tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29013980417807002032024-02-07T02:58:34.909-06:00angie and the appalachian trailnobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.comBlogger64125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-5012342985802028842013-08-29T20:25:00.001-05:002013-08-29T20:25:40.271-05:00a rant for crappy dog owners everywhere...<p dir=ltr>i don't know what's been so weird about the last day, but i've run into two really crappy dog owners in a row, and they've both made me SO MAD!</p>
<p dir=ltr>yesterday, a big group of us hikers stopped by a guy's house who was in our guidebook. he regularly invites hikers over for free ice cream and a game of croquet. as we approached his driveway, a large lab ran out into the gravel road and "welcomed" us with growling. a lady followed the dog and grabbed its collar and led it back into the yard. i assume she was the owner. she was at least the handler for the time we were there. </p>
<p dir=ltr>we all had a good sit on his porch as we ate our ice cream. all the while, this lady is trying to figure out what to do with her dog. at first, she puts it in her car. then i see her walking it on a leash. she walks it around. she brings it close to us. the whole time, the dog is never relaxed. </p>
<p dir=ltr>when we all go to play croquet, swayze gets up to come to me. swayze's coming directly to me, and the lady and that stupid dog are in between us. i didn't think anything of it because the lady has the dog on a leash (and a good owner/handler would be reading their dog's body language or have it under control), but when swayze got even with the dog, the dog jumps out and attacks swayze. i didn't see the original nip. when i saw it, the dog was at her neck, so i ran over, checked her neck really well, and she seemed okay. the lady didn't even apologize!!!! or even reprimand her dog for its behavior!!!! she was just like, "oh.. ok. my dog just jumped on yours. that's cool..." she tied it to the railing of the porch after that. </p>
<p dir=ltr>turns out, after closer inspection, the dog's original bite landed on swayze's rear and gave her a single puncture wound to her hindquarter. it will heal, but this morning, i would have been out of camp by 8, but instead i had to boil some water to make a sterile flush for her spot. also, that stupid dog that bit her is an iraq dog that's probably suffering from PTSD. AND the lady is apparently in vet school???!!! how in the hell are you in vet school and you don't have the common sense to keep a post-iraqi dog on leash away from other dogs???? and you can't read dog body language???</p>
<p dir=ltr>and then this morning in camp, some day hiker brings his FOUR very large dogs into camp off leash and lets them just roam around everyone's tents. by this time, i am already in the process of boiling swayze's water for her wound flush, so all of my stuff is already packed up. but it's still so inconsiderate of someone to bring their dogs into camp and let them sniff around tents. we are hikers. we live in the woods. we deal with bears and other large animals, and we hike upwards of 15 miles a day. granted, it doesn't make a lot of sense that a bear would be in camp in the morning time, but if someone had wanted to sleep in, those dogs sure would have ruined that. </p>
<p dir=ltr>so i'm by the bridge, and one of his huskies is approaching us. i stand up between swayze and the dog, and i ask the guy if his dog is friendly and let him know that my dog was bitten yesterday. he says yes, so i move and let them meet. they haven't met for five seconds and his dog is growling at swayze, so i move in and block his dog. i ask him to take his dog away and he says to me, "ah, i've owned dogs all my life, and it's fine. if they'd have wanted to do anything, he'd have done it by now." so i told him, "yeah, and that's what the lady said yesterday, too, and my dog got bit. could you get control of your dog?" and then he took me by surprise. he said, "it's not a f---in' private campground. </p>
<p dir=ltr>i'm from the south. and in the south, an older gentleman would NEVER address a younger lady with that word. but i realized i wasn't dealing with a gentleman, and i quickly lost my lady. i told him, "i realize it's not a f---in' private campground, but when i ask you to get control of your dog, you should do it!" </p>
<p dir=ltr>i have been so angry at people with dogs! how ignorant can you be??? if you have an even slightly aggressive dog, leash the damned thing so that good dogs and good owners may enjoy themselves accordingly! arrrrrr!!!</p>
nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-17433213295894236162013-08-27T09:49:00.001-05:002013-08-27T09:52:33.059-05:00i'm in new hampshire!!! :)<div style="text-align: justify;">
i am in my last state of the AT!!! :) </div>
