Date: 2012-04-10
From: Winding Stair Gap (Franklin NC)

To: Franklin NC Sapphire Hotel
Miles today: 0.0

With one state down, 100 miles under my belt and 9 days on the trail, I'm in need of day off. My only real complaint is my agonizing feet. Everyone here tells me that I am lucky that that's my only problem but it is hard for me to believe that this soreness is normal. Walking gingerly here in town feels like jumping off a nine story building with every step. The hardest thing on the trail has become a relative subject simply because what was hard in the beginning would not be hard now and what is hard now would have been impossible to do in the beginning. Also some of the tough climbs are the first thing you do in the morning and then sometimes the hardest climb will be after you've already put in 8 miles or so. All this makes it hard for me to determine what the hardest section was. I'm going to say the hardest day yet was my first 15 miler when I crossed the GA-NC border. That day had a little bit of everything big hill in the morning another big hill halfway through the day, big miles and I was definitely very tired when I made it into camp. They told me I was really sawing some logs in my tent the next morning. The worst or most miserable day is easy, that would be coming off blood mountain in the thunderstorm. I don't mind rain but I hate the thought of getting fried on top of mountain. It also qualifies as the worst because Blood was the coolest mountain in Georgia and I only seen it at break-neck speed. The best day was day 4 the views were to die for and I was hiking much stronger already. It was the day I really begin to feel I could this. It was easy in fact I don't think I could done that hike starting out but for some reason tired as was I felt good. People I've met on the trail.  Chatty, first day on springer I thought, this guy is talkative and sure enough that's the trail name he picked up. He caries a guitar and he's pretty good and a nice guy as well. Miles, super cool guy just returned from Afghanistan. He was wielding a 65 lbs pack but it got lighter as we went on. His section hike was over at Hiawassee. Acidglasses, he arrived in Atlana the same day as me, we had dinner at Hooters. Grayhound lost his luggage so he started the day after me.  He caught me and passed me on day three, he sails. Prana, strong hiker in good shape but fell behind me because he went into town twice. Met up with him again on Albert moun, I was headed to town and gave him my extra food since he was moving on, I may never see him again. Kristine, she camped everywhere I did for the first 5 days but fell behind waiting on food drop. She has the best trail dog I've seen out here, you couldn't ask for a better trail dog, I'm so jealous. Tree trunks and Manuela, really good couple, they hike all day and make the same camp as the rest of the group. Tree trunks has Schwarzenegger legs and Manuela is everyone's mom. B-1, cool dude had some issues at first but is a fast hiker. I guess he does the miles I do in half a day, I look to see him today that was the plan anyway. The airport left a tag on his pack and it didn't take long before he was known as the B-1 guy. Lynsie, (sp) very pretty young girl, every time I've seen her she had several guys at her heels. She is known as Hooters and Cleavage privately. She wears a zip up shirt, apparently when she gets hot she zips it about halfway down, she gets hot a lot. Slowski, AKA not-so-slow-slowski is my trail buddy. We have teamed up the last five days, he's kind of took the Greenhorn under his wing so to speak. There are many others, some I only see a couple of days, some I don't know there names and some fly by me or fall behind. I can say I haven't met anyone I didn't like.  My gear has held up well, made a bone head move one night when I put wet gear in my tent with me resulting in half gallon of water  on the down hill corner, what a mess.  I picked up some Green Superfeet insoles here in town, hopping that will help the tired ol dogs. Also added another T-shirt and shorts to the arsenal. My ideal of walking around town in my rain gear while my clothes were washing was not a good plan. All and all I would say its been about five times harder than expected which is not bad since I told myself it would be ten times harder than what I could expect.