morvasaaty/AppalachianTrail-LD-Hikers-Blogs-and-Weather-20-years huggingface dataset:
Date: 2003-03-30
From: Erwin, TN

To: Erwin, TN
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: light snow

Day 31: Zero Day in ErwinIt snowed, it snowed. It snowed a lot. A foot or so up in the mountains, with higher drifts in many places. I'm so glad I was safe and warm in Erwin. Miss Janet was busy today picking up hikers who were able to blaze trail down from the mountains to a road crossing and call her from the nearest house. Miss Janet's place was absolutely packed because all the hikers in town hang out there during the day, even if they are staying somewhere else for the night. I was glad to see that hikers had a place to go to be together. It is people like Miss Janet that make the Trail a community instead of just a Trail.Dean and I spent a lot of time at the diner, drinking milkshakes and watching the war news on TV while listening to 50's music on the radio, and just generally trying to get away from the crowds. Miss Janet drove a load of us to Johnson City to go to a movie, and we were having fun on the ride to Johnson City until a fellow hiker advocated beating up gay people. We were talking about how short of stature some actors are (I don't know why), and this guy said "Keanu Reeves is short, and he needs to be beaten because he's a faggot". How charming. If the Trail is a microcosm of American society, I think I'll buy a gun for self-defense and stop smiling so much.The collection of people showing up at Miss Janet's was interesting. There was the guy who had his hand down his pants when he talked to me back at Low Gap on Day 3; Ounce and his Three-Legged Dog, and Snuggles and Apollo, who had been part of the female triumvirate and entourage, always a few days ahead of me. While in Erwin, I walked two miles down to the Pizza Plus to watch the Tennessee Lady Vols basketball team whoop up on Villanova to make it into the Final Four for the umpteenth time. It was a very close game for the first half. Villanova has an awesome team. I must make it to Damascus in time to watch Pat Summit lead at the Big Dance. I ran the two miles back to Miss Janet's. People who are not from the South are continually amazed at the communication patterns of the people. I went to the post office, and 20 minutes later, came back to Miss Janet's with a cursory version of the interesting life history of the post master. All you have to do is ask questions and then listen. People will tell you amazing things. I also got a lot of information on the police officer who was in line in front of me.
Date: 2003-03-31
From: Erwin, TN

To: Erwin, TN
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: overcast clouds

Here is a story by my famous fellow thru-hiker Martin from Austria to his friends back in Europe, reprinted here with permission from Martin:An anecdote to show in what tiny and remote villages (like Hot Springs, NC) I end up in. I wanted to have my hair cut, well, shaved off, would be the appropriate term. To do that I went to the 'beauty'. Well house, with a 'beauty' sign in front of it. As I enter, there is this elderly lady (70+) there in this old room with mobiliar from the 50ies and I think it's unreal, but I think I can't draw back now and I gotta be brave, and it will give a nice story and in the end, there is not so much you can do wrong with shaving somebody's hair.So the lady is very interesting. We talk about history and Iraq, and she likes reading history. She is all excited about having a client from Austria. So while she is doing her business, manouevering the razor blades around my neck with her shaky hands, she tells me about how recently an elderly couple came in and she was giving the man a haircut. And in the end, the man somehow mentioned that he was a judge. And she answered,'Oh good that you tell me this now and not earlier, otherwise I would have been scared the whole time giving you this haircut.' Can you imagine how I felt? Well, she didn't cut me, and as I said before, you can't do anything wrong making a head bald. She was a lovely lady. The price for the chat and that operation: $3 (+tip). Now there you can see how small and remote Hot Springs is. Bye, Martin
Date: 2003-04-02
From: Cherry Gap Shelter