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i crossed into new hampshire yesterday. these last couple of days have been amazing. God has truly blessed me with trail angels... two days ago, poppins and i were coming down a mountain and a guy yells at us from his back porch, "you guys want some coffee?" it stopped me in my tracks, and i yell back, "umm... yes!" so we got to the roadway and turned right, dropped our packs in his side yard, and went in for a cup of joe. baltimore jack (a guy who's hiked the AT 8+ times) was there with a few other hikers and the owner of the house, whose name was dan. to summarize, we wound up staying there for a few hours, and then it was decided that they would slack us south for 13 miles that afternoon. so travis loaded us up in the truck, drove us to west hartford, and at 2:30 that afternoon, we started the 13 mile hike back to dan's house. we got there a little after dark for a completion of a 19-mile day. more people had arrived and a homemade smorgasbord awaited us. there was bbq chicken and pasta salad and corn on the cob... a hiker's dream! dan even gave me the last can of coke! :) </div>
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i wish i could explain how awesome the next morning worked out. i will try. i will preface it with this: i absolutely LOVE how trusting and amazing the hiking community is. </div>
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our original plan for that morning was to have travis drive us back to west hartford before he had to leave to go back home to connecticut. however, as i'm packing up my tent, a complete stranger pulls into the driveway at dan's barn, gets out, and asks me if the owner of the property is around. i pointed to dan's house, told him he lives there, and he asked me his name. the stranger's (trail) name wound up being forty-four, and he was there to see if dan wouldn't mind slacking him over the exact same section that we had slacked the day before. </div>
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no less than half an hour later, forty-four had handed his car keys over to us, and entrusted us to drive his car the half hour north to west hartford and leave it parked and waiting on him for the end of his hike. it wound up working out amazingly for everyone involved because travis could drive straight to connecticut, forty-four got an extra half hour of hiking time that wasn't spend driving to west hartford, and we got to stop by the dunkin donuts on the way. :) </div>
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i wish everyone in "the real world" was so trustworthy as to give them the keys to your car in absolute faith that it would be exactly where they said it would be at the end of the day. </div>
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it's 10:30 a.m. and i should be hiking right now, but i've decided that i will take today rather slowly. i haven't been feeling well these past three or four days, and at first i thought it might could be giardia but those "fears" have been put to rest and now i've decided that i am probably stressed and dehydrated and just really tired. </div>
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here are the following reasons why thru-hiking is SO MUCH EASIER than section hiking:</div>
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- you only have to request off from work or quit your job once. </div>
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- you have (relatively) no deadlines to work with, so you can take your time with everything</div>
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- you only have to pay for transportation to/from the trail once</div>
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there are probably many more, but those are the major three that i can think of right now. </div>
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i've just been stressed about having to meet tim, kira, and heba on a certain date at a certain time. new england has been kicking my ass as far as terrain goes, and it's so hard to tell when it's going to happen. one day will be an easy 7-hour 14-miler and the next day, it'll take me an entire 10 hours to complete the same distance and i'll be completely beaten down at the end of the day. i think it has something to do with the fact that i've been on the trail for over four weeks now and there hasn't been a single day where i've not put my pack on and hiked. granted, i did have one day where i only hiked 3 miles into town and the rest of the day was spent doing town things and relaxing, but i have backpacked every single day for the past month. when i was on the trail the first time, i was out for five months and an entire month of those were complete 0 days. that's a 0 every five days. that means i'm 4 days overdue for rest. :) okay, so maybe i was a little lazy the first time, but i'm kind of amazed at myself for not taking a full day off this time around. </div>
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i will be in the white mountains of new hampshire in a few days. for those of you who pray, please pray for me. :) i think every hiker is a bit intimidated by the whites because of the extremes of the weather. mount washington holds the record for the second-highest wind speed ever at 231 mph. granted, that was almost 80 years ago, but the unpredictability continues. and i'll be dealing with myself and swayze over it. i know it will all wind up fine in the end, but please pray for excellent weather for the next two weeks in new hampshire. :) </div>
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ooh!!! also!!!<br />
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yesterday, my AT checklist was completed because i finally saw a tree fall in the woods!!!! (and it made a sound!!!!) :) so now i've seen rattlesnakes and bears and moose and turkeys and porcupines and a tree fall in the woods. </div>
