Date: 2010-04-05
From: Cosby Knob Shelter

To: Standing Bear Farm hostel
Miles today: 10.4
Weather: broken clouds

Day 30 I am in hiker heaven, Standing Bear Farm hostel. Bunkhouse, cabins, kitchen/dining cabin, computer cabin, laundry cabin and the shining city on the hill otherwise known as the resupply cabin. Lots of thrus here too. The bunkhouse is full so I have this single cabin I am splitting with Slackimus. $7.50 each. Nice. I was up very late sitting around the fire chatting.The hike here was mostly downhill, but there were some tough spots. A fitting goodbye to Mr Smokey Mountain who had been this big menacing presence that everyone had been worried about since day 1 on Springer. All the horror tales- 6' snow drifts, ridge runners losing the trail, people stumbling out with frostbite. Endless discussions on whether we should take the lower trail, skip the smokies or suffer through it as far as we can get. Turned out that mean old mountain Smokey is really just a great big huggable Teddy bear. It was nowhere near as hard as we thought and it had some of the best ridgeline hiking that I have ever done. Even postholing in the snow was a new and cool experience for me. I thoroughly enjoyed the past week once the rain stopped.Today was pretty hot though. High in the 80's and the mountain was very dry once you got below the snow line. Towards the bottom I got into a lot of pine trees. With them, the arrid dusty trail and the hot temps it was almost like being back in Wilmington, NC. Well, if you take away the steeply sloped trail and the big old mountains. Thankfully in the lower elevations there are bigger creeks and the trail followed one as it cascaded down the mountainside. At the bottom of one cascade it grew deep enough to wade in. Chewy was there washing his clothes and soaking in it so I kicked off my shoes and joined him. Very nice. I rinsed out my footage (bandana) and washed my legs arms my face and even behind my ears like momma taught me. When I arrived at the hostel most of the people I had been staying in shelters with the last few days were here. The trail communities are pretty interesting. Up until gstlinburg I was pretty much seeing the same group of people every night. Coming out of gburg I hiked 7 miles further than my regular crew and found myself in the middle of a totally different trail family none of which I had ever seen before gburg. Lots of tiny bubble communities that will merge and mingle and regroup, but generally just grow into one big bubble spread over 100 miles on the trail. Pretty awesome. And like they wanted in the movie Bill and Teds Excellent Adventure, everyone out here is being excellent to one another. Rock on, Dudes. With that said it was a pretty good feeling to see Kashmir and Squash here as well as hermit. I've been hiking with those guys off and on since the beginning. Then the Slackimus showed up after a 19 mile day. Crazy dude. The rest of team Godat (Qtip trinket and swift) may not arrive for two more days.So I have been concerned that this journal is probably pretty boring and repetitive to anyone not living the dream. This is your chance to spice it up. If you have a question or want to know anything that o haven't been talking about ask in in a guestbook entry. If I can answer it I will, but I may have to change the names to protect the innocent (and the not so innocent).So good night and sweet dreams to everyone out there not living the hiker heaven Dream.