Date: 2008-02-24
From: Blue Mt Shelter GA

To: Deep Gap Shelter GA
Miles today: 15.3
Weather: overcast clouds

Day 7 ¢ Sunday, February 24 ¢ Deep Gap Shelter GA ¢ Miles Today: 15.3 Total Miles: 64.0The Night of the Killer Attack DogsShortly after we went to bed last night, Brakeman heard something run by our tent. A little bit after that, something else ran by our tent and then it ran by in the other direction. Then we heard growling and barking. It sounded vicious. Oh no, wild dogs. Nobody moved. Everyone, including the Boy Scouts, scoutmasters and us, just laid in our tents trying to determine what was going on. There was no noise from anyone. Then we heard a tent zipper open and a Scoutmaster say, "YES, it's a BIG dog". Followed by the shout of "Go away". Then all of a sudden, one of the dogs started yelping like it was hit or hurt. Then the wild dogs ran back and forth in front of our tent. We weren't sure what was going on and both of us were a little too nervous to get out of the tent to investigate. Needless to say if anyone in camp had not taken care of their nature call before the wild dogs arrived, they were in deep doodoo.   You can go ahead and place both Brakeman and Grasshopper in that category. Instead some creative measures took place. We'll just leave it at that. Brakeman laid awake most of the night wondering how on earth we were going to break camp tomorrow without getting chewed alive by the wild dogs. Grasshopper had her earplugs in so she slept pretty well except for the nightmares of wild dogs. I don't think any of the scoutmasters were disturbed because none of them ever got up to see what was going on and we could hear one snoring loudly all night. Well, the next morning we got up and climbed out of the tent with a bit of fear.   How bad would the dogs attack? Brakeman turned around to see a dog standing right behind him and then another dog appeared. OH NO! But wait, they look like two very nice looking dogs. And friendly!! So friendly in fact that if we bent down, they probably would have licked our faces! WHEW! We went about our business of tearing down the tent and packing up, getting ready to go. The dogs stayed with us the whole time. As we headed down the trail, the dogs followed right along with us. After we walked about 2 miles, two guys came up the trail towards us; they were the owners of the dogs. We learned that they radio-collar the dogs and then send them out into the woods. These two dogs had been out for 24 hours. The dogs are trained to track down different animals and make them run until they are too tired to move anymore. The hunters, so-called hunters as the dogs do all the work, track the dogs with an antenna and when they see they have stopped, they're pretty sure they have tracked an animal and stopped it. Then they'll go into the woods and kill it. The two gentlemen mentioned the breed of the dogs but we couldn't catch what it was - something like blue rabbit carrier or black rabbit carrier. They were very friendly dogs. It was kind of neat to have them with us as we walked down the trail. Throughout the day, Grasshopper had the giggles every time she thought back to these vicious wild dogs surrounding our tent ready to attack the occupants! Ah, what darkness can do to the mind, huh??When we weren't watching the dogs this morning while breaking camp, we were watching an awesome sunrise from the Blue Mountain Shelter. It was quite pretty and we got several pictures. Hopefully, they'll turn out. We had a long day - over 15 miles - to Deep Gap Shelter so we wanted to make good time. Not only did we have a long day but also this was the day, according to the charts, that would have the steepest, longest inclines and declines in Georgia yet. We were anxious to see how they would compare to the Smokies. Today's inclines did not fail us; they were very steep. Again, several times Grasshopper would get the giggles over how ridiculously steep they were compared with what we were used to in the Smokies. The inclines and declines were greater in distance than all the other days in Georgia, but still shorter than the Smokies. That's OK, we'll take the easier days when they come. The inclines today were pushing about a mile each and forced us to stop a couple times to catch our breath. At GA75 Unicoi Gap, we met Coffee Cat and Dave, a British couple in their late 50s or maybe early 60s. Dave is doing his second AT thru-hike; his first one was in 1999. This time he¢s hiking with his wife, Coffee Cat ¢ so named for her love of coffee and cats. They are limited to a 6-month adventure due to visas. Very nice couple. They were slack packing out of Cloud Nine Hostel in Hiawassee and we leaped frogged them several times throughout the day. We gave Coffee Cat and Dave two chocolates Excel gels earlier today, our favorite, as they so graciously shared with us some delicious carrot cake. We thought that was a pretty even exchange, especially for Dave who loves his carrot cake. Despite the weather forecast for sunshine which we heard while at the Outfitter, it was cloudy and somewhat gray most of the day, with just a few moments of blue sky and just enough sunlight penetrating through to cast a shadow. But overall, a great day for hiking as the temperature was just a tad below 50, from morning to night. We're trying to make sure we don't complain that it's not sunshiny as those days will come and it's going to be too warm. And it was definitely not too cold today. The cold days will come too. So we're trying to make sure we appreciate these mediocre days to their fullest. As we walked today, we realized that we are running pretty much like a corporation, with each of us being a one-man department. Grasshopper is running the planning and logistics department. Brakeman is running sanitation (that means he carries the garbage), cooking, safety (that means he stays up all night to protect us), engineering (that means Grasshopper just says "Hey, I think it's going to be very cold tonight, below freezing, and we need to protect our water bottles, and he has to come up with a solution or we need a different way to rig up something in our packs and he has to come up with a solution for that). He also owns the photography department. We got to camp about 4:00 and did our normal camp chores. Here with us are Jay and DonkeyLegs. Jay recently graduated from high school in Chapel Hill and is heading off to Boston University in September. He has about 6-7 months to do this adventure. He started the trail much earlier in February but had to get off for about 10 days due to some personal business. Real nice young guy. We were surprised to see DonkeyLegs here. We figured he was half a day or so ahead of us. He unfortunately is sporting duck tape on both of his heels due to some nasty blisters. With all the pain that he was walking through today, he had moments as to whether this was what he really wanted to be doing.   Hopefully those moments were short-lived. I can imagine when each step is painful; those thoughts would be quite common. He's also still struggling with his sleeping gear. He's using a quilt and is finding it chilly to which I remarked that he'd better get ready for nights in the 20s or single digits in the Smokies. Sounds like he may be shopping soon. This was a rare evening for us as we actually got to sit around a shelter picnic table and socialize. About 6:00, the sprinkles started. We eventually broke our social club up and headed to the tent. By 7:00 the sprinkles turned into a light rain. Hey wait, the forecast was for sunshine. You gotta love these Georgia mountains. Tomorrow we enter civilization so we're going to crash, do a 3.5 mile hike out tomorrow to Dicks Creek Gap (US76) for our 10:00 prearranged pickup via the Hiawassee Inn crew. Goodnight!