Date: 2007-05-06
From: Sassafras Gap, North Carolina 

To: Hot Springs, North Carolina
Miles today: 129.9
Weather: light rain

"Smokin In the Smokys"..................Ranger Jan Reporting                     With my new "Spider Powers" and no end to the sunshine, I continued knocking out 20 mile days. One day after leaving Sassafras Gap, I was at the Fontana Dam Shelter. (a 22 mile day propelled me with the thought of luxuriating at the great "Fontana Hilton" and getting a hot shower) The Fontana Hilton is one of those extra-ordinary shelters on the AT. Just above the Fontana Dam, it overlooks Fontana Lake with the Great Smoky Mountains behind. Nearby is swimming, a real bathroom and hot showers at the Dam Visitors Center. In the morning, I would catch a shuttle to Fontana Village and get my resupply food at the post office. The whole area was developed by the Tennessee Valley Authority in the 40's. The Fontana Dam is the largest concrete dam east of the Mississippi and the Southern Gateway to Great Smoky Mountains National Park.   Leaving my hiking partners of the last few days, "Five Eyes" & "Mosey", I headed up into the Smoky Mountains. The 3000 foot climb in 90 degree heat was only mildly challenging for me. With plenty of water and endless energy, I rolled into Spence Field Shelter. Nestled in an old orchard clearing, it's one of the nicer shelters in the Smokys. That night we would be treated to a sunset and the rising of a deep orange full moon. New hiking buddies "Gandalf" & "Doc" were there waiting, having left earlier from Fontana. Long, lanky 20-something boys from Missouri, they had been humbled over the last couple days and especially after today's climb. Track athletes back home, they had soon discovered that long distance backpacking can be far more demanding. Their dream of finishing the AT in 4 months (22 mile/day average) had hit the wall of reality.      So on we trod. Rocky Top, Thunderhead, Silers Bald, and finally Clingman's Dome, the highest point on the whole Appalachian Trail (6,643 ft) Amazingly, about 3 or 4 miles before the Dome, the whole landscape metamorphosed. Rolling hardwood forest turned to "Middle Earth" scenes of dense evergreen. Spruce and fir dominated, and deep, dark, moss-covered trees, both standing and fallen reduced the trail to a narrow sliver. A primal, old-growth feel permeated the forest. Freshly sawn logs lay everywhere, accompanied by their cool evergreen scents. Three weeks earlier a late season storm had roared through the area and over 150 large trees fell over the trail. Trail clubs from far and wide worked to clear the trail we now travelled. I could only imagine the chaos the first hikers on the scene had to negotiate.   On Clingman's Dome the scene was sublime, however. Unlike my 2004 hike, when 20 feet was the limit of our view, this time 20 miles or more lay exposed in all directions. Gandalf, Doc and I contemplated waiting for sunset, though we settled for an hour. (They left with some friendly tourists to "Zero" in Gatlinburg and I continued on.)    Over the next few days I would be in the company of "Sizzers", "Fortune Cookie", "Dogman" & "Joker". By far the wildest, most eclectic group I have travelled with yet. We experienced a day of spectacular ridge walks, above the cloud vistas and even a little rolling thunder to pique the adrenaline. Soon, however the Smokys began to revert to the typical Appalachian landscape. The evergreens retreated and the hardwoods and rhododendrons returned. Wildflowers in vast arrays sometimes blanketed the slopes and trail edges. Several varieties of Trillium, Trout Lilies, Bluets, Bloodroot and many more filled the forest. And the only rain for me came at night, long after I had safely retired in the shelter. After a fourth and final day in the Smokys and a long downhill trek to Davenport Gap, I found myself at the Standing Bear Hostel.(Again Ranger Jan's luck held, as a torrential downpour let loose just after I arrived.) The Great Smoky Mountains were now behind me.   Standing Bear is a hoot. Just outside Smoky Mountains National Park, it's a haven for all the long distance hikers who have just completed the Smokys. Everyone is relieved to kick back and relax after their arduous mountain journey. When we arrived their was almost a full house. The crew I travelled with now were real cowboys and our rapid pace had run us smack into a traffic jam of northbound compatriots. Soon after settling in, orders for beer and pizza started flying. Impromptu music and raucous laughter were the backdrop for a long evening of eating, laundry, trail stories, more eating, calls home, drinking, resupply, more eating, showers, jokes and finally sleep. The whole scene is reminiscent of an earlier era. (think hippies & Woodstock)   After a few too many late hour beers, my travelling companions Fortune Cookie, Sizzers, Dogman & Joker decided to hike 33 miles the next day and reach Hot Springs in the early AM hours. Their logic being; they could take the rest of the next day off and forgo a "Zero Day" (a rest day off). I demurred as the logic didn't quite add up. Once they arrived, they would immediately want to sleep for most of the day. So where in this scenario was the extra time off, to relax, do laundry, eat, resupply and generally chill? Anyway I pulled up after 20 miles and camped on a beautiful knoll above the Walnut Mountain Shelter and spent a still evening with "Edge" & "Corker", the very same hikers who were present on that first day of my adventure, in the snow, at the Stover Creek Shelter in Georgia, just beyond Springer Mountain.   The next day we would hike a leisurely 13 miles into Hot Springs. (And I would take a real "Zero Day" at my friend Paul's home in Asheville.) On the way down out of the mountains, I hooked up with "Otter", a middle-aged Scottsman who now resides in Maine. With his dog Max, he was hiking home. His lively sense of humor and disarming ways would color the rest of the day as I waited in Hot Springs for my friend Paul to pick me up. We ate dinner with "Zenon", a Canadian nuclear engineer and later gathered at the Paddlers Pub for beer and a little socializing with an assortment of other thru-hikers.   Three weeks and 270.7 miles of AT are now behind me. (12.4% of the AT) Most of all, though, I connect the people with the places, in a timeless whole. The days and miles just flow and what remains are images, a hiker's face tied to a scenic vista or a simple campsite background.