Date: 2004-03-22
From: Sarver Hollow Shelter

To: Four Pines Hostel
Miles today: 21.9
Weather: broken clouds

1. Start time: 08002. End time: 16453. Weather:        b. morning: The overnight was not as cold as expected, but a clear and sunny morning.        c. afternoon: clear and sunny, still cold        d: evening: clear and cold but stayed inside the heated hostel, so no big gig.4. Food        Dinner- meat pizza and Cheerwine from the corner store. Happiness is meat pizza, Cheerwine, and a woodstove.5. Trail description: Terribly cool today. Here are some of the names of the things that I passed: Hemlock point, Dragon¢s Tooth, Devil¢s Seat, Lost Spectacles Gap, Rawie¢s Rest. (tomorrow is even better)6. People: The Solemates, Joe Mitchell (owner of 4 Pines, he¢s a top shelf dude) , 2 really cool dudes from New York but I lost their info when my pocketmail died. One was Noah, and Jeff maybe?8. Money: About $20 for food and donation to stay9. Biggest complaint: The climb up the ridge to the Audie Murphy Memorial was pretty extreme, more like a Georgia climb but steeper and longer. But the day was too cool to complain about anything.10: Thoughts: Today is a great stretch of trail. Once up the ¢hill¢ to the old woods road which leads to the Audie Murphy Memorial, the trail is pretty mild. I spent a large chunk of time by the large granite marker which is in the area where Murphy¢s plane crashed about 33 years ago if I remember right. All of my exact info was again lost. He was the most decorated veteran of World War 2, I remember that. I think he got the Medal of Honor too as well as a broad spread of other decorations. It was very somber, to me at least. There were a couple of American flags which the winter had blown over as well as flowers that were scattered about. I did my best to straighten it all up and as I was picking up a flag I found 2 US Army ¢Core Values¢ cards. These plastic cards which resemble a credit card carry the creed and values shared by US soldiers. 2 men had come up the marker and left theirs there. I thought that was a pretty cool thing to do, I wish I still had their names.Anyways, the climb up to Dragons tooth which is a huge monolith of rock is very fun but the climb down is a little tricky, especially with a heavy pack. Lots of 3 feet drop offs which are manageable but make you a little nervous when you think about taking a wrong step and watching your femur poke through your zip-off pants.But the day was over before I would have liked and I found myself in the Joe Mitchell¢s pole barn up behind his house. What a great set up. Soon I had a fire blazing in the wood stove and gear hanging from hooks. Not long after I arrived 2 New York City lawyers waltzed in with backpacks. The cold air had gotten to them too, it was cold outside. I remember one was named Noah, but the other escapes me. If I remember right they prosecute child abuse and neglect cases. I wish we would have had more time to talk about that, seems like a pretty noble cross to carry. Not long after the Solemates walked in and later in the evening Joe took us all down to the local convenience store for pizzas and snacks. The pizza was great. I also tried to send out my journals which was quite unsuccessful. There was something wrong with my device, oh well. So that was depressing but the good food and better company made up for that.