Date: 2005-03-31
From: Wesser Bald Shelter, NC

To: Nantahala Outdoor Center, NC
Miles today: 5.5
Weather: moderate rain

Day 18, in which Jess thinks cheesy thoughts and immediately falls down, gets ditched by her travel companions (who claim illness and a desire to get braces), undergoes an extreme makeover by way of hot water and soap, eats like a lumberjack, gets patronized by an overgrown boy scout seeking a merit badge in chivalry, and crashes early, causing Tammy to wonder if the Trail ever closes for winter: Another day significantly shorter than planned. Are we sensing a trend here?Packed into the shelter like sardines last night. It rained hard in the early morning, and I was glad to be under a roof. We saw headlamps of night-hikers go by at 2 AM and wondered who on earth was walking through at that hour. Despite the rain it was a significantly warmer night than several previous, and so I slept much better-- temperature is, I've found, the single most indicative factor of how well I sleep.Scholar took off early again, and soon after I ambled down the trail. The walk was muddy and rainy, but warm; thunder rolled long and low, and small white wildflowers shone in the mist, which pooled in every valley on the way down. From each lookout, I stopped to look at the moss-covered trees, and the way the peaks jutted out above a low-lying sea of clouds, soft and white. "If Avalon were a mountain," I thought, "it'd look like this," and then I fell in the mud. Easy come, easy go.Cuppa Joe and I arrived at the NOC only to get two mildly alarmig pieces of news: first, Scholar, who had arrived a half-hour or so earlier, apparently hadn't been feeling well, and had just hitched a ride with MotherGoose into Fontana to take a rest day. In her aggravatingly stoic manner, she hadn't said a word about feeling ill-- just took off early. Hope all is well, Scholar-- we'll miss you til we catch each other again! Second, Weatherman was there, but was heading into town to get his ankle x-rayed, and he hoped, to get fitted for what he called a "Forrest Gump brace"-- orthopedic, ankle connected to the kneebone connected to the thighbone, and all that. He said he'd meet us in Fontana, too, some 30 miles north.We found as well-- and bid a fond farewell to-- the RNGFA, who, as it turned out, had been camping up on Wesser Bald only to awaken past midnight to the thunderstorm rolling in. Preferring not to die up on the tower, they'd quickly broken camp and headed down the mountain in the wee hours of the morning-- they were, as it turned out, the night-hikers we'd seen go by at 2 AM.I picked up my maildrop (also a delightful package from Jaime-- thanks!), threw a load of laundry in the machine, and headed for the showers; afterward, for the second time in 2 1/2 weeks, someone with whom I've conversed prior to showering has failed to recognize me post-shower. This time it was the NOC front desk receptionist. "You look different," he said. "It's amazing what a little soap will do," I said. Next time this happens I think I will say, "You should see me in a prom dress."So the plan-- the actual, honest plan, had been to hike into the NOC, shower, eat, do laundry, pick up maildrops, and hike a few miles out and camp for the night. But somehow, by the time the errands were all finished (I nearly fell asleep in my lunch-- an enormous salad, big honking sandwich, and cup of soup, of which I said, "I'll never be able to finish all this," and then somehow, twenty minutes later, it was just gone), and I say down to finish a postcard or two-- it was already 5:00. And the weather report said big, nasty thunderstorms were on the way in. And so somehow Cuppa Joe and I found ourselves reserving bunks. How does this happen?A nice evening, though. Ran into Domino, Jake, Raz, and Bearbait. Interesting conversation with Raz, who's never been north of the Mason-Dixon line (until this trip, I'd never been further south, in this country, than Chapel Hill, NC) and who thinks everyone on the trail is a crazy hippie liberal. I said I wasn't so sure-- but to just wait til we hit my turf. He's a good guy-- both of the Bruces are.Only downside to the evening was an inescapable run-in with a hiker I will call Gearhead (not his real not-real name), who took it upon himself to tell me all about how the bionic robot knees alarmed him and I'm carrying too much weight (I think my pack's pretty reasonable) and Packweight Is Fear and I'm bound to blow my knees out and if I don't do that I'll burn out my stomach on ibuprofen (which I am not even taking that much of anymore, for his information) and be forced off the trail anyway. "Asshole," I thought to myself, and smiled and thanked him for his concern. But perhaps with a slight edge in my voice.Now, though, it's quiet, mostly, and I'm sitting writing in the common room. A stranger in the back is talking about cocaine. Two twelve-year old girls just got in a catfight and broke a window. Ah, civilization.Thought of the day: You know you've been hiking too long when you see the Nantahala River and think to yourself, "Damn fine water soure-- shame it's wasted, this close to town."