Date: 2005-03-30
From: Wayah Bald, NC

To: Wesser Bald Shelter, NC
Miles today: 11.5
Weather: clear sky

As you can see, Jess has really picked up the pace. This is good, as Tammy raised the following question:Tammy: "so, i have a question. i calculated that if jess maintains her current pace, it will take her 10 months to reach the end of the trail. question: what's the deal?" She continues on, "i would like to ask the guy with the tapeworm about his plan to set out a cup of milk and attract it. do you have to, you know, sit in this cup of milk for some long time? can you put it, say, a few feet away and go about your business? this entry raises myriad questions."Day 17, in which Jess learns that crime doesn't pay, sees the face of God in a sleeping bag, escorts an injured compatriot off the trail, makes best friends with some guys from Alabama, gets hygiene advice from the trail yoda, and walks like a duck: Last night was the most assfreezing windy night of my life. Remind me never again to camp on top of an open tower on top of an exposed bald, illicitly or otherwise. We rigged up a whole array of tents and tarps as a windbreak; the wind promptly took the entire thing down. Weatherman somehow managed, early in the evening, to fall asleep, and began snoring at a decibel level that would scare a buzzard off a shitwagon. After a few minutes, I couldn't take it anymore. "WEATHERMAN," I said loudly. "ROLL OVER. OR SOMETHING. YOU'RE SNORING." He spluttered and awoke. "What?" he said. "I was? Sorry. That's crazy. I thought I was still awake." I've never been so glad to see sunrise in my entire life. The night's only highlight was that Scholar, in an act of unparalleled generosity, lent me her Big Agnes sleeping pad for the night-- which, after my dinky 3/4 length Thermarest-- well, I think I may have seen heaven.The day was lovely once it finally arrived, though. Scholar left first and the other three of us followed soon after. Shortly down the trail, blowdowns forced us to detour on a hastily built and very badly benched relo-- the trail was extremely uneven, and Weatherman tripped and twisted his already injured ankle. It became clear pretty quickly that he wasn't going to be able to keep walking on it-- Cuppa Joe and I hiked out to the road and caught up with the extremely nice guys from Auburn, with whose help we contacted someone at the Nautahala Outdoor Center to drive down and pick Weatherman up. Cuppa Joe went back and retrieved Weatherman's pack so that Weatherman could get himself to the road unencumbered by pack weight; an hour later, Shelby-in-the-purple-car arrived to take Weatherman back to civilization. Thanks, Shelby! (And thanks, really nice guys from Auburn!)Crisis averted, Cuppa Joe and I headed up the trail to the next shelter, where Scholar-- who had been up ahead during the entire mini-crisis-- had been resting for several hours, wondering if the rest of us were ever going to arrive, or what.The rest of the walk was quiet and pleasant. I sang to myself under my breath (at least on the downhills); the bluets and periwinkles were in full bloom, and the woods slowly beginning to green. The view from Wesser Bald was breathtaking.At Tellico Gap, Cuppa Joe and I ran into the Really Nice Guys From Auburn again, interviewing Seiko, a fifteen-time thru-hiker (not named Psycho, as Cuppa Joe thought at first). The RNGs asked Seiko (who knew the exact mileage of every shelter on the entire Trail) whether, with all his experience, Seiko could distill the essence of the AT into five words. Seiko thought about it, then counted on his fingers. "Don't forget the T.P.," he said. Then he told me how to walk like a duck.At the shelter, I was delighted to see Jake and Raz (now Bruce Spruce and Bruce Moose-- don't ask), who I'd assumed must be so far ahead by now that I'd never see them again. They had, it turned out, been walking some very short days recently, thereby giving us time to catch up-- they'd pulled a whopping 5-mile day to get there.It's hot now, and I still can't believe how much it was snowing only two days ago. I'm tired, but I feel good-- and the fatigue is more due to last night's lack of sleep than to the day's hike.