Date: 2005-03-27
From: Hot Springs, NC

To: Hot Springs, NC
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: broken clouds

start: Hot Springs, NC finish: Hot Springs, NCmiles: 0.0day: 20Aah, a wonderful night's sleep at Elmer's. Our bedroom has a door out to a second floor porch. The birds are madly chirping at dawn and it's gently raining - you can hear it on the roofs. Some trees are starting to flower in the yard - it must really be pretty here as Spring progresses.Enough procrastination. Time to get out of bed and pack up. Wandering downstairs... This is an amazing house, all 11 foot ceilings, 8 foot wide halls, dark wood floors, wainscoting and picture rails, wallpaper, antiques, and stained glass lamps. The double hung windows are huge, and many rooms have doors to access the gardens or the balcony.There is a cat named Monday that has taken up residence in my lap. Oops, the breakfast bell just rang. Gotta go!OK, that was a good breakfast, vegetarian-style. Pancakes and granola, juice and herbal tea.Checked out of Elmer's, thanking him for our stay, and proceeded down to the outfitter to buy a few band-aids and something like BodyGlide, but different, in a small tube. This is used to prevent blisters, etc.Speaking of blisters, I have a doozy. It started in the final 8 miles of our recent night hike and I didn't want to deal with it then. Now it hurts almost too much to walk. It's a deep one under a callous, and is inflamed. So I'm limping around this morning...... on down to our 10:00 appointment at the spa. Yes, the town is named accurately. There are natural springs at about 102 degrees, and our plan is to sit in a hot tub for an hour before hitting the trail. A hiker named Pace (aka Strawberry Lightning) joined Goldilocks and I. We had a great time including a jump into the nearby creek and back into the tub, and some good discussion about architectural design.Well, we were warned. It's just not possible to soak and hike, in that order. Without a care, we easily rationalized another full zero day - some lousy work ethic, eh? Actually, my bad blister was also feeling worse, not better after the soak, and I'm hoping a day off will help it.We wandered back to Elmer's and were offered to select a different room, to get another perspective of the house. We're now in a room where my bed is in a bay with windows on three sides. This is so hard to take.I feel bad because I learned yesterday that things aren't going well for Mrs. Moosie at home. The dog has been sick, with lots of diarrhea, and a tree fell in our driveway and damaged a corner of the roof. Luckily we have some really good friends who are helping her out. Thanks Xie, Doug, and Drew!We wandered back down to town. I updated my Pocketmail, and called home. Then we went to the outfitter again, where Goldilocks updated his journal, I checked some other journals, and... [drumroll please] I bought a hiking kilt! Aah, the freedom. And those breezes are cold. It's a fantastic tartan plaid polyester kilt that feels like worsted wool. It will dry quickly, and there will be zero chafing and sweat problems. This may not be anyone's favorite topic, but all hikers know what I'm talking about. This is gonna be hugely comfortable. It should also make it easier to hitch rides I'm sure all my non-hiker friends and relatives are cringing reading this, afraid to say they know me. Oh well.I bought a ripe avocado and brought it back to the hostel and shared it with Goldilocks, Olive and Yum (Erica's trying on that for a trail name). Yum's cutting up cans making an alcohol stove.Some of us are planning to go over to the diner for dinner soon. Time to feed the hikers again.Had a great group dinner at the diner: Goldilocks, Traction, Yum, Olive, Camel, Sabotage and Running Moon were all there.We all went back to the house and settled in the music room (yes, there's a music room, and the house is also chock full of books!). Goldilocks and Olive played guitars for about 4 hours, with Sabotage leading the vocals. He knows an incredible amount of song lyrics, and sounds just like a young Bob Dylan. The rest of us just sang and requested songs (lots of Dylan, Dead, Neil Young, and other stuff), and played bongos and the like. We were joined throughout the evening by Sam (aka Turtle SOBO 2004), Red Blaze, Easy and Dave (two more Deadheads, woohoo), Pace, and perhaps one or two others. Man, we had fun.It's been raining since dinner, and now it's almost midnight (real, not hiker's), and it's still coming down, and windy too.