To: Stan Murray Shelter
Miles today: 19.8
Weather: clear sky

Day 34: Groan Mountain and the Chocolate Pudding RideElevation Gain: 6390'Hiking Time: 7:30-8:00Remember yesterday when I wanted to hike around Unaka Mountain because the trail was too mushy? Today was much much worse. I think this was the first day I wanted to cry on the trail. I actually thought the day might be better if I added a nice pity party. The climbs were so steep and long, and the worst ones came during the second half of the day. I slid my way up Roan Mountain, which is apparently beautiful during the summer when the rododendrens are in bloom. I got off the trail coming down into Carver Gap because I was following footprints instead of trail blazes, and found my way back to the trail by walking down a road. I refused to walk back uphill to find the trail again. After Carver's Gap, the trail was very nice and new and paved with gravel going over a couple of beautiful balds. I got to those right around sunset and talked to some nice day-hikers. I kept saying "you're so clean" to each day-hiker I met. I was just thinking that the mud-hiking was over and maybe my shoes would be sort of dry by the time I got to the shelter when the nice gravel path ended and became a narrow deep rut on the bald, filled with mud and dsnow and no berm on other side. Then it got dark. Then the trail began a steep decline. Luckily, I was so busy trying not to fall in the mud that I had no time to worry about bears and mountain lions. After about an hour of night mud hiking, I arrived at the Stan Murray Shelter. Yeah! my buddy Deborah was there and gave me water so I didn't have to hike down the hill to get some. We stayed up talking for a long while. It was one of the nicest nights I've had in a shelter so far.
Date: 2003-04-03
From: Stan Murray Shelter

To: US19
Miles today: 13.9

Day 35: American Gladiators and the Boys from PennsylvaniaElevation Gain: 2740'Hiking Time: 8:00-5:30Diner Call! I hear through the shelter registers that my buddy Dean is at the shelter only 2 miles ahead of me, along with Pile Up, so I headed out to try and catch them to see if they want to hitch into Elk Park, NC to go to a diner. I get to Overmountain Shelter and find out that Dean got up early (unheard of for him) and is attempting a 30+ mile day. Wow! Deborah and I spend some time at Overmountain goofing off, taking pictures, getting water and such, then head out for the Hump Mountains, which are just beautiful balds. I think this past week has been the most beautiful section of the trail, but then again it rained on me almost the whole time in the Smokies, so I can't compare the two sections. Deborah, like everyone else, is much faster than me, so soon I can no longer see her tiny figure waving to me from the top of the next bald, and I am on my own again. Deborah had reminded me that US19 was a dangerous road crossing, the one where AT author Kelly Winters had been chased by some non-thru hikers a few years before, so I walked the 1.5 miles to the Country House Restaurant instead of hitch-hiking. There I was treated to the friendliness of the waitress and the locals and subjected to the cruelty of teenage girls. Teenage girls should really be put in charge of criminal punishment, because they are the cruelest group of people on earth. I couldn't hear everything they said about me, with their mouths hidden cleverly behind their hands and the shushing sounds when I would walk by, but I think my dirty appearance and you're-not-from-here-ness were the biggest offenses. I yelled over to them that I hadn't had a shower in three days and that I would come over and sit with them if they didn't stop whispering about me, and that took care of that. Teenage girls don't like it when you point out their cruelty. While at the Country House, I read the paper and realized that I needed to get to Damascus, a mere 70 miles away, by Sunday night to watch basketball. This was Thursday. Uh oh. I finished my coffee, Mountain Dew, sweet tea, water, and hamburger and headed back to the Trail. About half an hour up a hill, I ran into a guy cussing his way down the hill. Hey, it was Teacher! He and his buddy Yingling (aka The Boys from Pennsylvania, or Tim and Adam) were camping at the top of the hill because they were full of beer and couldn't hike anymore. I ended up camping with them. I love those guys. They are two of the few people I've ever met who were big fans of the TV show the American Gladiators. We talked about Ice, Siren, and Two Scoops Wesley Perry with fondness.
Date: 2003-04-04
From: US19

