Date: 2010-04-11
From: campsite by stream

To: Deer Park Mtn Shelter
Miles today: 13.1
Weather: clear sky

A decent average hiking day = fairly big day for us. Yesterday , just after Max Patch, we passed a woman who made camp early afternoon just into the woods past the open grassy area. BTW, I didn't explain what Max Patch is- its a big grassy topped mountain called a bald. They don't really know what causes certain mountains to be bald, its not treeline as its still too low, and not all mountains have them. Those mountains that are bald however, are fantastic. It is a lot like going above treeline in the sense, you hike up and up and the trees dwindle and then you have expansive views. On great days, they are amazing. In crappy weather, they are exposed and windy and not be lingered upon. There are some bald spots on mountains south of Max Patch, but nothing quite as expansive. Max Patch is just a special place. I have been lucky to have three relatively good days on the three times I have been there.        So we passed this woman, she was in her 40's or 50's and had the look of a thruhiker. She caught up with me this morning hiking and slowed her pace to talk to me. She had thruhiked last year and had come out again to hike to Trail Days. I told her of our hike and told her about having friends living near Suches GA that helped us out a lot in the beginning. She was hiking in front of me and she stopped in the trail and turned around suddenly. "what are their names?"         "Homeless and Unemployed!". Turns out she met them on the trail last year when they hiked the first 200 miles as a warm up for the PCT (which they did not get to do because Unemployed/Mary Ann was diagnosed with breast cancer about 6 months after I was). Now I remember Mary Ann mentioning another hiker she knew starting March 20th and hoping she would get to see her at Neels Gap. Her name is Nature.         She ended up at the same shelter we did, tho she got there much earlier, and then decided to move on a little bit to get into Hot Springs really early. She made a wise decision as there was a lot of chatter around the shelter late in the evening. We were the only ones tented in front of the shelter, everyone else was behind the shelter. Two guys staying in the shelter were talking not so quietly way past dark, talking about online poker of all things. Didge got up and asked them to keep it down and they were very apologetic.         A big group caught up to us today- we had taken a break with some of them at a rock outcropping on top of Bluff Mountain. I was dead set on staying at Elmer's, and I wanted a private room for us, so I called to see if I could make a reservation for tomorrow, as I knew even only 3 miles out of Hot Springs, many other hikers would beat us to town and Elmer's fills up first. I got the reservation, but when a couple of other hikers tried to call and make reservations, they had decided they weren't taking reservations and it was first come first serve. I felt somewhat bad, but not really, since all of them could hike faster than me and I don't think any of them were after a private room which was my main concern.         They seem like a good group of people, roughly even gendered, which is rare. Klarity, Flycatcher, and Red Lobster are the girls; Power Nap, Sweet Tea, Tattoo and the Crusher are the guys. Crusher is french canadian and there were some other french speaking section hikers camped here tonight so they were very social.