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nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-27909834609416099232013-08-19T19:19:00.001-05:002013-08-19T19:19:53.882-05:00three weeks down... <div style="text-align: justify;">
my, how time has flown by! :) </div>
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i am currently in vermont and as i type this, i'm downing a pint of ben & jerry's phish food. vermont has been amazing thus far! y'all, i am super close to being a 2,000-miler, and i have STILL not had to hitchhike. i really had planned on hitchhiking this morning when i got to the road, but these vermont people are so nice, i swear i had not even set my pack down and had time enough to put my thumb out, and a car had pulled over and wanted to know if i needed a ride. so swayze and i hopped into her car, and she took us straight to mcdonald's. wanna know what my breakfast was? are you ready for this? i had a bacon, egg & cheese mcgriddle, a sausage biscuit, and a cinnamon melt that was washed down by two big glasses of sweet tea (thank GOD mcdonald's exist in the north)! 1,200+ calories of pure bliss. swayze had her fix, too: three sausage biscuits! </div>
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mcdonald's was an amazing treat because yesterday, i ran out of food. up until vermont, you could "deli hop" on the AT, which basically means that you hit a town at least once a day that's close enough that you can go in for lunch, and not have to pack that food with you. when i resupplied the day before i hit vermont, i got the normal amount of food that i have been getting, but there aren't any delis mid-day here in this state. so i went through my food faster than i thought i would, and i was sufficiently starving by the time we got to town this morning. </div>
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my pack is newly decorated! i ran into a few trail maintainers the other day, and they were painting blazes on the trees. i really wanted to paint a blaze, and i asked them if i could, but i don't think they took me seriously and they just laughed about it. but when i ran into their buddies a few miles north, i asked them if they would paint a blaze on my pack, and they let me do it myself! :) so now i have a white blaze on my backpack, and it's with bona fide AT paint! </div>
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i have been meeting new, awesome people on a fairly regular basis. i haven't seen damselfly in almost a week. i feel really bad because there was a bee climbing up my shirt, and when i tried to climb behind my back, i took my pack off and dropped it to the ground, but when i bent down, the bee fell in my hair and got stuck, hahaha. then i semi-freaked out because i could hear this bee getting so pissed off going BUZZBUZZBUZZBUZZZBUZZZZZZZZ right next to my ear, and damselfly braved the bee and got it out with two sticks, but then it fell on her foot and stung her through her sock. and she's allergic to bees! =( so she took my bullet bee for me, and then had to go into town and medicate herself, and i have yet to see her since. she is okay now, and hopefully, she will catch up and i will see her soon. </div>
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swayze's feet are holding up well. i bought some softpaws... they are nail caps that are meant to protect hardwood floors from dogs' feet. they're the last thing i could think of that might work for hiking. her front feet have had them on for almost 3 weeks now, and i just put her back toes on a few days ago. we'll see how this goes. i just ordered her a new coat tonight that should keep her nice and toasty for the white mountains here in a few weeks. i'm getting kind of nervous about how cold it will be when i get to them...</div>
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oh... i stayed at a hostel a few nights ago. i saw a picture of tim from 2011 where he'd stayed there. there is now a blank spot on that poster, and every time i open my guide book now, a handsome hiker man stares back at me. =D</div>
nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-39464608673179312582013-08-06T11:58:00.000-05:002013-08-06T12:13:51.680-05:00hello from connecticut! :Dso we're in connecticut! :)<p>
everything so far has been pretty awesome. it took us about a week, and we still don't fully have our trail legs, but swayze has totally perked up, and just the other day, we pulled our first 21-mile day. granted, the day after, those numbers were reversed, and we just did 12, but we're getting there. :)<p>
we ran into a rattlesnake three days into the trail. that was kind of scary... it was big and fat and yellow. i had to call swayze off of it two or three times, and then it just went on its way. no bears yet. i have yet to do any laundry, but i've had two showers. none with soap, though. <p>
it's so cold for summertime! it's getting down into the upper 50s and lower 60s here, and that's not normal for (what i consider to be) summer. i mean, i guess it might be for here, but when i hiked two years ago, i didn't think the north could get hot. it was still in the 80s at night two years ago. but now, i'm thinking that these are normal temperatures for the north in "summer", and it worries me because i'm not sure how cold it'll be when it actually starts turning cold. i've got a +45 bag, but i can't fully crawl into it and bundle up because i share it with the swayze dog. <p>
