Buena Vista to Ashby Gap

After a wonderful 5 zeroes I made it back onto the trail Tuesday evening.  I was picked up at the airport by my friend Snausage and his friend Molly.  I was so well fed in Roanoke by Snausage and his roommate Alex, who are chefs by trade, that the walking was slow going and I made it only 5 miles that first night.  The next couple of days I struggled a bit just getting back into the swing of things and dealing with some heavy rain.  I did make it to shelters a couple of times before real heavy downpours occurred.  One of these shelters was called 'The Priest'.and while I say there for 3 hours I was able to read a series of confessions left in the shelter register by other hikers... Most having to do with food or pooping, quite entertaining reading to pass the rainy afternoon away.  On about the 4th day of this stretch I hit Shenandoah national park.  It was an interesting stretch of trail to say the least.  The trail crosses skyline drive every couple of miles so when it was sunny there were plenty of people out.  I met up with Patches and hiked with her for a couple of the days through the Shenandoah.  This was awesome for so many reasons!  First of all her parents were there to support her on this stretch do I experienced an amazing amount of trail magic, complete with camp pad Thai, s'mores, etc...  Another huge perk was that the miles went by quite quickly with somebody to talk to.  After a few days with Patches we caught up with Chuck Wagon and later that same day Patches had to head out to an outfitter.  So for my last couple days of this stretch I hung out with him, drank a blackberry milkshake at the last of the waysides to make sure I got the whole Shenandoah experience, saw 8 bear, got great weather, was treated to a couple of nice wide open views, and got to eat his camp made raspberry cobbler at a shelter one night!!  It was a really fun stretch for me, lots of people around for the most part but it will take me awhile to catch them because I am now in the middle of another planned 5 zeroes... An awesome break for a family reunion up in Montana!

Pearisburg to Buena Vista

This was a 170 mile stretch that I did in 7 days.  I started to run into a huge bubble of thru hikers, passing probably 50 along the way.  Some of the highlights of this stretch were the Keffer Oak (largest tree in the south on the AT), the Audie Murphy monument, the trail magic, Dragons tooth (an awesome rock formation with great views), hitting McAfee Knob at sunrise followed by Tinker Cliffs and Mexican food in Daleville all in one day... I think the pictures speak for themselves for this stretch:)

Damascus to Pearisburg

Such a great stretch of trail for so many reasons!  Starting with the zero in Damascus, filled with chores (including picking up a package of Allybars, YUM!), cards, and food with fellow hikers, mostly Grand Poobah, Bounceback, Twigs, and Chuckwagon whom I spent the majority of this stretch with.  For the time that I was with this awesome group we had nice campfires each night with good company, so fun to be surrounded by fun guys.  During this stretch i reached my 35th highpoint, Mt Rogers!  We went through the Grayson Highlands together on an  amazing clear day, had some awesome interactions with wild ponies and day hikers:). After about 4 days most of the guys had to head back home, sad to see them go, but I did get all of their left over food!  In addition to the food given to me by my friends leaving I experienced enough trail magic in southern Virginia to go an extra 9 days before having to resupply again!  After the boys left and I was on my own again I came to Woods Hole hostel.  This is hands down my favorite hostel so far!  It is a farm ran by a young couple.  Neville made an amazing dinner and breakfast while I was there, I got a massage and the hiker box there had a pair of shoes in it that I thought might work (they didn't!!). Woods Hole was just an amazing, relaxing, peaceful stop that I am very glad I made!  From there to Pearisburg it was only 11 miles, about a mile from where the trail heads downhill into town a thunder storm hit and lightning got pretty close do I did some running on that portion of trail!  Made it into Pearisburg where I bought some 10 dollar shoes at Wal Mart and spent a nice night in the hostel there with Fingers and Patches.

Erwin, TN to Damascus,VA

This 5 day stretch was great!  I have now ran into about 8 other thru-hikers along with some great long section hikers and have enjoyed the company of others along the trail.  One worth noting is a 20 year old kid from New Jersey attempting to complete the trail in 100 days.  This has resulted in him putting in some long days!  His trail name is Glacier and it has been really fun running into him from Hot Springs to Damascus, but I have a feeling he is going to leave me in the dust as I take a zero here and he moves on.  There are quite a few others that I have been able to camp with as well, which made a couple of nights on the last stretch really enjoyable.

My favorite part of the trail on this last stretch was by far the Roan Highlands!  This was an amazing bald that lasted miles and was so beautiful.  It didn't hurt that I had great weather while I was walking across it, made for a wonderful hike!  During this stretch I left the border and moved into just Tennessee, and near the end crossed over into Virginia, so I am now in state number 4!  There were some great lunch time views along this stretch as well!  As far as miles go, I was able to do 4 twenty-six mile days in a row then an 18 into Damascus, so I am really getting into shape.  However, I felt pretty well starved on the trail even though I had eaten what I considered 6 days worth of food in 4 and a half days.  The hiker hunger has begun!

Newfound Gap to Erwin, TN

The majority of this stretch has been on the border of North Carolina and Tennessee.  There has been quite a bit of rain which has meant shelters most nights for me.  I really enjoy the different mini-society that forms in each shelter for just a night.  During this last week of hiking I have been with a group of teachers, old stoners from Georgia I could not understand for the life of me, grungy hippie thru-hikers, and some quiet guys.  Each night in a shelter is a completely new and entertaining experience.

