Date: 2016-04-06
From: Captain's

To: Sarver Hollow Shelter
Miles today: 23.7
Weather: clear sky

Today's hike whooped my butt. I don't recall being as tired after a hike than I was after today's hike. The hike began and ended in near darkness. I woke up last night seeing twinkles from my tent, except that they turned out to be frosted twinkles inside my tent from condensation. After collapsing my tent, there was enough snow accumulated from within my tent to make a descent size snowball. I had to wipe down the condensation in my tent and on my down sleeping quilt as best as I could in order to remove the moisture that would be heavy on my back and break down my gear.After stowing my tent and gear, I went to the Captain's zip line set up to shuttle hikers to and from the AT to the Captain's beautiful yard. You can imagine the relief I felt a after my successful zip line crossing over the stream that separates the AT from the Captain's yard. The last thing I wanted to do was to call for help if I had gotten myself stuck mid-stream. The Captain's zip line contains a swing-like seat for me and a carabiner above for my loaded backpack. The push-off from one side doesn't get you completely over to the other side but another rope is available to pull the passenger to the other side. The zip line is fun, as is tenting on the Captain's property. Fresh Ground came from the prior shelter to pick me up on his way. We began hiking together around 7:15 and pretty quickly came to the blown down tree shown in the picture. Fresh Ground was good enough to hold that position long enough for me to take his picture after I threatened to push him back under the tree if he moved before the picture was taken. So the laughter today began early - so early that the discussion around the darkened picnic table used to prepare tonight's meals resulted in a number of comments that all contained how incredible it seemed that certain aspects of the AT had been undertaken during today's hike. Today's hike contained a significant descent before an 1800 foot climb. This is nothing we haven't done before except that this descent and climb seemed to contain endless rocks of all sizes. Rocks really slow down our pace as we have to pick our way through the trail. I came off one such rock while eating some Ritz crackers. Leaves covered the trail where I planted my left foot and I took a perfect slide on my butt for a few feet down the mountain's side. Fresh Ground witnessed the fall and kept laughing as I continually asked for his call as the ump. I wanted to know if I was "safe"' or "out" with my fictitious slide into home plate. Blues Brother and Rambo caught up to Fresh Ground and me just after I got up so the whole scene was explained in detail. The Kid told us later that he too had fallen there. This was my fifth fall of this hike and it was clearly my favorite. The last fall from a few days ago wasn't anywhere near as much fun because my right shin crashed into a rock and I'm still displaying that bloody bruise. The four of us (Blues Brother, Rambo, Fresh Ground, and me) hiked together for a while sharing our challenges as we hiked today's trail. The banter between us just goes on and on. I was remembered of this banter at the end of today's hike after two new hikers were introduced to us as we lumbered in to tonight's shelter after they were already in their sleeping bags for the night. Giggles and Tigger (this one being female and the second Tigger thru-hiking) said they were amused by our banter as we unloaded our gear to prepare to eat and sleep. This was the longest hike for each of us and the Kid called me out after I said that today's hike enabled us to consider hiking 22 miles tomorrow to get to Four Pines Hostel, from which Eddie at the hostel will shuttle us to Homeplace Restaurant for that delicious all-you-can-eat meal I've been hungry for the last couple days.We almost stopped at shelter 7 miles before this one. It was a tough call pushing out of that shelter just before 5:00 and knowing that some of us wouldn't arrive until just before darkness. We all made it though and the final climb of 800 feet, that seemed to mostly be a vertical climb with few switchbacks, took everything out of us just as we had expected. Also, as expected, we enjoyed hiking through open pastures for a few miles. This pasture hiking was a visual treat and I was glad those 3 cows could only look at me from the other side of the fence that separated us. Today whooped my butt. Tomorrow may whoop my butt too - but that's okay.