Date: 2013-04-03
From: Beech Gap

To: Winding Stair Gap
Miles today: 19.1

Well we started the day determined. Invisible said his legs felt much better and we had heard the weather was due to turn nasty overnight so we wanted to push for Winding Stair Gap and a shuttle into Franklin. I had also had text messages from Army Ant that he, Mother Teresa and Wilson were hiking a short day into Franklin for a zero as well.We got underway at 8:55 (hey - we aren't morning people, at least while mother nature has the heat turned off at night).All the way to Mooney Gap was more of the AT you get in the brochures. The third day of fine hiking weather in a row and some of that really enjoyable trail. It becomes a case of one million dollar view, followed by another for hours on end. We are starting to notice far more bird noises as the woods wake up from winter. When we started we both commented how incredibly still and dead the woods seemed with no leaves, no birds, not even insects. So different from Australia. Now we are noticing more insects, birds and today we saw a small black mole or shrew cross the trail in front of us and disappear down a little burrow under some leaves.And then came Albert Mountain.I have said how I am not doing uphills well. Well Albert Mountain is definitely uphill. It has a "kick" for the last few hundred yards/metres that definitely caught me fair in the solar plexus. At the top is a fire tower. Invisible took my camera and climbed the tower to take some pictures. I did not have enough left in me to do it.This also marked the first 100 miles of trail. Given all our stops I didn't feel like celebrating as we have taken so long to get this far.We only had one dehydrated meal left so we made the decision to cook and eat it there for lunch and essentially make Franklin tonight whatever it took.It was after 2:00pm when we left Albert Mountain for the remaining 9.7 miles to Winding Stair Gap.We did very good time and stopped at the brand new Long Branch Shelter for a privy stop and to filter water. While there I took a pic of the infamous carving that Rifle did a couple of months ago that drew so much flak for him on Whiteblaze.net and Trailjournals.com. After Long Branch it was exactly 3.5 miles of excellent trail to Rock Gap shelter and we covered it in exactly 60 minutes. We felt like we were hiking. We didn't stop at Rock Gap but continued straight on. At Wallace gap started our last climb of the day and it wouldn't have been too bad except the previous 16 miles was catching up with us. We hiked slowly up and eventually began the descent into Winding Stair Gap. Invisible rang the Budget Inn but they were booked out (there are a LOT of hikers out here) and the number for the Sapphire Inn rang out. So we liaised with Army Ant who ensured we had a room reserved at the Microtel. Unfortunately this didn't include a shuttle.We got to the gap and Groundhog was waiting for a shuttle ride to the Budget Inn. The rest of his group had got a shuttle from Rock Gap but he had missed the change of plans. We tried hitching briefly but traffic was light and then Ron Haven showed up to take Groundhog in. We offered to pay for a shuttle but he wouldn't do it unless we cancelled our booking at MicroTel and booked at the Sapphire. We couldn't do that as Army Ant had already committed to our room. We then rang one of the numbers Army had given us for the local hiking club and within 10 minutes we were picked up by Mike and Nancy and driven to the Microtel. We gave them $10 as a donation to their club.