To: Dennis Cove Road, Kinkora Hostel
Miles today: 22.6

Day 36: Trail Magic from Fellow Thru-HikersElevation Gain: 5450'Hiking Time: 7:00-6:15I got up early and tried really hard not to wake up Teacher and Yingling in the next tent. I think I was doing OK until my sleeping bag rolled into their tent wall and hit one of them on the head. Oops. Sorry guys. This section of the Trail is much harder than it looks on the map! I got to the Kinkora Hostel on Dennis Cover Road just exhausted. Luckily, my crabby stage had passed about an hour before my arrival. I sounded like Gollum up on that mountain, hissing and cussing and spitting and hitting trees with my hiking sticks. I hated everyone that afternoon. I stumbled into the driveway of the Kinkora Hostel, dropped my pack, and drifted over to the lit up section of the compound. I heard a car pull in behind me but was too tired to turn around. By the time I got to the porch, the people in the car had spilled out around me. It was Dean, Martin, Deborah, Flick, and Pile Up just come back from a run into town. They had heard that some more hikers were coming in that evening, so they brought extra pizza and soda and ice cream!. I almost wept. I also made up a new word that sounds like "pshaw" but with almost no enunication, and it means, "Yes, I would like some of that, thank you."My maildrop had not arrived at Kinkora, so the guy who owns the hostel, Bob Peoples, aka The Nicest Man Alive, ran Canoli and I into town for groceries at 8:30 at night. Canoli had done a 32 miler that day. I bought some twinkies because Martin from Austria had never had one and some Krispy Kreme donuts just on principle.
Date: 2003-04-05
From: Dennis Cove Road, Kinkora Hostel

To: Iron Mountain Shelter
Miles today: 24.5
Weather: light rain

Day 37: What Would Pat Summit Do? Elevation Gain: 6510'Hiking Time: 4:45-7:15Thirty four hours, and 51 miles until Pat Summit and the Tennessee Lady Vols take on Duke in the semi-finals of the Final Four. I got up at 4:15 and had hiked back to the Trail by 5:00am, ready for my 24.5 mile day. I waited for a few minutes for daylight once I got to Laurel Fork Gorge so I could see the big beautiful waterfall. I snuck right past Donkey's campsite, where he was softly braying in his sleep, his floppy mohawk tucked up in the hood of his sleeping bag. It began to lightning, thunder, and rain harder than ever before during my trip while I was in the gorge, and I got completely drenched, but I kept going, metal poles and all. The lightning had stopped before I climbed up to the ridgeline where the real lightning-strike danger is. I was all dried out by midday.I hiked around and over the pretty Watauga Dam all day. I wouldn't mind coming back to this spot again some time.   I hiked 10 miles to the first shelter by 11:00am, and there was Dean. He had hiked the first 10 miles the day before and got a ride from Bob almost all the way to the shelter. A few minutes later came Donkey, who is a very fast hiker. They were going to stop at a shelter just a few miles away, but we passed a church youth group headed to that shelter, so they pressed on to Iron Mountain. They made it to the shelter about an hour before I did. Church groups and boy scout groups are great, but they are usually large and louder than thru-hikers are used to, so we generally avoid them like the plague. Thru-hiker bedtime was around 6:30pm when we first started, and now it is around 7:30-8:30pm, depending upon when the last person gets to the shelter, but youth groups rarely get quiet this early.Also at the Iron Mt. Shelter that night were Gapper, whom I had met at Kinkora, and Wild Bill, whom I renamed Wild Bill Hammock, because he set up his hammock in the shelter. They were real nice. I had such a hard time with 24.5 miles that I resigned myself to not seeing the Tennessee game the next day, since it would mean a 26 mile day, so I fell asleep with a heavy heart.
Date: 2003-04-06
From: Iron Mountain Shelter

