Date: 2019-03-31
From: Long Branch Shelter 

To: Long Branch Shelter 
Miles today: 5.0

Long Branch was crowded when we arrived at the end of Saturday (Day 2) and we really had to squeeze in. We were all on slopes of various angles. I was probably on the steeper end. We knew cold rain was coming and took precautions to keep water from running under the tent and between the ground tarp. I bag legs most of my things in a trash bag as an extra precaution. We had a good dinner and were wash in our tents by around 8:30. It was hard to stay on my sleeping pad because my bag and I kept slipping and sliding down the pad to the downhill side of the tent.  It was like I was on the slip n slide of my youth. I went to sleep easy but kept waking up in a ball at the bottom of the tent. The wind was really kicking up as the evening wore on. You could hear it slamming into ridge beside us in an undulating roar. Sounded like a freight train going by again and again and again...The rain started around 12:30 and came in a serious of cells in varying degrees of intensity. I kept feeling like I was getting wet but just dismissed it. Until there was no doubt. The bottom of my tent was wet. I think I essentially pushed the tent out from under the tarp as I repeatedly slid down and push against the tent to push myself back up. Not good. Especially with the bottom of my sleeping bag being wet. I took the full trash bag filled with my treasures an put it at the base of my sleeping pad. So that I¢d slide into the bag but stay out is the water.  That worked pretty well until I really fell asleep deeply. And awoke to my feet and the trash bag being in the water. I found sleeping diagonally worked best as I would slide into my pack and stay out of the water. It was still raining off and on til around 6:30. I tried to go back to sleep until I heard the others stirring. I got up and started dealing with the wet mess. My clothes were all dry so really it was a wet tent and a wet sleeping bag. We had a hot bfast and continued packing up, it wasn¢t a quick process. That gave us all time to agree that we didn¢t want to spend the night out with temps in the low 20s and wet tents and gear. So the consensus was to come off the trail and head into Franklin for the night. We planned to pick up the Gainesville Ganfs two cars from Standing Indian Campground, which I¢d seen a sign for on Friday. Machete hadn¢t told her companions that essentially they were doing a big loop and were going to pass their cars after walking 30 miles! Hahahahahaha.  Everyone was a pretty good sport because we were close to the cars and could use them to get into Franklin. We stopped to catch our breath at Rock Gap and a local drives up in a tourist bus and offers to give us a lift to Franklin or the cars. It turns out the sign I saw was 0.6 mile up but the road to the cars was paralleling the trail. Let¢s just say there was not a consensus to take the short way to the cars. Beast in particular was not happy with the decision to take the loooooooong way to the cars. We did get the cars and headed to the Comfort Inn. Laundry got started and then went to the Lazy Hiker Brewery for dinner. We are all drying our stuff, washing our clothes, and repacking our packs. Bear Bear wants to do a long hike. Machete is planning for 7 miles. I¢m good with the 7 miles but think the planned 6:30 bfast is a bit too early.  Distance: 5 milesSteps : 19,000Floors: 53 floors