Date: 2005-08-23
From: Hall Mt. Lean-to

To: South Arm Road
Miles today: 4.1

Day 162 8/23s: Hall Mt. Lean-tof: South Arm Roadm: 4.1w: cloudyI woke up this morning as Oly was leaving the shelter and I got ready to go hiking after breakfast and talking with 3 Cats. The morning was pretty chilly and I actually started the hike wearing my long-sleeve shirt. I am glad that the weather is finally getting cooler.I hiked up and over Moody Mountain around 3 Cats, Moterin and Free Heel. The climb was pretty difficult, but not as bad as people had indicated. We arrived at South Arm Road around eleven in the morning.I had been thinking about the necessary daily milage to get done with the hike in time to fly back home on September 18th and it occured to me that I need to go ahead and let Yardsale catch up so that we can make some more definate plans. On top of that, I was hungry and was really craving pancakes, so I decided to hitch back into Andover for a late breakfast.I got a ride easily enough and was eating blueberry pancakes in no time. These pancakes were even bigger than the ones I ate yesterday and I left the place feeling pretty full. I bought some more food and hitched a ride back out to the trail.I met Cooker Hiker and another section hiker at the road, both slackpacking the section between the two roads leading to Andover. I talked with them for a while as they waited for their ride.A really short day now and then is nice, but this is the third really short day I've taken in a row and I was beginning to get anxious. I felt like I wasn't getting anything accomplished by doing so many short days and I was pretty sick of letting all these people pass me by so that Yardsale could catch up. Every other time Yardsale has gotten off the trail, other hikers have been around who were going the same pace as me. But this time people just keep passing me and that is worse than being alone entirely. I don't think Yardsale has been working very hard to catch up this time either, and that somewhat bothers me.I spent the afternoon reading, writing and collecting firewood. I built a fire late in the afternoon and boiled some water for dinner. While I was eating dinner, I heard a car park along the road and I began to fear for my safty. A person came walking toward me and I recognized him to be The Wandering Bull, so my fears were laid to rest. He was looking for two other hikers to take them back to the cabin, but I hadn't seen the folks he was trying to find. We spent some time catching up and sharing trail stories before he had to leave. It was really good to see that guy again.I heard some more noise in the woods after The Wandering Bull left and I recognized this noise as being non-human. It went away for a while but, when I went to investigate more noises, I saw a pretty good sized animal jump into the brush just in front of my fire. The animal was tan in color and it was at least the size of a bobcat but I was unable to make out any specific characteristics. The animal didn't seem to retreat too far into the woods, so I made some loud barbaric grunting sounds and waved a burning log around in the air. I don't know if this helped the situation, but it felt like the only logical course of action at the time. I brought the log next to my tarp as I went to sleep only to be startled by the sound of Wooly Buggers (a type of caterpiller) crawling on my tyvek groundcloth.