Date: 2007-03-02
From: Woody Gap

To: Low Gap Shelter
Miles today: 21.2
Weather: clear sky

Day 2. Chilled last nite with Silver (silver haired thru hiker who's been helpin Paw Paw section hike a bit.) Paw Paw is from Florida. He's 85! Funny as hell. Lots of stories. And he's gonna make a go of hikin the whole trail! Hiked a lot in Florida. Lots of other section hikers at the hostel were great too. Navigator made some homemade soup last nite that was fabulous.[in retrospect yesterday turns out to be an infamous day that everybody already on the trail will talk about for weeks. Hilacious rain. Very few people hiked any miles at all. If they moved they hopped one shelter or got off the trail to grab a hostel. I'm pretty pround it was my first day out and I cranked out my 20 anyway!]After another awesome breakfast at the Hiker Hostel Paul (Old Man) drove me back to Woody Gap where i jumped off at the end of day 1.But not before I reallized I neva grabbed my trekking poles from Jamie's (Navigator's) SUV last nite. And she already left to drop off another group of hikers. Guess I'll have to suck it up without poles for now.Hopefully Old Man can locate them and drop them at the outfitters at Neels gap before i get there, otherwise they'll have to ship them ahead to me.Got dropped off at Woody Gap and headed right out before the others in the group. They were busy foolin with their packs and such. Hollered something to me about goin the wrong way, but the way they said it I thought they were kidding. They made no real effort to stop me. Last nite it was dark and rainy, and they picked me up on the wrong side of the road so I guess I was confused/disoriented. Hiked about 15 minutes before a sign with mileage to various points tipped me off that I blew it! Felt pretty stupid.Oh well. Turns out this was only the first of a few trail mishaps I'd commit along the way. And it's pretty common. Even among hardcore hikers who have their act together.Anyway, I cranked to Neels Gap and hit the gear store. And YES my poles were there. Wasn't too bad hiking without them, but pitchin my tent would have been tough as I use 1 trekking pole to save weight-I don't carry a tent pole!Great gear store at Neels. Since it's only 30miles into the trip this is the first place hikers get to dump all their heavy gear and the biggest gear swap known. A sign offers that they'll help overhaul every piece of gear you have and typically shave 12 lbs!!! by replacing with lighter stuff or ditching gear.I had done my homework so I didn't need this, carrying roughly 25lbs with 4-5 days food and plenty of warm gear. Bought just 1 or 2 small items but spent an hour looking around and chatting with very knowledgable staff. They didn't have better stuff or lighter stuff that would benefit me, so I'll keep what I have (which is pretty good).Cranked to Low Gap Shelter, squeaking in by dark @8pm ish. But despite my effort, the shelter that sleeps 8 was "full" with 6 hikers snoozing away at 8pm spread out all ova the shelter and not stirring despite my headlamp. They looked whooped. This turned out to be typical of early trail. Everybody in bed asleep by 8 or 9pm!So I pitched my tent in the dark, skipped dinna, as I was too whooped to care, and hung my bear bag on the cable provided. The idea is if all the food is hung and the bears can't reach it, it discourages any bears since they never have succes finding food despite being attracted by the smell. They usually stay away from humans in the shelters IF there's no food there to attract them.The trail maintainers have taking the trouble to install these cables with pullies in many of the shelter areas in popular bear areas to encourage hikers to hang their food bags. Otherwise, once the bears have success they'll get more used to associating human smell with reward, making it more dangerous and more likely they will continue to frequent shelter areas, placing everyone at more risk.Normally they just run away when they encounter humans on the trail. (supposedly)Anyway, slept great and no bear issues.Awoke energized for day 3!FedEx