Date: 2004-05-05
From: Derrick Knob Shelter

To: Semper Fi
Miles today: 7.2

For the sake of nutrition, my morning meal includes Carnation Instant Breakfasts. On this particular morning, my cup was dirty. I did not want to bother having to boil water and sterilizing the cup, so I tried a different approach. I shook into my mouth some of the Carnation powder then took a hit of water from my water bottle. Yuk! Never again. Five minutes after I started hiking, it started to rain. The umbrella was helpful up to a point. My "breathable" shoes were useless and my socks and feet became soaked. (When outfitting for this hike, I opted for breathable shoes knowing they would be ineffective in repelling water).The misery of hiking in the rain did not prevent me from marveling at the beauty of the nearby hollows and depressions which became immersed in plumes of fog that resembled smoke, hence the name Smoky Mountains. I stopped for lunch at a shelter and glanced at some of the messages in the register. One of them said: "Pope killed one with a shovel." I assumed that the deceased party was a mouse.The sun finally came out. I hiked slowly, lingering on the trail to observe a distant eagle soaring against the backdrop of a mountain side. I looked down into a wild hollow and wondered what it would be like to venture into it. I stopped to snap a photo of a multitude of wild flowers blooming on either side of the trail.When I reached Double Spring Shelter, I found the time to give myself a sponge bath. Then I ventured into the nearby woods to relax and write my journal. Later, near the campfire ring outside the shelter, I continued writing my journal. Inchworm and Greybeard were there, plus three other hikers I had never met. It was quiet and relaxing.And then the Marines arrived.Two young men partially clad in combat fatigues and wearing heavy packs charged down the trail in a foot race and collapsed into a happy heap of exhaustion by the camp fire ring. Behind them, six other members of their squad drifted in. They were hiking the Appalachian Trail in the park as a voluntary training exercise of some kind.In a sense, they took over the shelter. They hauled in firewood and started a fire. I helped them gather the wood. Their gear was strewn all over the place. The key man in the group was a gunnery sergeant, 31 years old. The younger soldiers called him Gunny. He was the quintessential marine, barking orders and communicating with military anachronisms."Head call" meant going to the outhouse."Taps at 22" meant the squad would go to sleep at 10:00 PM.The marines ate their MRE's around the camp fire circle. Off to the side, Greybeard quietly watched them. I knew from a previous conversation with him that he was an ex-marine who had been deployed to Vietnam. I could sense that Greybeard was enjoying the presence of the marines in our midst; it was as though he was looking at his past. Gunny looked over at Greybeard and asked him if he had served in the armed forces.Greybeard replied, "U.S.M.C""I want to shake that man's hand," announced Gunny with a southern drawl. The burly sergeant with the big knife on his belt got up, sauntered over to Greybeard, and shook his hand. Gunny and the other marines in the squad said that the hiking on the Appalachian Trail was exhausting them. They had no idea how difficult it was. They also said the trail conditions were hard to deal with.Gunny offered a solution."You get a company of combat engineers and some dozers." One of the marines talked about his past deployment to Iraq. He said that his strangest mission was tracking down stolen vehicles¢police vehicles.These marines have been a great bunch of guys to share this campsite with. And get this, not once have they uttered a profanity, possibly in deference to Inchworm, the only female here.