Date: 2008-06-11
From: Newfound Gap

To: Tricorner Shelter
Miles today: 15.6

Heard the news last night that a good friend from high school had committed suicide. I spent a lot of time today deep in thought, contemplating life and how our journeys take us different paths. I certainly recognize how blessed I am as I'm spending six months walking in the woods with my daughter. Even out here as simple as life is it's easy to get caught up in our routine and lose sight of the incredible opportunity we have here.Okay, enough waxing philosophical, on with the hike.We are doing a semi slackpack today and tomorrow. Norma dropped us this morning at Newfound Gap and we started hiking north. Tonight we stopped at Tricorner Shelter and tomorrow will finish back at Davenport Gap. Both days should be approximately fifteen miles.Starting out this morning we noticed the temperatures were a bit chillier than we expected. As hot as it had been we had left all cold weather gear at Norma's camper in a box addressed to be mailed home. First hikers we met we asked how cold the night had been and they assured us it was fine. So we hiked on and soon warmed up.The first excitement of the day was the stop at Icewater shelter to see the peacock. There is a female peacock at Icewater shelter. We had heard about it days ago. I thought it was kind of sad being there all by herself. We said hello and took a picture and hiked on.The trail throughout the Smokies runs along the ridgeline on the North Carolina and Tennessee border. At some places it drops off pretty steep in one direction or both. We were joking that if you weren't very careful you might fall into Tennessee. I almost dropped my hiking pole into North Carolina. The views from up here were stunning. Actually, just saying that is pretty stunning. I've hiked the Smokies many times and had so much fog that nothing could be seen. But today it was gorgeous.The path running along the top of the ridgeline as it does made it difficult to find a spot to stop and rest or eat, but we found one wide spot where we spent a few minutes. Other than that we were pushing through as quickly as we could. At first we were racing to beat the heat, but as we crossed Mt Chapman we began to hear very loud thunder off in the direction of the shelter. Now it was really a race!At 3:30 we came around a curve in the trail and saw the shelter sign and heaved a big sigh of relief. At the shelter we found a troop of scouts from Illinois. Nice people. We didn't have reservations for the shelter. According to our thru hiker guide four spots in the shelters are set aside for thru hikers. We figured we just had to be the first four thru hikers in...and we were. Actually I think we are the only thru hikers here at all.Right now the shelter is packed. Six scouts, a trail maintenance crew of about seven people, a couple section hikers and the four of us. The maintenance crew has tents set up nearby, but for now they are huddled in here because that storm did hit a few minutes ago in force. The rain was pouring so hard it was difficult for me to hear the person next to me speaking. Lightening struck close enough to make several people jump. We were so thankful to be huddled down in our sleeping bags reading and journaling.It's been another good day on the trail.Rabbit, Owl and RooJoshua 1:9