Date: 2008-03-21
From: Holiday Inn Express - Erwin TN

To: Cherry Gap Shelter TN
Miles today: 16.4
Weather: broken clouds

Day 33 ¢ Friday March 21 ¢ Cherry Gap Shelter TN ¢ Miles Today: 16.4 Total Miles: 356.2We had a little delay leaving the Holiday Inn Express in Erwin because they had a huge delicious continental breakfast with eggs, bacon, cinnamon buns, cereal, yogurt, juices, milk, coffee, toast - pretty much name it, they seemed to have it. So we had to have two breakfasts before we left! How on earth could we even consider just having one breakfast? Impossible, we say. The first breakfast was at 7:00 after which we went back upstairs, packed our backpacks and then headed back down again at 8:00 for our second helping! Brakeman had half a dozen eggs, half a dozen strips of bacon, two yogurts, juice, two coffees, one cinnamon bun and a bowl of cereal. Grasshopper had two cinnamon buns, 4 eggs, two yogurts, two juices, and 6 pieces of bacon. It was delicious. The cinnamon buns were just to die for. The ability to eat like this with no impact to our bodies makes us consider becoming a lifetime long thru-hikers!   Life is really good when there is food around!This morning at the breakfast buffet, we ran into none other than Virginia Slim! What a surprise! The last time we saw him was in Hot Springs. He had taken a hard fall on the ice in the Smokies, hit his hip hard, and was having back issues as well as pinched nerve issues running down his leg. We were really surprised to see him still hiking, at least this far along the trail. He told us that he got off the trail before Erwin, got a ride into town and is now hiking with a friend. His back is still giving him a little problem and to add insult to injury, he sprained the same ankle twice the other day. He's always in great spirits and you'd never know that he had an injury to complain about. Brakeman mentioned the mouse encounter in the last shelter we had shared together when he flung the mouse off his sleeping bag over towards Virginia Slim and wondered if the mouse happened to hit him. Virginia Slim just laughed and said, ¢No, it did not hit me.¢ That left us all wondering where the flying mouse ended up landing. Oh well, a mystery we¢ll never be able to solve.   Finally after filling our spleens to the gill (about 9:00), we began our 1-mile plus walk along the roadside to the trailhead. We don¢t like these long walks back to the trail, as they don¢t count towards our official miles to Maine and just add more wear and tear on the body.   Luckily it wasn't too long before a car pulled over and the driver hollered, "Hey, do you need a ride to the trailhead?" So without even sticking out our thumb, we got a hitch to the trail!   As we got out of his car at the trailhead, another car pulled up to drop off another hiker. What a friendly town. The driver of the other car turned out to be the infamous Miss Janet, who is well known amongst all the hikers for all her hospitality and care.   Her hostel is closed this year as she searches for another place.The trail on this side of the Nolichucky River turned out to be quite rocky so we lost our smooth trail today in the beginning. But the incline up the rocky side wasn¢t so horrible. We know that each time we come out of a town, we're leaving a valley and heading back up into the mountains with a full pack - 4 days of food this time. The first day out of town is not Brakeman¢s favorite day, as he carries the food.We ran into a group of 3 guys day hiking. The one guy obviously knew his plants so Brakeman asked about several of the plants that we had been seeing a lot. One was Galax, a low groundcover with a maroon colored leaf. In season, it will grow a stalk, which will smell like garlic - like a fine Italian restaurant. The other plant he showed us was also a low growing plant called teaberry. When you crumble it and smell it, it smells just like spearmint gum. He says you can put that in water, boil it and make tea. In season, it will get a reddish berry, which is perfectly safe to eat. Then there's a spiny, somewhat thorny bush which will get another long stalk blossom - I think it's white - and I think he said that one was safe to eat, too. Before you know it we are on the topic of food, a topic dear to all hikers. We¢re not quite sure how it happened, but the next thing we knew, this kind gentleman who just explained all the plants to us, was furiously rushing to zip open his little day pack.   