she is getting all sorts of trail magic, as always. damselfly and i walked to a deli that was .6 off the trail the other day, and i bought swayze a can of alpo just to break up the routine food, and next thing i know, the lady behind the counter brings her out two more cans as a treat. and then today, we were sitting outside the coffee shop and a lady bought a dog treat and fed it to her. she's lovin' it. :) <p>
gearwise, i'm impressed with things. carrying only 50L isn't so hard at all. i have yet to perfect the amount of food i'm carrying, and i can't drink enough water. even though it's relatively cool, i'm still drinking upwards of 3L a day. i'm not 100% sure how i feel about the tent that i wound up getting... i had to go with the big agnes fishhook ul 2, and it's zipperless. its setup can be tricky on tent pads/concrete, and every once in a while, a few bugs (mainly black ants) will still wind up getting in. on our test run in tim's parents' backyard, we decided that a permethrin treatment was a must, so that's definitely helped with the amount of mosquitoes, etc., but that was a downfall of the tent: i feel if you spend $460 on a tent, you shouldn't have to do anything else to it, especially if bugs getting in is a known possibility. imo, the fishhook should come pre-treated.<p>
my hiker hunger is beginning to kick in, but it's not full-force yet. i have been craving cokes, but nothing super weird (such as ice covered in ketchup) yet.<p>
i miss seeing and talking to everybody! much love to you folks!<p>
some have asked, and if you would like to send anything, here's the formula for general delivery. :) many, many thanks in advance for anything received. :D next town stop to be announced soon. <p>
angie holbrook<br>
c/o general delivery<br>
dalton, ma 01226<br>
please hold for thru-hiker<br>
est'd date of arrival 08/15/2013nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-66150895751918671182013-06-24T09:49:00.000-05:002013-06-24T09:49:03.044-05:00a brief view of things to come... :) <div style="text-align: justify;">
lots of fun things are happening, ladies 'n' gents. </div>
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in the past two weeks, i've talked with both of my managers concerning a 6-week leave of absense for the end of july through august that would allow me to go finish the AT. </div>
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three weeks ago, tim, kira, swayze and i went to linville gorge for three days and two nights of outdoor adventure. the weather on sunday was not so great, so we car camped that night and then hiked out on monday morning. God bless all trail maintainers!! we took an unmaintained trail off the mountains to sea trail to get down into the gorge, and at times, i was just closing my eyes and walking forward to avoid having them poked out by the leaves and overgrown branches. we saw three snakes... an unidentified brown snake, a black snake, and a copperhead. the copperhead was really pretty... he was just sunning himself on a rock. the main bridge down in the gorge had been washed away a few weeks prior due to flooding, so we actually had to swim across the river. we threw our packs on a pulley system someone had rigged up and forded the river. no oxen died in the fording. </div>
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we ran into two people who were at linville hiking with their dogs. the dogs were two really cute labs named springer and baxter. :) it was kind of crazy, too... apparently the guy followed my blog when i hiked. small world! they were really nice.. the guy offered moral support to swayze when she had to swim across the river, haha. she wasn't too fond of that. </div>
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that weekend, i realized i might be able to cut my pack volume by more than a few liters. for the three days, i had plenty of extra food, and plenty of empty space in my bag. since that weekend, i've tried on multiple packs in the 50-55L range. i think i've decided on the osprey aura 50L. but i want the green color. not the ugly purple color. </div>
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so not only will i try to hike with a ~25% reduced pack volume, but i think i'll try going stoveless this time, too. while i really enjoy a buttered hot chocolate every once in a while, i'm super lazy about doing dishes in the woods. twelve hours between cooking and cleaning doesn't make ramen any easier to scrape off the sides of your cook pot. this will take some getting used to. stay tuned on how that all works out. </div>
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section hiking kinda sucks, though. i'm gonna have to figure out all travel logistics and whatnot. i much prefer the "drop you off in the woods and just call me when you're done" routine. not so much a big fan of having a timeline i'll have to go by... what happens if i get to a town and there's another church picnic with ponies to ride?! or if i meet another stranger lady that just happens to want to take me and my dog out of the summer heat for three awesome days of home-cooked meals and ice cream?! zeroes are the BEST! and i'll have to limit them. </div>
