Date: 2011-04-20
From: Hot Springs

To: Allen Gap
Miles today: 15.2
Weather: overcast clouds

Day 30 - I slept much better last night at the Iron Horse Inn and was up at 6:30am getting organized. I walked down to the Smoky Mountain diner and had a hiker's breakfast of a bacon/cheese omelet, a pound of hash brown potatoes, a biscuit with homemade apple butter and a tea. I met two other early morning hikers there, Sunguide from Minnesota and Traffic Director from Ontario. Traffic Director is a Methodist minister and his congregation allowed him a 2 month sabbatical to hike. I asked him if the congregation was keeping up with him on the trail and he said that they had a bet among themselves on how much weight he would lose. While leaving I saw Steamer, I had not seen him since Standing Bear when I made my mad dash out of there. Steamer is a retired railroad worker from Massachusetts; we have tagged along with each other for the past couple of weeks. I left the IHI at 8:15am and crossed the French Broad River and immediately it started raining with the wind blowing. I put on my rain jacket but it was so warm I was sweating, so I ended up just walking in my tee shirt since I was going to be wet anyway. Today is a treat, not only am I going home for a few days but I am also "slack packing" today. I left my back pack at the IHI and just have my waist pack with water, candy, fruit, and a sandwich. I had the diner make me up a BLT without mayonnaise so I will eat that sometime later. Whenever one is able to get a ride back to a starting point they can slack pack which really makes an enjoyable day. I have only done this once before on Day 1, when I slacked packed up Springer Mountain for 0.9 miles. The very purist will say one should not slack pack but carry their back pack the entire trail. Needless to say, I am not a purist, I will stay on the trail but if I get an opportunity to slack it, I will. The hike out of the river bottom was ok, without my back pack I was able to go at times over 3 mph. I crossed over US 25 at Tanyard Gap at 10:30am and arrived at Rich Mountain fire tower at 11:50am having gone 8.7 miles at a 2.5 mph pace. I climbed the 42 steps to the top and ate lunch and enjoyed the view. It had stopped raining at 11:30am so the clouds were dissipating over the mountain ranges. For the last couple of days my left foot has been in Tennessee and my right foot has been in North Carolina as the trail has straddled the state lines. During the early afternoon, I crossed into Greene County (TN) and was walking along a ridge line. I was walking in fairly dry but matted down dry leaves. Along the way, I started to hear what I thought was rain drops. Upon hearing this I stopped after 20 or so yards and was going to put my trail map and telephone into a water proof bag. However, when I stopped so did the rain drops plus I did not feel any rain on my head. I took a few more steps and like magic I heard the drops again. I did this off and on for several yards and looked down to the side of the trail to figure out where this noise was coming from. Then I saw it, every time I took a step, either the vibration of my step or the sound would send 2-3 dozen quarter inch baby crickets into the air to land on the surrounding dry leaves. As soon as they hit the leaves, it sounded like rain drops. This must have gone on for a mile and there must have been thousands of crickets along this stretch of the trail. I officially walked off the trail at 3:30pm onto NC 208/ TN 70. I hitched one 4-5 mile ride back toward Hot Springs and walked for another mile. I had made arrangements for my friend, Megan, to pick me up somewhere along the highway so I just stopped, swatted flies for thirty minutes and she picked me up at 4:30pm. We went back into Hot Springs to get my pack and headed over the mountains back home for a few days off the trail.I did a total of 15.2 miles today at a 2.5 mph pace and have gone a total of 286.6 miles.