setting up electronics… and I got my trailname before we officially set foot on the trail (the path through town didn’t count).
You can probably guess…Gadget.
I reviewed with mom and ascertained that I didn’t influence the actual name…apparently its just THAT obvious that my name was pre-destined.
Of course, I’m pretty happy with my name, given the other possibilities that occurred to me on my own… but then again, I am pretty harsh on myself. I don’t know that anyone else would be that mean.
Also, please note that Cingular has NO SIGNAL WHATSOEVER in Damascus, Va. They are right, they have the fewest dropped calls there… mostly since you can’t call anyone at all. See? Success criteria spun successfully.
Allegedly, there is a bench in between the hostel and the Dollar Store that you can get one bar of Verizon. I can neither confirm nor deny those allegations since I was in radio silence effectively since we turned off of the hiway onto 58 toward Damascus.
Eek…to put it mildly.
So, I was without internet reading material or email or even communication, but I didn’t really seem to notice it as I was so stuffed up and tired.
I took a shower before bed and then crashed hard… only waking up every hour to turn over (we were on sleeping platforms on Thermarests in our sleeping bags) and to use up 6 ft of toilet paper to blow my nose.