To: Damascus, VA
Miles today: 25.9
Weather: scattered clouds

Day 38: Marathon HikerElevation Gain: 3990'Hiking Time: 7:15-6:15Time change day! I lost an hour. Gapper was nice enough to wake me up early this morning, so I hit the Trail by 7:15 (but it felt like 6:15). The terrain was easy today, but I didn't think there was any way I would make it to Damascus by 7:00pm for the Tennessee game. But I just kept hiking. I thought back on my marathon training days and ate something every 45 minutes and drank water constantly. At about 2:20, I caught up with Saint Gapper at a shelter 10 miles from Damascus. He gave me water (which saved me about 10 minutes since the spring was way down a hill) and encouragement and sent me on my way. I made it to town, 25.9 miles later, by 6:20 and checked into the fanciest hotel in town with cable TV. Then the hotel owner told me that ESPN was out in the whole cable area, so I wouldn't be able to watch the game until they fixed it. I was so tired that I didn't even care anymore. But they fixed ESPN about half an hour into the game, so I got to watch most of it. Tennessee won, so I'm staying in Damascus at my fancy hotel for two more days so I can watch the championship game on Tuesday night. That's right, I'm taking two zero days, and I'm very happy about it.
Date: 2003-04-07
From: Damascus, VA

To: Damascus, VA
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: overcast clouds

Day 39: Zero Day in DamascusAll the hikers have been congratulating me on the Tennessee game since I yakked about it so much at Kinkora and in the shelter registers. I've just been doing town things today, email, laundry, post office, eating, eating, eating. I ran into my buddy Canoli at the outfitter store and pointed out that he did 80 miles in 3 days. He was so tired that he didn't even realize it. I sent my hiking boots off to Salomon in exchange for a new pair. Imagine boots coming apart after only 800 miles. I've been hanging out at the Side Track Cafe, run by the Mountain Man, a hiker hacker. Side Track has espresso drinks, internet connections, food, and sweet tea. I made perhaps the wisest purchase of my hiking career - a pair of plastic camp shoes called Wallies that weigh only 10 oz. They cost about $25. I stopped by the post office this morning, took a shower midday, then went to the post office again this afternoon, and the post master told me I looked a lot cleaner. That kind of smarted because I had a shower last night. I told her that the first shower just got the smell off, and the second shower got the dirt off.
Date: 2003-04-08
From: Damascus, VA

To: Damascus, VA
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: overcast clouds

Day 40: Zero Day in DamascusI've now spent 7 hours at the Side Track Cafe talking to Mountain Man and updating my journal. It's nice to be caught up for once. The group of hikers I came in with (Dean, Donkey, Gapper, Pile Up, Canoli, etc.) left today, but Teacher and Yuengling (I finally learned how to spell this word) showed up a little while ago, and I'm sure others I know will be popping in soon. Teach and the Yueng are finally taking a zero day and really looking forward to it.Must...watch...basketball.
Date: 2003-04-09
From: Damascus, VA

To: Lost Mountain Shelter
Miles today: 15.8
Weather: overcast clouds

Day 41: Creeping Along the CreeperHiking Time: 10:30-5:00Elevation Gain: 1000'I sat around the Side Track Cafe all morning, drinking lattes and talking. Then I waited tables for awhile because the owner, Mountain Man, was swamped. It was fun. The other hikers got to boss me around and call me Flo and stiff me on tips, and I got to tell them to "Kiss my Grits" and remember why I don't like waiting tables. I had to explain who Flo is to some of the younger hikers, and they regretted asking when I sang the entire theme song for the sitcom "Alice". I also explained that one of Jodie Foster's finest film moments occurred in the movie "Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore", upon which the sitcom "Alice" was based, but I had long since lost their attention and was really just talking to myself. I feel so guilty. Today, I blue-blazed on purpose for the first time. For you non-AT hikers, than means that I walked on a trail other than the AT. This really pisses off a purist AT hiker. Other things that piss off a purist hiker are (1) slackpacking (aka "freedom-hiking), when you get someone to carry your pack for you for part of the way, and (2) just getting off the AT by mistake and getting back on later down the trail, without going back and covering the bit that you missed. Generally, the purist hikers only subject themselves to these stringent standards, and the rest of us try not to make fun of them. But I still feel guilty for blue-blazing on purpose, as opposed to the many times I've gotten off the trail by mistake. Anyway, I hiked on the Virgnina Creeper Trail, which goes along the former location of the railroad tracks for the Virginia Creeper Line, right beside Beaver Creek, for miles. I walked through a community called Taylor's Valley, which had a cafe that was closed. Doh! I stood around looking pitiful in front of the closed cafe and got a ride up to the store half a mile away and back by an older woman who had been living in Taylor's Valley all her life. She told me that her house was over 100 years old and used to be a hotel for the men building the Virginia Creeper railroad. I finally got back on the Appalachian Trail and spent the night in Lost Mountain Shelter with David, his 120 lb. dog Delilah, and the Red-Headed Stranger. We had a good time talking about Bill Bryson's book. David and I had read it before, and the Stranger was just reading it for the first time, so we told him all the best parts and ruined it for him. Sorry Stranger.
Date: 2003-04-10
From: Lost Mountain Shelter

