Date: 2018-05-20
From: Dickey's Gap

To: Pine tree campsite
Miles today: 7.7

Today I knew that I couldn't sleep in. Dakota needed to start heading back to South Carolina by noon. He worked second shift and wanted to get home early to nap. Since I packed most of my stuff the night before I was pretty much ready to rock n roll. I slammed a cup of coffee and the breakfast casserole. The first car load to go was Poncho, Bandito, Remedy, and I. We needed to drop off Remedy first at Grayson highlands. It still took us awhile to get there since the mountain roads curved every which direction. We talked about the lack of diversity on the trail and reasons for it.  Remedy had a clear day to hike Grayson. The ponies were out frolicking around. Dakota dropped us off at Dickey's Gap, we said our goodbyes and headed off on the trail. Dakota was going to pickup Pumpkin Spice and Chill next.We were packing a lot of weight today. I was carrying 4 beers. Poncho and Bandito were carrying 6 beers. We were planning on having a feast at a campsite 6 miles in. Luckily trail was pretty flat.  We did have a 500 foot climb over 2 miles but that was nothing. The weather did get a little hot but nothing like the hike out of Damascus. We arrived at the next shelter for lunch. It was swarming with mosquitos. It was the first place since starting that had so many little buggers. I've heard that New York will be the worst for them. We climbed back up from the shelter for lunch since we couldn't handle all of them. I had a tortilla with cheese and summer sausage. It was way better than tuna!After lunch we headed another 4 miles to a campsite. It was nestled in the shade of tall pine trees. A small stream flowed around the site. It had a fire ring with a small spring shooting up from the ground. We setup our tents and waited for Chill and Pumpkin Spice. After about an hour they came walking down the trail. Pumpkin had a small day pack on the front filled with beer and an empty package of hot dogs. He had eaten them cold on the way in. I haven't done something like that since I was a kid. He was also packing Johnsonville brats and hoogies.  We started gathering wood to build a fire. Most of the wood was wet from the last several days of rain. I started cracking large logs by using the fulcrum of two trees.  Poncho and Bandito worked on getting the fire started. It took about an hour of struggling with leaves, paper, pine needles, and blowing to get it started. Once a fire gets hot enough you can burn wet wood. We placed 12 beers in the natural spring that kept them cold. I sharpened a stick using a tiny Swiss army knife. It took awhile but I got it there. The brats cooked up fast over the fire. As grease fell in the flames rose higher. Mine split open to reveal all the pink bits getting killed by the flame. I had to make sure it was dead.  I slid the brat off using the hoogie and added cheese that Pumpkin brought. He has a crazy addiction to cheese and packed out Doritos, Cheetos, and 3 blocks of cheese.  Luckily it hasn't affected his bowels too much. A woman named Try Try showed up. She got her name because this is her 3rd thru hike try. We offered her brats and beer. She gladly accepted a brat. Poncho lost both of her brats in the fire. She scraped off the ash and ate them anyways. We started making jokes about going number 2 by saying that we had to go to the board meeting. Sometimes the board meeting was delayed other times it was a last minute meeting. That convo was signaling the end of the night.I'm in my tent listening to a bubbling spring with a full happy tummy.