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so pretty much the entire dynamic of this hike will be different than last hike: less space, less weight, less meal options, and less vacation in the middle of the woods. this will be based on planning, planning, planning. and i kind of suck at that. </div>
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challenge accepted!</div>
nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-32583682802246596992012-05-21T21:30:00.000-05:002012-05-21T21:30:32.092-05:00i'll take being a hippie ten days at a time.okay, so how awesome is this: last week, i went eight days between showers... :) <br />
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i miss hiking so much. <3 <br />
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saturday morning, after a breakfast of bojangles biscuits 'n' sweet tea, jennifer and i hiked north from the james river foot bridge. the weather the first day out was a little cold, but beautiful nonetheless. and i'll be damned if we didn't run into john & chester ("yah" and "token"), two absolutely wonderful customers from the cary rei. we all stopped and had a half-hour chat trailside. they were southbound, so i gave them my phone number and told them to shoot me a text when they got to trail days. <br />
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my legs didn't hurt as bad on the uphills as i remember them hurting down in georgia last year, haha, but my lungs weren't in "talking on the uphill" condition. there were a few nice vistas that first day where we stopped and had breaks for trail mix and oreos covered in nutella thanks to jennifer's genius idea. :D the rhododendron was in full bloom, and it made for a really pretty walk. we camped that night about 11 miles in at a shelter that was supposedly haunted by the ghost of a 4 year old little boy who died on the mountain a hundred years ago. i didn't see or hear anything supernatural, but then again, i slept so soundly that night, i didn't even hear the coyotes that jen said she heard come close to camp after midnight. <br />
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the following day was a pretty long one, and it wasn't really all that fun, but we did run into some trail magic at a road crossing, where i downed a fudge-covered brownie and chugged a mountain dew. i think that's what got me up that last mountain of the day. i was really aiming not to camp where we did, but logistics such as sunset, fatigue, and impending rain put us stopping at cow camp gap shelter. the main reason i didn't want to stay in that general area is because that's where stonewall's body was found. if you weren't reading along last year, or if you're unaware, an AT hiker was found dead under "suspicious circumstances" last summer near the trail. the FBI eventually ruled the death a homicide by strangulation. as far as i know, the case remains unsolved. i met stonewall for a brief period south of harper's ferry, and from what i gathered, he was a good guy. it's just a sad, sad situation, and i wasn't scared to camp at cow camp shelter... i just really didn't want to see any remnants of his death (like a grave marker or disturbed dirt). i saw nothing, but thought of him a lot. <br />
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the rain began right before we got to the shelter, and after setting my tent up in a constant drizzle, i discovered the seams that were sealed so well three weeks prior in the hail storm in grayson highlands were not to tightly sealed this time. i guess my tent has officially died. the rain dripped in throughout the night and eventually formed puddles all around me. my down bag got pretty wet, and that's one of the main drawbacks of down: once it gets wet, it loses its insulating properties. i said my sunshine prayer, which mainly consists of "dear God, PLEASE let it quit raining before sunrise," but it just didn't work. i told jennifer that i thought i was a pretty decent person, but for some reason, God felt the need to put me through some character-building exercises. the next morning, once i had broken my tent down in the rain, off we hiked. i'd forgotten my rain jacket back in raleigh, so i had stopped by target and bought a $1.50 poncho before we headed out, and i must say, it was money super-well spent. it blocked the cold wind, and i stayed relatively dry because it was so cold, i wasn't really sweating on the uphills. <br />
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we only did 10 miles that day, and right before we got to the shelter, two guys hiked up behind us and asked which one of us worked at REI. "uncle nole" (sp?), a hiker we had met the first night out, had asked about the sawyer filter i was testing out. he had mentioned the fact that i had it to these guys, and so they caught up so they could ask about it. their names wound up being "meat" and "coffee to go" and they were the highlight of my hike. :) they are super nice, awesome guys and they made me laugh so much. that night, swayze and i got a spot in the shelter. :) i absolutely hate hate hate setting up or breaking down a tent in the rain, so the shelter made me super happy. to avoid boredom, since we all stopped hiking before five, we cooked supper and laid out pads and bags, and then put our headlamps on and played a game of phase 10 that lasted until midnight. <br />
