Date: 2008-01-03
From: Woody Gap, Hiker Hostel

To: Neels Gap
Miles today: 10.6
Weather: clear sky

I woke up this morning and went out to see Josh and Leigh cooking breakfast...and coffee was already made. :-))Superstar and I had a great breakfast and talked to Josh and Leigh all the while we were eating. Our plan today was to walk from Woody Gap to Neel Gap, then go eat some fried chicken at the Cookie Jar in Blairsville. :-))I walked outside and checked the temperature. It didn't seem too cold, so I just wore my shorts and a light jacket over my shirt. We finally got ready and headed up to Woody Gap. We got there at 10:30am and only had about 10 miles to walk. I told Josh that I would be back one more night since I have some banking business to take care of tomorrow before I'm out of the area for the rest of this walk. My truck has been parked along side of Superstar's truck up at Neel Gap. Our plan was to take one truck to Blairsville for dinner, then head back to Josh and Leigh's where I'll stay and Superstar will head for home and work tomorrow. It was 26 degrees when Josh dropped us off. That felt quite balmy after the weather we've been walking in. I started walking north and enjoying the snow. I got about 300 yards or so and saw some medium sized bear prints in the snow. It looked like he came off the mountain and headed to the water source to the left of the Trail. I also saw 3 sets of footprints walking north on the Trail, but none coming back. I wondered to myself if they may be looking for that lost girl and her dog that I heard about. I forgot to write about the Trail magic at Cooper Gap yesterday. We came down off the mountain and just before the gap, there was 2 RC Colas sitting in the snow in the Trail. I drank mine on the way up the next mountain.....nice, ice cold soda. Thanks to whoever left those!! :-)) It is an absolutely beautiful day for a walk today...bright blue skies, almost no wind and a mild feeling mid 20 degree temperature.It only took about 10 minutes into the walk before I took my jacket off and packed it away for the day. I got to the rock overlook on the way up Big Cedar Mountain sooner than I expected to. It is soooooo beautiful out here today!! I get into these walks and I feel like I'm the luckiest guy in the world to be able to be out here and walk through the woods and mountains every day. I've had some people sending my emails and signing my guestbook and asking about my winter gear and how it's working. I will start talking more about that in a few days when I get into the rhythm of this walk and journaling. I'll try to do that on a day when I'm not so long winded with everything else. ;-)) Another thing I've enjoyed is how nicely the springs and streams are running right now. I was a little worried about water when I first started thinking about this walk, but for now this area has plenty.Hokey Pokey emailed me last night and told me that I'd probably see some helicopters flying around today looking for that missing girl. Well, just an hour into the walk was the first of many that I saw today.On a personal note (for those of you who are squeamish close your eyes).....I tried wearing boxers because of the cold weather. I usually don't wear underwear, but thought it might work nice for this time of year, but they seemed to be bunching up and causing a little chafing, so I stopped and took them off and everything was good again for the rest of the day. Guess I can lose that weight for the rest of my walk. :-)) We stopped on a nice rock in the sun on Burnett Mountain to eat lunch. I saw a dog come around the corner of the Trail while I was eating, and a short time later a lady came walking up. She lives nearby and was out on a day hike to Bird Gap to clean up some garbage. We walked on and when we got to Jarrard Gap, I saw tire tracks. I didn't think you could get up there with a truck, but maybe it was another part of the search and rescue going on in the area.I looked up a little before I got to Bird Gap and had a great view of Blood Mountain and some people standing on the rock overlook on that summit. That's one of the great things about walking this time of year....the views because the leaves are all gone!! I started seeing lots of footprints in the snow from about half a mile before Bird Gap where the Freeman Trail comes into the AT. There were so many footprints that it seemed like a very large group had gone through the area. I was thinking it was going to be that way for the rest of the walk today, but when we did get to the Freeman Trail, the tracks went that way and only 2 tracks of walkers on the AT. I guess that means that they were looking mainly on the Freeman Trail for the girl. I heard voices over towards Slaughter Gap, but there were no footprints in the snow heading that way on the Slaughter Creek Trail. We made the climb to Blood Mountain summit. I climbed up on the rock overlook and took some pictures. I could look down and see 2 helicopters near each other going slowly over the tree tops below. I went down and there was actually a register in Blood Mountain Shelter, so I signed that and used more of my smiley face stickers. I looked around inside the shelter and I'm pretty sure I saw some graffiti etched in the wood beam that said;¢Lone Wolf Slept Here". Ha!! ;-)) We headed down the mountain and in about 10 minutes, one of the helicopters spotted us and came in for a closer look. I was looking at the chopper and could see the guys face as he was looking at us. They took off and started slowly hovering over the trees and working from lower on the mountain towards the top. There were several helicopters around checking different areas and we got checked out one more time before we got to Neel Gap. Winton, Alpine and Squarel all came back in from being in the woods searching for the girl right after Superstar and I got there. We talked a little about the situation....very sad.Superstar and I got ready to head to Blairsville and Cola Monkey came out and said that Agent Smith wanted to talk to us. He was at the Byron Reese parking area just 1/4 mile from Neel Gap. I drove down there and even though it had a road barrier and said it was closed, I drove in. It was a busy, busy area with GBI, SAR, state police and local police. I parked when I couldn't go any farther and we started walking up to the main group of people. I stopped one official looking person and asked where Agent Smith of the GBI was because he wanted to talk to us. I was told they were getting ready for a meeting at Vogel State Park and that she was on her way there now. She took my name and cell # and said she would give it to Smith. We headed to town and had that fried chicken dinner, then headed back to the Hiker Hostel. Phew!!! What a day of mixed feelings of joy and wonder of the day and the beauty of the day....and the sadness of what is going on in this area I walked through today. My prayers go out for that young girl and her dog that are missing. It couldn't be a worse time because of the weather over the last couple of days.