To: Damascus, VA
Miles today: 12.0
Weather: light rain

Day 42: Who's the Big Baby Who Can't Hike in the Snow?Hiking Time: 8:00-1:00Elevation Gain: 2500'David and the Stranger left the shelter just before me. It had rained hard all night and was very cold, and we were expecting snow tonight, so I planned to hike just as far as I possibly could and stop close to a road so I could hike out the next morning if the snow was too bad. I climbed up Whitetop Mountain in a cold drizzle and began being pelted by freezing rain as soon as I got to the bald, out of tree cover. It got colder and colder, and the rain was getting more and more like hail. I couldn't even look up without getting stung in the face by hailish rain. I wished that I hadn't sent my winter clothes home already. Oops. I crossed a road, consulted my map, and decided to hike off the mountain and hitch a ride back to Damascus. I'm out here for fun, not torture. As soon as I turned onto the road, the snow started, and there was 2-3 inches on the ground by the time I walked the 4 miles down to the WhiteTop post office. I would like to point out that 5 bastards passed me in their nice warm vehicles and did not even think about picking up the snow-covered shivering hiker stomping along the roadside. My most recent "Nicest Man in the World" award goes to Doyle Hensley, postmaster of WhiteTop, and also the Treasurer for the Fire Department, owner of the general store, owner of the library building, and local Christmas Tree farmer. Doyle not only let me hang out at the post office for 3 hours waiting for someone to come get me from Damascus, but he entertained me with jokes and told me a lot about the history of WhiteTop. He also didn't get upset when I muddied up the post office lobby with my wet pack and shoes. The other nicest guy in the world was Kelly, the post office driver, who, along with Doyle, helped me beg a ride to Damascus when the Mt. Roger's Outfitters people couldn't get over the mountain to pick me up. So I am back in Damascus, spending more money that I don't have and waiting for the weather to clear up. There is no snow in Damascus, so the other hikers don't quite believe that there is snow just 24 miles north of here. Oh, they'll find out. Oh, yes. Maybe Mountain Man will let me wait tables in exchange for free food again. Kiss my Grits.
Date: 2003-07-01
From: Damascus, VA

To: Home
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: overcast clouds

Hello! I sort of left the journal hanging, so I thought I would write a quick entry to tell my readers that I left the trail on May 5th, right near Harper's Ferry. I had a great time hiking, but I reached "done" somewhere in the Shenandoahs. I had a blast my last few days out, just goofing off and hiking a little with Bone Dancer, Lawn Ornament, Braveheart, and a couple of nice pot-smoking boys. (Tip: Do not try to hitchhike with two boys who reek of pot.) I do plan to finish posting my journal entries for the last month of my hike, so check back in a week or two. In the meantime, I've written an article for a Sierra Club newsletter, and I'm planning to co-author another article. If you need an article written, about anything - the Appalachian Trail, hiking, taking a sabbatical, being from the South, bluegrass, the live music scene in almost any city, or roadtrips - just let me know. I work real cheap while I'm building my writing resume. For the last two months, I've been laying around on various couches, watching cable TV, hiking (Grand Canyon, Pecos Wilderness near Santa Fe, Smokies), doing another crosscountry roadtrip, and now I'm off to find a job. I have organized my AT pictures and posted them on www.ofoto.com. If you would like to see them, send me an email at dianapriceisright@yahoo.com, and I will send you the links. All rights reserved.Take care, and thanks for sharing the journey with me. Diana (Tennessee)