Date: 2015-03-26
From: Hot Springs

To: Spring Mountain shelter
Miles today: 11.0
Weather: light rain

Had another lie in today, didn't check out of the hostel until 9.30. Brightside and her mum fortunately met me just as I was about to leave. Yesterday they spent the day doing their own thing, and now today Brightside has a new backpack. It's another Osprey (the latest Aura 65 AG), and has more padding and frame than her old one. I've tried it on, and though it's heavier than mine, it's very comfortable and well fitted. Hopefully it will make her shoulders and hips feel much better. We stopped at the diner, where I had biscuits and gravy. It was very filling, and I definitely like the American version of biscuits and gravy. I have also been enjoying the sweet tea here, though it is definitely 90% sugar. My favourite diner food will always be pancakes though. From there, Brightside met the yearbook people whilst I went inside the Hiker Ministry. The yearbook people are taking photos of as many thru hikers as possible and put it in a year book, with names and email addresses. It's a nice idea, I might get one at the end. Also, the Hiker Ministry had some fresh cookies to start off my hike with. Then, we said goodbye to Brightside's mum and followed the trail through Hot Springs and up into the mountains. Today was another beautiful sunny day. There was also absolutely no wind at all. The majority of the hiking today was uphill, of varying intensity. Within 10 minutes of hiking, I was already pouring with sweat - absolutely streaming down my face. There was a bit of trail magic half way up the first leg in the form of chewy granola bars. I took one and moved on. Hiking today felt like it took a long time, because of the intense heat and enormous amounts of sweat. Within an hour, I had caught up to Brightside and the Rhode Island Express. They were all standing around a pond, with Frodo and Chef fishing. We saw a frog and some newts. The boys said that they saw a large water snake, and caught 2 small sunfish which they threw back. The trail was gentler after that, with a lot less climbs and sweat. There was a section of the forest today that was being burned, as part of a prescribed burn. It was quite cool to see one side of the trail that was normal, and the other side was all burnt on the ground. But it was impressive how none of the trees were damaged (at least none of the healthy ones). However, it was actually hard to walk through the smoke. I was already hot, and the smoky air made it even harder to breathe. Eventually I made it to Spring Mountain shelter, where I met Amy and Beaker (who left shortly after). The shelter is only 11 miles from Hot Springs, but today felt unnecessarily difficult. Possibly because of the heat, possibly because I haven't hiked for 2 days and my body has completely forgotten how to do that. My feet were painful as usual, with the blister on my right little toe and the one on my left heel still causing the biggest problems. But I think wearing liners and my new socks has stopped me from getting new blisters today- though the smaller mileage also makes a huge difference. Tomorrow we are aiming for about 20 miles. The weather is expected to be very bad. I can hear the wind picking up already. The chance of rain is 100% tonight, so I'm happy to be in the shelter.