Date: 2016-05-05
From: Wayah Bald Shelter

To: Wesser Bald Shelter
Miles today: 10.6
Weather: moderate rain

Cinco de Mayo was our Snow Day. The rain continued all night long and the temperature continued to drop. It was a cold morning so I stayed in my sleeping bag extra long. Jazz Cowboy was the only other occupant in the shelter and he was hunkered down as well. Finally about 7:30 am I decided to get a move on and started packing up. I opted for a cold breakfast not wanting to get the stove out. I finally departed at 8:30 to cold temps and overcast skies. I was wearing my down jacket and pants for the first time, previously I had only worn hiking shorts and a T-shirt.As I walked it started to lightly sleet, and then a few snowflakes mixed in. As I climbed towards Cold Spring shelter it began sleeting and snowing heavily. When I got to the shelter I ducked in and met Lefty (a one arm hiker) and Lucy (his dog) and another hiker November. Both were dodging the brunt of the weather in the shelter. I ate a light lunch and the sleet subsided. I took off shortly thereafter, leaving Lefty and Lucy in the shelter, and the sleet and snow picked up again. The ground was warm so not much was sticking on the trail but visibility was down to 100 feet or so and the sleet kept pelting. A few minutes later I met Luna as she literally ran down the trail. She was dressed lightly in a tank top and a light poncho. We exchanged hellos and names and she was off down the trail. I'll never see her again I thought as she was literally running.The trail from Cold Spring shelter went down about 1000 feet to Tellico Gap, and then back up about 800 feet to Wesser Bald. The weather had cleared some by the time I got to Wesser Bald and I climbed the tower and got some descent pictures of the clouds hovering over the mountains and a few shafts of sunlight to highlight the mountains. A cloud was heading my way and just as I got off the tower it started sleeting heavily again.The Wesser Bald shelter was eight tenths of a mile and I hustled down the bald as quick as I could. I got to the shelter and it was filling up, and there was Luna with her friends. They had done 18 miles today. There was one spot left on the shelter platform and they welcomed me to it. I ate a cold dinner of cheese and crackers and headed for my sleeping bag to warm up.A little bit later Jazz Cowboy came in but the shelter was full so he tented outside. Then the three Florida girls came in. It was still raining so they huddled under the shelter roof for a while. They were in hammocks and the group encouraged them to string their hammocks from the rafters if they could. They decided they would try one, but the other two they would set up outside. Jane would take the inside hammock as she didn't have a tarp to go over it. Virginia started climbing around the rafters to string the hammock and she was very impressive. She got her trail name from that, she was now Spidergirl.By 6 pm those of us sleeping on the shelter platform were bedded down for the night. Jazz Cowboy and the FL girls cooked their dinners in the shelter and then headed for their tents and hammocks. As I was laying there I got to thinking how we as frail humans all needed shelter from the elements. Be it the wood walls and tin roof of this AT shelter, the thin nylon of Jazz Cowboys' tent or the tarps covering the girls hammocks; or the houses and apartments we occupy at home. We wouldn't last long on this cold rainy night. And the same goes for the rest of society, we all consider shelter a basic need. Most of the rest of the animal kingdom is adapted to survive in the weather without constructing a shelter. They generally only build nests or dens or lairs to birth and raise their young and then they abandon them. We humans are almost the only animal that needs shelter to survive even most ordinary weather. I've always understood that we humans differentiated ourselves by our ability to make and use tools. I suppose we also differentiate ourselves by our inability to survive the elements without shelter of some sort.