The highlight of the hiking has definitely been 'the balds'.  They have gotten much bigger on this stretch, and I actually passed by 'Big Bald' yesterday in some decent weather and got some nice views west to Tennessee and east to North Carolina.  It has also been fun catching up to some other thru-hikers and getting to know them, many are from the north east and it is a foreign experience for us all traveling through the south.  I am currently staying at Uncle Johnny's Hostel right off of the trail with about 7 other long distance hikers.  Its nice to be in a bit of a crowd for a change!

A major highlight of this stretch was getting to see an old hometown friend in Hot Springs, NC.  Ally Stacher is living in Asheville and rode her bike up to have lunch with me for the day.  It was so much fun to see her looking so healthy and happy and hearing her amazing stories about traveling around the world racing her bike.  I absolutely love when people come and see me in trail towns!!  Hot Springs was a great little stop over for a quick night at Elmers, with a great breakfast to send me off in the morning.

The trail is going great and I am so excited to have caught up with a group of people to hang out with on the hike for awhile!

Bly Gap to Newfound Gap

Made it to mile 200 yesterday!!  I am now rewarding myself with my first true zero in Gatlinburg, TN.  I am not really done with North Carolina yet, the trail walks along the border of NC and TN for awhile then goes back and forth.  Since Georgia, I have been seeing some beautiful country, saw 7 bear (one mama with 3 cubs and one with 2), made my way to the Nantahala Outdoor Center, which is stationed on the Nantahala river, great little stop for some real food and a little bit of live music for a night.  After that I had a day and a half of great weather getting me to Fontana Dam.  While at the shelter just south of Fontana Dam it started to rain.  The others that were staying there said that it was supposed to last the whole next day...

I took this as an opportunity to try out my rain gear!!  So I got all of my 'special gear' (sleeping bag and electronics) wrapped in trash bags, put the pack cover that was given to me by Blueberry in Neel's Gap (THANK YOU!!), and put my new rain jacket on with the hood up and headed out around 8:30 in the morning.  I crossed the dam which provided nice views of the lake, and then entered the Great Smoky Mountains on the other side.  After I was completely soaked (around 8:45)  I really started to enjoy hiking in the rain.  It was one of my favorite days on the trail so far!  I found it kind of novel to just be out walking soaking wet, and if I wasn't worried about my stuff getting wet (which it didn't) I would have enjoyed it even more, which I am sure I will next time now that I know I can trust my system!!  There was thunder and lightning throughout the day as well, luckily the lightning never got closer than 7 miles away so I felt pretty safe and actually managed to put in some good miles.  The rain actually started to clear up around 4:00 and this was right as I got to some of the balds (large tree-less areas), which provided amazing views right after the storm!  The balds throughout the Smoky's have been just beautiful thus far.  It is kind of a shame that I was unable to take any pictures this day because it was amazing...

After my day in the rain, I woke up to a sunny morning and semi-dry shoes thanks to some awesome shelter mates that kept a fire going throughout the night!!  So I ate a little breakfast and got on my way, only 10 miles to Clingman's Dome, the highest point in Tennessee and the highest on the trail!!  I was so excited, but that 10 miles killed me... for some reason I was just sapped of all energy and had to take tons of breaks and eat all of my snacks that I had left, but I made it.  It was a great moment, making it to my 34th state high point and the highest point on the trail at the same time:)  I spent about an hour there talking to people, taking pictures, going down to the visitors center.  I then got back on the trail for another 8 miles to Newfound Gap where I needed to find a ride to Gatlinburg.  About 5 minutes into the downhill hike, I saw a blue drysack roped to the end of a log by the trail... On it was some tape with "For Stacy from California" written on it... Some very specific trail magic:)  So I open up the dry sack and in it is an MP3 player and a note from one of the singers, Dwayne, that had played at the open mic night at the NOC and that I had talked to for awhile that night...  He had written me a song!!  Needless to say, this gave me something to listen to for the next 8 miles, and pretty much made my day.  So I made quick work of the trip to Newfound Gap through a lot of dead and down trees and made my way into Gatlinburg for my first '0' day!! 

Loving life, I have many good pictures on my camera unfortunately the only ones I am able to post here right now are off of my phone...

Way Down Yonder... Georgia

So it begins... I managed to get to the Amicolola Falls trailhead on the night of May 23rd thanks to a hard working shuttle driver, Ron Brown.  I was told that I should definitely do the approach hike by a couple of friends that have done the AT, and I am so grateful for that advice because it was a beautiful hike!  The falls were amazing and it broke me right in to the climbs that I have been facing since. 

My first day on the trail was half the approach hike to Springer, where I was officially at the beginning of the AT.  Got some pictures taken, ate some lunch with some other hikers, then got another 8 official AT miles in.  It was a good first day hiking, a lot of people were out on the trail, which I later figured out was due to memorial day weekend.  When I got to camp that night at Hawk Mountain there were probably about 30 people camped in and around the shelter, madness!!  Ate dinner with a group from Tennessee... loving the accents down here.

The next couple days I cruised through Georgia.  It was a quick state and quite the experience making it through my first state in just 5 days!  There was water all over the place and it is just so green!  Also, there is an abundance of birds singing, its a great way to start hiking in the  morning.  There are certain things that I am getting used to again, like waking up in the middle of the night because my legs need to be stretched, massaging my feet 3 times a day, finding myself singing every song that I have ever heard about Georgia or the Chattahoochee in my head (or out loud).  Over all Georgia went really well, got my hiking legs back and just felt really good to be out on the trail again.  I was very lucky to experience fairly mild temperatures with no rain while hiking through Georgia... We'll see what the next couple months brings:)