Date: 2006-04-28
From: Whistling Gap Campsite, TN

To: Erwin, TN
Miles today: 13.5
Weather: clear sky

Day: 42Date: 4/28/06Start: Whistling Gap Campsite, TNWeather: Blue skies, cool winds in the morning, hot afternoonFinish: Erwin, TNMiles: 13.5Cumulative A.T. Miles: 338.7Branch: After last night's campfire, we had the best time sleeping in our *dry* tent and sleeping bags. It felt so luxurious to finally be dry!Today's hiking was so nice. The terrain was easy, the views pretty, the weather was great, and Erwin, TN was in our sights. We spent the morning leap frogging with Blazer as he was also town-minded. You see, on the days that we plan to go into town, we seem to wake up with the mantra "Town, town, town" playing through our head with each step.During one fairly flat stretch of trail today, the town mantra was playing in my head particularly loudly and quickening my steps such that I could hardly see where I was stepping. In the middle of one step, I saw something that at first looked like a rope, but I immediately realized that it was a snake! At the same instant of that realization, the leg that remained on the ground propelled me upward in a fashion that it has never previously done before and I landed no less than 4 feet away from the offending snake that happened to be sunning himself in the middle of the trail. I screamed as I leapt, Clay screamed because I was screaming. Clay and I then had a new problem. Clay was on the southern side of the snake and I was on the northern side. The snake was between us. Upon a far off closer examination, Clay believed that the snake had a triangular head which would indicate that it was probably poisonous. He threw some leaves on the snake, hoping to encourage it to leave, but it did not move. So, when the snake was distracted by the falling leaves, Clay used his hiking pole to gently move the snake off the trail. The snake then got the message and headed for another spot to sun itself. Afterwards, however, every branch, leaf, or odd-shaped rock on the trail somehow seemed to look and move like a snake to me. After only one or two false snake alarms we finally made it safely down to the road.Clay: The terrain today was perfect. Tough, short uphills (30 minutes or less) to get your heart pumping, easy terrain in between, and a big downhill towards town. When town is within a 30-mile range, some hikers tend to run like the Oklahoma Sooners. The young, flat stomach hikers will attempt to hike 20-30 miles in a day just to get to town (e.g. Pro from Dover did 27 miles to get to town). The lure of town causes the clumps of hikers to break up within the 30-mile range and causes hikers to cluster and reform new groups while in town.When we got to town, we headed from Uncle Johnny's Hiker Hostel to the Super 8 Motel. We figured that the $15 difference was worth it for two big and clean beds with fresh towels, the Weather Channel, Continental breakfast, being in town, and most of all, privacy and quiet. After taking showers, Branch and I headed across the bridge over to the Huddle House (the closest restaurant was 1/2 mile away). We were ready to "Huddle Up" on some fat food to celebrate doing 70 miles in 5 days. We drank about 3 soft drinks each and ate a boat load of hot food. This satisfied our weary bodies. We headed back to the hotel, called our loved ones, and went to bed for some needed rest. Our "zero" day tomorrow is going to be a full day of work in town.