Date: 2003-05-07
From: US321 Trailhead

To: Kincora Hostel, Dennis Cove
Miles today: 8.9

Last night Bob Peoples offered us a slack-packing opportunity, which, amazingly, only Verity and I have taken. So this morning, at 8.30, Bob dropped us off where the AT crosses NC321 (which goes to Hampton), 8.9 miles north of here at the western tip of Lake Watauga. We would walk back to Kincora, hopefully in about 3-3.5 hours. The morning weather was poor (which may have encouraged our friends to stay in bed and take another off-trail day) and the first hour and a half was a slog, or it would have been if we had been carrying full packs, as we climbed 2,000 feet up to Pond Flats. This is a plateau at almost 4,000 feet altitude that extends for a mile and a half before the trail goes down the other side to the Laurel Fork River. By the time we reached the plateau, the weather had brightened and this was turning into an extremely enjoyable walk. Deciduous trees, mingled with white pine, spruce, and young Fraser fir, made a very attractive scene. As we moved downhill to the river, corridors of shrubbery, usually rhododendron, mountain laurel and azaleas, were much more the norm. In a number of places, bright orange deciduous azaleas were in flower. The river flowed fast, much of it white water. The trail, which for a while had been a comfortable stroll on a floor of leaves and pine needles, now took us into the rock formations bounding the river itself, and at one point, we were walking along a narrow ledge about a foot and a half above the water. Then the path moved away, sharply uphill, and switched-back, which gave us our first view of Laurel Falls. They are about 40 feet high, about the same across, and with the volume of spring season water coming down, very impressive. As we went up the switch-back, we at long last saw our first rhododendrons in almost full flower, some full pink, some a subtle lilac-pink, lining the left side of the path for fifty yards or so. All these things combined to make this the finest section of the trail so far in our view. No doubt the lack of weight on our backs helped that perception too.           TRAIL REFLECTIONS:1. Verity, previously "Wee Toe", has changed her name again, and is now "Thistle". Learning that this is our national flower, the "Chafe Master" thought it fitted Verity's personality perfectly. She isn't offended. We do spend time coming up with alternative trail names for our fellow-hikers, and "Dimple Rock" has been trying to hang "Red Plate" & "Blue PLate" on us. As far as I can tell, we are the only hikers who use plates at all (Verity's is red, mine blue), to the endless amusement of our Kansas friends. Actually, we have been following sometimes the primitive American practice of eating straight from the pot, but we wouldn't dream of doing this in front of "Dimple Rock".   My favourite alternate trail name is the one someone devised for "Two Speeds". He wears dual-purpose trousers - the kind where you can unzip the legs to turn them into a pair of shorts. Unfortunately, he lost the unzipped pant legs some weeks ago, and has become affectionately known as "Lieutenant Dan". (Forrest Gump: "But, Lootenant Dan, you ain't got no legs")2.About 35 years ago, I was a young Economics student reading the texts of some of the great Scottish moral philosophers like Francis Hutcheson, David Hume and Adam Smith. Since then, I've lived my life without giving them the slightest thought until a conversation with Bob Peoples this afternoon. From memory (so this may be muddled), Hutcheson advocated a moderate form of Scottish Presbyterianism, believing in the rationality and innate goodness of man. Hume took the contrary view that man's actions were driven by his passions and emotions, but that he was capable of being "socialised", i.e. acting in a constructive way under the influence of habit, convention and rules laid down by the society he lived in. If, in this quiet corner of Tennessee, it has taken a knowledgeable man with an enquiring mind and a strong interest in his Celtic heritage to remind me of the Scottish Enlightenment, the actions and behaviours of the hiking community have given me cause to reconsider the Hutcheson/Hume debate. No conclusions here - let's just say Hutcheson is gaining an edge.