Date: 2017-11-11
From: Hickory Flats cemetery

To: Springer Mountain
Miles today: 6.3
Weather: clear sky

I'm hiking along an old forestry road beside Long Creek and it's been an increasingly disconcerting span of time since I last saw a white blaze. This is worrying, for matters of ego as much as of navigation, since I'm more than 2,184 miles into the Appalachian Trail and less than two hours from becoming a triple crowner. After avoiding nearly all navigational snafus on the AT so far, there is NO WAY I'm going to let myself get lost on the final five miles. I even keep looking around, thinking that being so close to the start of the trail would mean the marking for nobos would be exaggeratedly frequent and clear, but there's still nothing. I'm grateful that I'm using the Guthook app rather than the mapless AWOL AT guide because it means I can check what topography the trail is supposed to be going through. It concurs with the trail I'm following but it'd be nice to have a white blaze as confirmation.Finally, after what must be more than a mile, there's a white blaze and my concerns evaporate but it's also a reminder of the need for vigilance, even though I'm so close to the end. Hubris, RT, hubris... Last night plunged down to temperatures that made me grateful that this is final time we'll sleep outside. Even this morning called upon element of my high-altitude mountaineering experience of how to get going when temperatures are below freezing. Today for the first time on the entire trip, I've kept my fleece on even after warming up, opting to go slowly to keep my temperature under control rather than strip back a layer. Although I'll admit that the paucity of white blazes along Long Creek also had me sweating, albeit for different reasons.I'd left ahead of the others with the theory that it means we'll arrive at the southern terminus at Springer Mountain at about the same time but they certainly looking like they were in no hurry to leave -- and if there's one thing I know about Team KRT after 1200 miles, it's that they enjoy smelling the roses along the way. And after all, our only deadline today is the Sobo Hiker Wedding of Ash and Jay at the southern terminus at 3pm. All this meant I decided to go even slower than my non-sweating policy required, including a side trip into Stover Creek shelter. There was an AT maintenance crew training session going on here, so I had the chance to thank those who'd helped make the trail easy to hike (white blaze gaps notwithstanding) and who do so for future generations of thru-hikers. In time I returned to the trail and completed the climb up towards Springer Mountain, eventually stepping into the parking lot at the forest service road just 0.9 miles from the southern terminus. I saw Nine's dad sitting in his car and jumped in to enjoy much warmer conditions, thinking the others were still behind me, and it was only after chatting to him for 10 minutes or so that I realised that the others had already been through and were actually ahead of me.Hubris, RT, hubris!So I hauled up the gentle climb up to Springer Mountain and once the top was just in sight through some low shrubs, I pulled out Train's coconuts and clip-clopped my way up the final 50m to the others.The end of any thru-hike is usually an anticlimax and so it was here. I'd been working towards this moment for five and a half months but just like life itself, thru-hiking is always about the journey rather than the destination. Team KRT gets it done: www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7mAHv...2am's family was present and had managed to find some Lazy Hiker beer to celebrate the end of the trail and our newfound status as lazy non-hikers. Props to him: he'd done the official trail the whole way and, apart from the ascent of Katahdin, had eschewed all options to slackpack. His parents seemed unsure exactly what to make of the rest of us!Sriracha and Sweetblood also had a bunch of friends from North Carolina who did the final 0.9 miles with them, bearing bottles of bubbly. And Ole Man, who we'd last seen at Woods Hole hostel, also turned up, which was a bit of a shock.It was still pretty cold so after an hour or so on top, we wandered back to the parking lot, where Dirt's father was due to meet us. He'd driven over from his home in Alabama and brought trays of Subway sandwiches and beer, which we enjoyed as we sat around in the wan sunshine, soaking in the idea that we'd finished with the AT.2am headed away with his family and Happy Feet also headed off on the long journey back to Maryland. We'd seen plenty of hikers go over the last five and a half months and it was always with the knowledge that our paths might cross again. The oddest thing about finishing is that the realistic option is that we won't cross paths by chance.The rest of Team KRT were keen to attend Ash and Jay's reception down in the valley tonight but had been a little ambivalent about being present for their actual wedding at the southern terminus. I'd been keen on both, thinking it was an appropritately epic and memorable way to finish an epic hike and, through dint of inertia, we were still hanging around the car park when 2pm rolled around and the first of the wedding guests started arriving. This was enough to swing the momentum towards the rest of us attending the wedding.The members of the Second Breakfast Club had finished yesterday and looked disconcertingly clean, wearing suits or elegant dresses, while people like Beast were sporting haircuts and trimmed beards. Three Goldilocks and the Bear, who'd finished with them yesterday, also reappeared in polite attire. We, of course, looked like the dirty homeless hikers we'd been until about an hour before.We rocked back up the 0.9 miles to the southern terminus for the wedding, which because of some essential car breakdown, ended up starting an hour late -- remarkably good considering the logistical challenges involved.It was a humbling event. Ash's brother David, who'd done the thru-hike with them, gave a stirring speech and it was just nice to be around a really cool couple who together are more than the sum of their parts. And if they can survive thru-hiking the AT, marriage should be a breeze!So we made our way back to the road, where we drove back to Amicalola Falls Lodge, where Nine's dad had booked a room big enough for everyone who remained from Team KRT. Soon we'd showered and changed into the least manky clothes we possessed, which is about as glam as we were capable of getting.We then made our way to the wedding reception, which was a fun affair in which we had the chance to celebrate with about 30 of those around whom we'd hiked for around five months. The feeling of being around those completing their first thru hike was something worth bottling, although our main focus tended to be on unbottling...Don't believe me? Just watch! www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpCqX_...Life is good.AT fact of the day: The "last time" moment of the day? Everything.