Date: 2023-02-10
To: View Entry
Miles today: 0.0

"Behind Every Successful Man..."I have to give a lot of credit to my wife. Not only has she given her consent for me take on this endeavor, she is really supporting me in so many ways. I won't go into it all but I want to mention that up until now, she has been my only shuttle driver. We really enjoyed getting up really early on those, mostly Saturday, mornings and heading to a trailhead. That's because we would find and plan to go to a good breakfast place on the way and enjoy a good breakfast together. Breakfast may actually be our favorite meal of the day. You can't beat a good cup of coffee at a good breakfast restaurant.When the trailheads were in Georgia, we mostly ate at the Main Street Grill in Hiawassee. I think we ate there at least three different times. It was a great place to have breakfast. The service was good, as was the food. There was one of the times we went by way of Clayton GA and it was more convenient to have breakfast in Dillard than in Hiawassee. So on that particular morning, we enjoyed breakfast at the Valley Cafe in Dillard. Again, you couldn't ask for a better breakfast. Once I got to the point where the trailheads were north of Franklin but south of the Smokies, it became most convenient to have breakfast in Bryson City. Everett Street Diner was the place. Again, I think we ate there about three different times. They have a Mountain Man Breakfast there that truly is a breakfast for a hiker. They open at 7:00 am and there are usually people waiting in line at the door to get in. The owner of the restaurant is usually the one who seats you and he is very friendly and hospitable. When I had to leave my truck at Green's Corner Road in Tennessee near I-40, we went by way of Waynesville NC. That morning, we enjoyed breakfast at Mountain Beach Diner. They had a good hiker breakfast and it is just an excellent restaurant.Sorry to spend so much time describing places we had breakfast. But getting to spend time together and enjoying breakfast before she set me out on the trail was important. Even now that we are a few months past those days, she still remarks how much she enjoyed those mornings. I did too. In fact, when she sets me out on the trail at Green's Corner next Thursday, we plan to visit Mountain Beach Diner again.Early in my AT planning, we were out on the west end of our county and were driving by Winding Stairs Gap where the trail crosses Hwy 64. There was a hitchhiker. I figured they were a thru-hiker and was going to stop and pick them up and bring them to Franklin. My wife was very reluctant to pick up a hitchhiker but I persisted. It turned out the person was a female thru-hiker although you couldn't tell she was a female until we got closer. It turns out giving that lady a ride was one of the best things I could have done. This was probably the first thru-hiker my wife had ever met. The lady answered a lot of our questions and I think it put my wife's mind at ease about a lot of things. Although we didn't get her real or trail name, we learned that she had previously hiked the PCT and only that day had covered 34 miles of the AT!My wife still has a lot of trepidation about me taking to the trail. But over the last year she has learned a lot, as have I; and she is much more enthusiastic about me doing this than when she first consented. I am going to be depending on her a lot while I'm away and she is going to have a lot on her along with her responsibility of teaching a classroom of second graders. If you are a praying person, please pray for her.