Date: 2016-04-24
From: Davenport Gap

To: State line Branch
Miles today: 1.3
Weather: clear sky

While we were away we closed on our first home as a married couple! We purchased the "Stratospire 2" from tarptents.com! It is a roomy two person tent that uses trekking poles instead of tent poles to save weight. Speaking of saving weight, our combined gear now weighs just 29 pounds (down from about 57 at the start)! We swapped out our packs, tent, sleeping bag (don't worry, our new double bag, the Nemo tango duo, is just as comfy as the King Solomon, just not as warm), cookware, and left a lot of stuff like cold weather gear home. With packs under 15 pounds, we are now ultralight! In the bible, the book of Hebrews tells us that since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses (people who have lived their lives faihfully as witnesses to the fact that a life of faith can be lived), we too should lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so close, and run the race set before us with endurance, looking to Jesus, the author of our faith. The author of Hebrews is using a metaphor of a race as a picture of our lives. Churches are good at emphasizing the need for people to lay aside sin. Sins are like breaking the rules in any race (say catching an uber to the finish line) and can disqualify you. But less often do churches discuss laying aside weights. Picture a person running a half marathon and smoking a cigarette (or carrying a brick in each hand). Nothing in the rules prohibits this, but it would probably cause the runner to have a worse time. In the same way there are things in our lives that aren't against the rules, they aren't sins, but we won't live our lives well if we hold onto them. Maybe taking a travel assignment at work will take you away from church and rob you of fruitfulness? Lots of examples. We think a lot about literal weight right now because we have to carry everything with us. But there are things with spiritual weight too. It is good to consider those as well. Should I buy that house, can I honor God with my time and remain fruitful while also owning a boat or motorcycle, etc. The answers aren't straightforward and require prayer. Speaking of things weighing us down, we are still hoarding food and that is pushing our pack weight way above what it should be. But we can eat our way out of that dilemma. For example, we got an awesome waffle iron as a wedding gift. While we were home for the wedding, she made him Belgium style Leige waffles. If you have never had one, they are made with yeast, not dough, have a type of lumpy sugar mixed into the batter, and taste phenomenal. We packed a few with us for the trail because they keep pretty well. Today was an example of Gods provision in our lives. We were so busy this past week, we didnt even have time to update the blog. We never made any arrangements to return to the trail. All we had was a plane ticket to Greensvile Spartenburg airport in South Carolina, which is a 2 hour drive to an obscure dirt road where we needed to go. To make matters worse, none of the shuttle companies offered rides that far and there was nowhere nearby to drop off a one way rental car that would be open on Sunday. We boarded the plane dumbfounded as to how we would get back. While in line for our connecting flight, we stood next to an awesome lady who is also doing a backpacking trip this week. Her name is "Martian" (she works at NASA) and goes on trips with a group called fitpacking.com that helps people meet fitness goals while enjoying the outdoors. As we chatted with her, we learned that she worked with our friend who got married. She had rented a car for the day but didn't have to be anywhere for several hours. She took us to Walmart to pickup fuel and then drive us all the way to the trailhead! What a blessing. We hope God puts a blessing in her life for helping us. After getting dropped off, we were thoroughly exhausted. Mr Moose was at the gap and said hi to us which made us happy, felt we were right where we left off. He must have taken a long time in the Smokies because we last saw him over a week ago. We decided to camp near the trailhead and nap all afternoon instead of resuming our hike in earnest. Speaking of those waffles, he got hungry for one and she confessed that she had accidentally used the waffle bag to store her butt wipes (used). At least we are responsible hikers. There are lots of used butt wipes that we see daily along the trail. It was rather unfortunate, but as she was peeing, she fell on nettles and got a nice rash. She tried wiping them down and in her dazed state, confused the garbage bag for the waffle bag. We now have two garbage bags... Those nettles hurt so bad and they left big welts! Update: they are all gone the next morning!