Date: 2013-03-16
From: Blue Mountain Shelter

To: Tray Mountain Shelter
Miles today: 6.7
Weather: overcast clouds

I left the Blue Mountain Shelter at 8:20 AM, Saturday March 16, 2013. Half an hour later, as I crested a hill, I met Slow But Sure and her husband, Because Of Her. Slow snapped a photo with my camera (it didn¢t come out) of me with Pilgrim, a Vietnam veteran who, like me, was using an REI Flash 62 pack. I loved my pack, but Pilgrim had bought his online and even the Large size was too small for his long torso and caused him much shoulder pain; he was headed for Hiawassee for a new pack.        At 9:45 I removed my zip-off legs and hiking shirt, down to shorts and T-shirt in the hot sun. Fifteen minutes later I rolled into Unicoi Gap, finding a wonderful ¢trail magic¢ setup by Dave, Bob, and Andrew. Moonshiner (an older man with a trim gray goatee), Pilgrim, Bottle Cap and Fun Size were there, drinking cold beer! (Some added 110-proof liquor!) The trail angels replenished my supply of toilet paper; then I enjoyed some food and soft drink and I pulled out at 10:15, beginning the long climb out of Unicoi.        About an hour later I reached the peak and began descending, snapping a few photos of the view, trail, and myself, and at 12:23 PM emerged at Indian Grave Gap to find a second ¢trail magic¢ setup! This one was by the Glenlock Baptist Church ¢ no beer or whisky but tons of other things, even disposable razors! After a couple of photos and drinks, I enjoyed two hot-dog-roll-and-relish sandwiches (I¢m a vegetarian), as I had at Unicoi, and pulled out at 1:18 PM, starting the climb out of this gap.        Again it took about an hour of ascending to finish the climb, but after only a short descent I came to a THIRD ¢trail magic¢ of the day, at Tray Gap! This one served hamburgers (the prior two had only hot dogs), and had ¢fixin¢s¢ of lettuce and tomatoes! I enjoyed two whole-grain hamburger rolls with lettuce, tomatoes, and mayonnaise, again skipped the beer (I drink an occasional one at home, but was unsure how I¢d handle it on the hike), and headed out at 2:55 after a half-hour stop. I pulled into the Tray Mountain Shelter exactly one hour later.        Saturday night the shelter was full. I slept between Ridgerunner (a burly gray-bearded trail steward who covered all of Georgia¢s AT; I¢d first met him at Stover on my first night out) and Alfalfa, a pleasant 14-year-old boy hiking with his father, an Iraq war veteran who was using a hammock behind the shelter. Triple Step, a spry Connecticut 70-year-old named for a dance step, slept to Ridgerunner¢s right; Blackhawk Bob and Bottle/Fun were tenting nearby, as were several others I¢d met before. (Triple-Step puzzled me a bit. He referred several times to his wife, and I¢m sure his assurances that he loved her were sincere, but he related to the group a detailed and carefully thought out plan to get away with murdering her. He would not have invested the effort to reason out that plan unless he enjoyed devising it... Diff¢rent strokes, as the saying goes, but I can¢t imagine finding pleasure in devising a plot to murder a loved one. Triple-Step¢s trailjournal dot com post that his plan was ¢a lie¢ does not change my observation.)