Out popped 3 red delicious apples and a huge dark chocolate bar imported from Poland. He threw them into our hands and said, "The best gifts are those that are inexpensive or easy for one person to give, but mean so much to the person who is receiving them." And boy did he nail it! Though we were already carrying our family¢s care package of nearly 3 pounds of M&Ms, we gladly received the nearly pound bar of dark chocolate and the 3 red delicious apples, two of which were eaten immediately. We¢ve had great Trail Magic already on our hike! Talking with the day hikers was a nice break too, as we were climbing in full sun, and it was quite warm. This area burned relatively recently, so it was mostly just low growth ¢ i.e., no shade.Shortly after we left them, two more hikers came south on the trail. It turned out that they were part of the same hiking party that we just visited with. The one gentleman is going to reach his 30th birthday next year and he is thinking about hiking the AT to celebrate the event. We probably spent a half hour with this group of 5 people, learning plants and sharing information on how to prepare for a long distance hike. We went over another bald today - Beauty Spot. Balds are always gorgeous to go over. I don¢t think we shall ever tire of them. On this bald, we could see Mount Mitchell, the highest point on the east coast; the town of Erwin in the valley; off to the side, the town of Unicoi; in the distance, Washington County, which seems to be an abundance of farmland; and then in the far, far distance, Pinnacle and Buffalo Mountains. Absolutely gorgeous views. A couple day hikers were on the bald as well. Everyone is out trying to take in the nice weather while they can. We arrived at Deep Gap Campsite about 4:00 and actually found the blue blaze trail to the spring as listed in the book. It is quite unusual for us to find campsites listed in our guidebook, as they don't always seem to be well marked. We decided that the 18 mile planned day tomorrow was a bit much so we headed on up to Cherry Gap Shelter.A few miles after the campsite, we entered a really cool pine forest at the top of Unaka Mountain, at 5180'. It was a very thick plush pine forest with lots of moss and snow patches. The trail was very poorly marked through the pine forest. It looked like the trail could go many different ways but luckily we kept managing to connect the dots. We have actually started to call following the AT white blazes "connect the dots". You just hike from one dot (blaze) to the next. But anyway, a very cool forest, despite the confusion of the trail location. Brakeman took a picture of it.We arrived at the shelter at 6:00, after a 16 plus mile day, to find one section-hiker already there - a man in his 60s trying to do as much section hiking of the trail as he can. He said he realizes that he probably won't be able to get it all done as it's just not really feasible to section hike without a huge support team. Later in the evening, a thru-hiker and his dog arrived. We believe this is the hiker that pulled into Hogback Ridge Shelter at 9:00 the other night and pitched beside us. That day threw everyone off, as the shelter seemed to be much further than our books said. We walked over to talk with him. His name is Hammer and his little terrier dog is named Nails, thus Hammer and Nails. He started a couple days behind us and we remember the Fontana Dam Hike Inn owners saying that he was about a day or two behind us at that point of our hike. Unfortunately, he has numbness issues in his feet and spent 3 days in Hot Springs to see a doctor and rest in an attempt to get better. The trail doctor basically told him the numbness would disappear in about a year. I think he's trying to slow down to get his body issues under control. He appears to be struggling a bit both physically and mentally, as he really just wants to get the miles cranking again. Catch 22. Apparently he and the dog have done 40-mile day hikes. Nails does not carry anything nor does he wear any special pads on its feet. The dog seems to be having a blast out here. He spent most of the evening jumping and rolling in the leaves, after hiking all day! Dang, if only we had that kind of energy upon arriving at camp!   Hammer is from Boston and went to a college in Gettysburg - a real nice man probably in his 30s.Today was just a delightful day. We had clear blue skies. Although there was frost on the cars in the Holiday Inn Express parking lot this morning, it eventually got quite warm - probably in the upper 60s. We hiked in shorts and t-shirts and remembered to put on our sunscreen. Today we both realized how much more relaxing it is when the weather is warm and we're not in a survival mode. In addition, the days are longer so were not in quite a rush to get to camp. We're really looking forward to having slightly warmer temperatures all the time and longer days to make the days very calm, peaceful and relaxing. Believe it or not, it's almost 9:00 and we¢re not asleep. We're in our tent with an almost full moon lighting up our vestibule. We tried to get a picture of the pretty moon. It's still about 50 degrees, but a cold front is supposed to be moving in, perhaps tomorrow. We have our water in the vestibule for tonight. It should be fine, but we¢ll check it at our midnight nature call to make sure it is not freezing. We walked through some snow patches today and I imagine we'll hit some more tomorrow, so we're going to need to keep an eye on our water filter and water over these next few days to make sure they do not freeze. Goodnight from North Carolina and Tennessee, soon to be Virginia!