Date: 2017-01-10
From: Wayah bald shelter

To: Franklin, NC
Miles today: 11.0
Weather: moderate rain

You could feel the warm up this morning, although it wasn't enough to take care of my shoes which were frozen solid. That's kind of a demotivator for starting the day. But even so, my feet never exactly got cozy but I didn't need to use the hand warmers. The snow was a bit slushier today and hiking was a slog. First thing I passed was the Wayah bald fire tower which is this really cool stone structure. I was confused at first because it looked nothing like it did in the picture. Then I realized the giant wooden roof had been burned off and when I looked around all the surrounding trees were charred black. This must've been a raging fire because there aren't really many trees within a 50 ft radius of this thing and all that's left of the roof are a few charred pieces of lumber still attached to the post stakes at the base of the roof. The informational signs at the top are also just melted. It added a surreal touch to the really great view. Later on we learned some more about wild pigs. No bear tracks but these weird pig tracks were around along with areas just torn up like with a tiller. I guess the boars just get after those nuts when they find em. Wonder if it's all theft from the squirrels and chippies. Just before lunch we met an actual northbounder, Johnny Depp. A nice kid who was in need of a bunch of advice but I refrained from giving any. We chatted for a while. I think hel was lonely and might want to wait a couple months for the real nobo season if it's getting to him already. We got to the winding stairs gap before 4 and it took us a solid 40 minutes to get a hitch into town. The guy was a bit disconcerting at first because h ed wanted to take our picture first and t hen sent it off to a friend before pulling out. I checked to make sure the cold lock wasn't on amd he ended up being really nice and took us directly to the hostel.  Zen at gooders hostel was also really nice and dropped us at lazy hiker brewery while he went to go shuttle teashot. There were some characters there. Apparently every Tuesday they have a ping pong tournament with serious prizes that had been canceled this Tuesday for some reason.  The guy next to us was waxing poetically about the dudes at the end of the bar who win every week and are ducks about it to boot. With all the talk and drama I was expecting to get trounced. When our bar stool friend and I went over to play, those dudes meanly heckled us. Like for real. You could feel the hatred they had for each other. They were even heckling me. So I beat our friend by like 10, then the hated weekly champion was like oooh, now let's really play. He pulled his paddle out of a leather case. I tried to make small talk and he wasn't having it. I waxed him by like 8 points. I was kinda pissed the tournament was off. Coulda won a bar tab. That was just weird. I can hold my own at ping pong, but I've known many people who I can never beat. For all the ping pong drama and trash talking at this place, I wonder if I'll make it into local lore, how one day, a vagabond from parts unknown waltzed into town and spanked the tyrant, never to be heard from again. Long story short, if you're halfway decent at ping pong there's money to be had Tuesday nights at the lazy hiker. After that episode had passed, tealeaf and buckshot showed up! We had such a late start today and with their troubles yesterday I was worried they'd had it rough since center never caught us, but they were in good spirits. We hung out for a bit more then watched a terrible movie at the hostel and hit the hay.