Date: 2013-04-18
From: Jones Meadow

To: Beyond Flint Mountain Shelter
Miles today: 10.7
Weather: broken clouds

Arising from my near-Jones-Meadow tarp Thursday, April 18 2013, I found a windy and very misty morning at 5:40 AM. Still not quite awake, I decided to enjoy some of the instant oatmeal someone had left at Spring Mountain Shelter yesterday, so (still lying in the tarp) I fired up the Pocket Rocket, emptied two packets of oatmeal into an aluminum dish, and poured in the boiling water. Something looked funny, so I found my reading glasses and looked at the empty packets: grits with imitation bacon bits! Bah! I¢m a vegetarian! The bacon was phony (soy, I guess) but the taste was so strong I almost gagged. Out it went... I hope creatures of the wild enjoyed some of it. Amusing in retrospect... and I even thought it was kind of funny at the time! I may have heard someone come in and camp near the spring, after dark, but nobody passed my little informal site this morning.        As I pulled out at 7:30 AM, the mist was still very thick and the wind strong; half an hour later the sun was making an effort but the wind continued to roar high up in the trees. There weren¢t many white blazes, which I found a little disconcerting. At 8:10 an overlook at Whiterock Cliff came along, and at 8:15 a trail left to Blackstack Cliffs; between them were two blue-marked trails west, unidentified... perhaps the heavily travelled one went to Jones Meadow! At 8:24 the Jerry Miller Trail headed off to the right, and two minutes later a sign offered the choice of a ¢Bad Weather Trail¢ (blue, left) or ¢Exposed Ridgeline Trail¢ (white, straight) ¢ despite the high wind, it wasn¢t raining, sleeting, or snowing, so I headed for the ridgeline.        Around 9:00 AM I reached the narrow ridge, and it was very windy. A couple of gusts almost blew me off my feet ¢ I wouldn¢t have fallen far, just into some rocks and bushes, but it would have been uncomfortable! I never felt the need to crouch down on all fours, as I had in Scotland's Cairngorms a couple of years ago, but sometimes I was afraid to move, reluctant to give up one of my four points of contact with the mountain. On the ascent I found ¢DB Cooper¢ written on a rock with a marker; nice to know he¢s still around, but DB, that¢s a no-no! At 9:18 another ¢To bad weather trail¢ opportunity was offered, but we were soon descending and at 9:52 I reached the bad-weather trail¢s north end. Glad I didn¢t take it ¢ that narrow, wind-blown Big Firescald ridge was a thrill and a half!        By 10:30 AM the path was wide and smooth, almost wheel-chair accessible. I was passed by a middle-aged man, Knight Rider, and we joked about our mutual fondness for that silly TV show. He was at the Jerry Cabin Shelter when I rolled in at 10:52 AM, and was tickled at my explanation of what KITT (the name of the show¢s talking Trans-Am) means: Knight Industries Two Thousand! He¢d started on March 24, and typically does 20-mile days. Not Werdigo! A friendly girl snapped our photo, with my three extended fingers denoting that we were roughly at the 300-mile point.        After lunch of a couple of tortillas with peanut butter, I left the shelter at 11:40 AM. Despite the continued wind gusts, the path was pleasant, interrupted briefly by a somewhat confusing boulder jumble around 1:00 PM ¢ a nice group of older day-hikers met me there, and their friendliness took some of the sting out of the boulders. The trail then picked up a dirt road, very easy walking, that took me to the Shelton Gravesite at 1:50 PM (where a woman snapped my photo, and I snapped one of her and her friend) and the Green Ridge Trail at 2:00 PM. We then began a long descent, 900¢ I believe, to Flint Gap, reached shortly before 3:00 PM; I formulated an ETA of 3:30 for the shelter and 4:20 for the spring, 1.2 miles beyond the shelter, where I planned to camp.        Flint Mountain Shelter arrived at 3:27, as expected; with water only a mile down the trail at my day¢s destination I just chatted briefly with the fellows there and moved on. I didn¢t note my time of arrival at my campsite, but it had to be before 4:30 PM. The trail descended, along the east side of a ridge, then took a sharp right turn over a tiny brush-clogged gully, and began a gradual ascent. I figured that gully must contain water, probably the guidebook¢s ¢spring,¢ so I pulled up and looked around.         Just before the gully and the sharp right turn there was a level area to the right, almost as if an old road had once come in there. I chose that for my tarp site, and was able to fetch water from a small seep down in the gully. It was still early, and pleasantly sunny, so I hung the hammock beside the tarp and enjoyed coffee in comfort. Relaxed, caffeine¢d, warm and dry and alone, this was what I loved! I experienced a sense of euphoria at being here, and being able to do this ¢ ¢camping out,¢ that¢s what I like!