April 18 and 19 - 15.6 / 412.8 and 17.8 / 430.6

April 18 -

Sorry, I have been a little slacker on my posts. Yesterday was a pretty lax day. I got going and again made good time off the bat. I leaped frogged Ranger Rick and Nut Ring (not their real trail names but names they have been given by other hikers), another thru hiker whose name I don't know, and Dragonfly. Dragonfly is an older lady who has section hiked about 600 miles already. She wants to finish the rest of the trail this year. She mentioned she has a hiking buddy, but he wasn't hiking with her yesterday due to resting an injury.

I also crossed another hundred miler mark. Yesterday was 400 miles. Just 0.5 of a mile later there was wooden bench on the trail looking out over a clearing. It was a pretty cool sight. Dark Star and Scruggs were both sitting there enjoying the view. I went on. However, it wasn't a short time later that they were already caught up. DS has one speed...fast. There are days I try to keep up with him. He is walking, and I am running.

We passed two guys out for the weekend and they told DS that the water source at the next shelter was not too good. Therefore, the three of us stopped at a creek crossing for lunch. Shortly after, Gilly and Speed Stick joined us. Scruggs was the first to head on, then DS, then myself followed by the other two.

It wasn't 30 minutes later that I heard a lot of leaves and branches make some noise. It was coming from higher up on the mountain from where I just came from. I knew it had to be a good size animal. I could there hear Gilly and SS, but I could not understand what they were saying so I moved on. At almost 410 miles, I could see a clearing and a field. In the field was Scruggs and DS. Scruggs was playing his banjo. It was a pretty cool pic through the trees. I joined them and then SS and Gilly showed up. We all noticed Gilly was in some pain and had some good abrasions on her leg. I instantly knew the noise I had heard earlier was not an animal. It was from Gilly tripping on the trail and falling into some brush. She recounted her story to us. DS said she should be called Tumble, and I shouted Tumble Weed. So Gilly now has the trail name of Tumble Weed. We laughed, sat for awhile and then headed on to Kincora, the hostel owned by Bob Peoples.

An old barn provided for picture time right before the road to the hostel. We got to the road and walked the 0.2 miles to the hostel. It was pretty packed. There used to be another one the other direction, but it closed this year. At 6, we all piled into Bob's truck for a shuttle into two. It think there were 16 of us. I mainly went for dinner whiched ended up being Little Ceaser's Hot n Ready. One large pep pizza, bread sticks, and a 2 litter Dr. Pepper. I split the drink and sticks with TW. I also ran in to the IGA grocery and bought chocolate milk, two apples, some drink mixes, and cotton candy. Then back to the hostel we went.

DM, SB, and SW were walking up as we pulled in the drive way. All of us stayed at the hostel in addition to Beef Stick, Donner, Akido Joe, Frankie the Sleeper, Roughin It, and Scruggs.

April 19 -

This morning I woke up to Walking Man (there are two of them) and Frankie the Sleeper. Supposedly, FS was making too much noise for WM. Whatever happened got blown out of proportion. Out of the 7 of us, I was the first to leave. The first three miles were amazing. The trail followed a gorge. I definitely plan on coming back here some time to camp. After the gorge was a climb over a mountain and then down to Watuga Lake. Donner was ahead of me and Scruggs and Roughin It were shortly behind. I had a snack and pushed on.

The next few miles were just up and downs, but by the time I got to the shelter 17 in, my feet were killing me. I stopped to refill my water. The water source was terrible. It was a walk way down into a ravine. I got back to the shelter and started to contemplate the next 7 miles. I wanted to do 25ish today and 25ish tomorrow. That would get me into Damascus by the evening. Now I might we looking at a 33 or stopping 11 miles short and rolling in the next day.

DS, DM, SB, SW, and TW all stopped at the lake. They are going to get up in the early morning hours to try and do 40 into Damascus. I just have no desire to do that. I don't like being separated, but I have to remember to hike my own hike. If it comes down to it, I'll just have to catch them in a few days. I might also hike with Roughin It, Frankie, Akido Joe, and Donner (those at the shelter tonight) for a few days just to get to know them better. SS is meeting his parents on Friday so he too is in no rush to get into town. I'll keep yall posted on if they make the 40 miles. It would be quite an accomplishment.

Until then, have a good evening!