Date: 2010-03-10
From: Sapling Gap

To: HIawassee, Georgis
Miles today: 12.0
Weather: moderate rain

Well, my alarm-setting worked. It went off at four a.m. and I got up shortly after. It rained a little during the night, but everything stayed dry.It took me a little over two hours to pack up. That will get faster. I wasn't hurrying and I'm still not in the groove. Every trip is different. I carry slightly different things and pack them differently. I've got winter gear, so I need to get more things into the pack than I did the last couple of times I was out.I had a good day. I left at 6:40 this morning and got to Low Gap Shelter in two hours, just as it started to rain. It rained most of the rest of the day. I spent an hour at Low Gap, getting water and treating it, eating, using the facilities and chatting with the three guys I had lunch with yesterday, before they headed out. They told me that Friar Tuck and a few other people were heading for the next shelter.I attached my umbrella to the pack and it worked well for the next three and a half hours, which is how long it took me to go 5.5 miles. My arms got a little wet, especially the right one, but overall, I was dry. The pack straps were dry. It was much, much better than anything I have ever used in similar conditions. The only place it didn't work was up on the ridge where it was windy and cold. I didn't expect it to work in the wind, and, that being said, having it in the wind was still better than not having it.The only thing about it that is a hassle is taking the pack on and off. I managed to do it once and leave the umbrella attached, but the second time I tried it got messed up and I had to reattach it. I'm still on a learning curve with that.I was feeling good at that point. It was about two miles to the shelter and 4 miles to Unicoi Gap. I knew quite a few people were headed to the shelter, so I figured I would have to pitch my hammock, which seemed like a huge drag in the rain. It was only about 50 degrees at the most during the day. This isn't the kind of weather where you want your gear to get wet. I also looked at the trail guide, and realized that if I stopped at the shelter then tomorrow I would have to go down into the gap and right back up again. I don't like starting the day on a downhill and I thought I would just as soon break that up.So I called into town for a shuttle and waited for someone to get back to me. I also left a message with Dawn to see about coming into Asheville for the weekend. I was really wanting my tent, thinking it might be on its way to Lula in Asheville, and thinking if the weather was going to be bad I might wait until it turned or wait until my tent showed up.After hiking over an hour, I was thinking it would be hammock night at the shelter, when Joyce, the shuttle driver, called and I arranged for my ride at Unicoi Gap. I met her at 5:30 at the gap and she took me to the Holiday Inn Express in Hiawassee. I asked for the hiker rate if they had one, and I was so tired I didn't even look at the bill when I signed it.I went straight upstairs and ran the in-room Jacuzzi! I was pretty tired and achy. I had hiked 12-plus miles, with only two sit-down breaks. The bottoms of my feet had gone beyond sore.I called Steve and he called Neel's Gap again about the box with the tent. He called me back and it was there! I arranged with Joyce to get a ride there at 8 a.m. tomorrow morning to pick it up. I was too tired to go out to eat, so I ate trail food in my room. I decided to wait until morning to decide whether or not to take a zero day tomorrow. Joyce said it's supposed to rain for the next five days, so I have plenty of time to go back out there and get wet.At about eight o'clock I tried to turn off the four a.m. alarm on my watch and went to bed.