Date: 2006-04-07
From: Over Mountain Shelter

To: Campsite
Miles today: 17.1
Weather: scattered clouds

Long day..Going to be an even longer night. Tonight, I know is going to be one of those nights where every sound is going to make me jump. At the moment, we are at a campsite about 8 miles out from 19E in Tennessee, where we had a few creepy occurances. This is a place where thru-hikers are urged to be very cautious. There is some bad blood with the locals and they do not take very well to thru-hikers.However, we probably brought the uneasy feeling tonight upon ourselves. Even though we are told to use caution around the area of 19E we all decided to go ahead and make our way to a restaurant that is only about 1.5 miles down the road. We just couldn't pass up real food.When, Swansons, Snake and I got to the road, the rest of the guys were a ways behind us and we decided we'd have an easier time trying to hitch just the three of us. We still had 8 more miles left to do that day and it was already 12:30pm, but hey, Miss Janet told us if a few hours are going to make or break a hike then you are doing something wrong. In other words, stop and smell the rocks and treat yourself..So, we did. And at first we were super glad we did. We got a hitch from an awesome guy and had burgers and cokes at the Country House Restaurant. (Great burgers! Go there!) Then, we walked to J's Market and resupplied on candy. It was sunny and hot and we hung outside the market eating various desserts and drinking Dr. Pepper. No Worries, Little Brother, Stinky, Orangutan and Jevus showed up walking. Poor guys couldn't get a hitch for the one mile. They couldn't be lazy! We were the lazy ones. So, the guys went on to the restaurant and we began walking back to the trailhead. Some guy passed in a truck and yell out "Stay away", or we think that is what he said, and that is when we first started to realize maybe we should have just kept hiking. But, the burgers were worth it. About .5 miles from the trail head another truck drove passed us and a deafening sound rang out, which stopped us dead in our tracks. I was convinced it was probably just his car back firing but the guys had other things to say about it. So we walked faster and were relieved to get to the trail head and back into the woods. The first stretch was littered with garbage and we had to cross another road which irked us even more. It was like a whole different trail now and we just wanted to get away from all the logging roads an off roading trails.By the time we got to our campsite for the night it was getting dark and the thunderheads were rolling in. I was so tired and done with the day that I ate a bagel for dinner. I never thought I would not want a hot dinner.The thunder storms are heading in so I'm going to start wrapping this up, so I can close my eyes and pretend I don't see the lightning over my poor little tent. After dinner, it all pretty much went like this...Couple stories about run-ins with cops, me being nervous about angry locals coming to get us, then once we were all tucked in our tents...Snake caught the weather forecast on his radio---went like this..."Uh, guys?" "Yeah?" "Tornado warnings for this area overnight". "Oh yeah?"   Few moments of silence.   Then I say..."what do we do if a tornado hits? Grab a tree?"   We left it at that....then the storms hit. But we didn't have to hold on for dear life or anything....so it was a good night..