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my sunshine prayers were finally answered in the pre-dawn hours of tuesday morning when it quit raining. all the hikers were talking about the "free lunch" at the dutch haus, a bed & breakfast 1.1 miles off the trail. they'll pick you up at 11 a.m., drive you to their place in town, and feed you. for free. i wasn't really sure if they would allow dogs, but i hiked down with everybody anyways. they had no problem with swayze, so we all loaded up in the back of the pickup truck and when we got there, i was able to lay my tent out in the yard and it was completely dry by the time we left. :) the lunch consisted of amazing hot chili, baked potatoes, and cake. and it really was free. these people cook every single day for any person who hikes into the parking lot with a backpack on. i would love to do that one day. <br />
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because of some previous injuries that were resurfacing, jennifer pulled off the trail at the dutch haus and got a shuttle back to her car. it was sad to see her go... the more, the merrier when it comes to hiking. even swayze seemed to be like, "wtf?" when we hit the trail again that afternoon. the remainder of the afternoon consisted of the 1.1 mile straight uphill hike back to the AT, then i think we did another ~12? miles to go two shelters out. we wound up at a really nice shelter right beside a huge creek, and it was nice falling asleep to the sound of rushing water that night. i'm cool with water as long as it's outside my tent. :) <br />
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because of two late nights in a row (we stayed up 'til 11ish tuesday night trying to keep a fire going), we were all pretty tired on wednesday. we woke up early and coffee, meat, and i were out of camp by 7. we had a 2000' gain coming out of camp, and we took so many breaks that day. it was just so. slow. going. by noon, i think we'd only done 10 miles or so. what the heck? meat and coffee definitely could have gone on and left me behind... i was slowing them down. <br />
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but that day sound up being perfect. we took numerous long breaks, had awesome sunshine, and towards the end of the day, we decided to camp on top of a mountain with a view instead of trying to make it to the next shelter. when we came out at the dripping rock parking lot on skyline drive, it was 430ish? and we still had 2 more miles to hike before we got to the campsite. we all sat down on the side of the road and got to talking. i mentioned how awesome calling and getting pizza delivered roadside would be, and it was a chain reaction from there. i was basically just thinking out loud, but when you think good ideas out loud around coffee, he takes them seriously and makes them happen. :) then "mamaw b" came out of the woods... she is AWESOME. she's a 71 year old lady who's thru-hiking by herself. when meat discovered he had 3G, mamaw b told him to hook us up. :) he tried three different pizza places, and the third one agreed to deliver to the blue ridge parkway!!!!!!!! =D we ordered two large pizzas and 4L of coke, and we all sat around smiling and laughing and eating and drinking and just having fun. alcohol and drugs can't get you that kind of high, folks. that's high on life right there. when every slice was gone, we strapped the pizza boxes to the back of our packs and began the uphill hike to the campsite. we got to the top just in time to see a very beautiful sunset... every last bit of it. it's crazy how fast the sun disappears once it starts setting. once our tents were set up, we had a celebration burning of the pizza boxes and then went to bed. i slept with my rainfly off that night, and right before i fell asleep, i saw a shooting star. like i said: perfection. <br />
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the next morning we were out of camp by 630 for the 12 mile hike into waynesboro. we maintained a consistent pace and we arrived in town at 1130... not too shabby. :) the last five miles were really nice because we'd caught up with "sunshine" and "balls", a father-daughter team that hiked the PCT last year. when we were hiking grayson highlands a few weeks ago, tim, jim, and i actually met them on sunshine's birthday. she was turning 12. they have plans of hiking the CDT next year and making her the youngest triple-crowner on record. they are very nice people and it was a joy to hike with them for a bit. <br />
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waynesboro provided cleanliness. coffee to go had decided to ride on down with me to trail days, and meat was staying with one of his friends at a hotel in waynesboro, so we all went into town and did laundry and showered at the YMCA and then hit up the chinese buffet before heading to the outfitter. we didn't leave town until well after 5, and then we stopped at jen's house to pick up my stuff that i'd left in her car. then we headed to pearisburg, virginia to pick up orion (or will, as i first knew him), the guy i met on the trail in the shenandoahs last year. then it was to damascus!!!! :) we didn't get into town until 130 friday morning, but it was amazing. <br />
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I LOVE MY TRAIL FAMILY. i can't even list all of the people i got to see because it would take forever, but i was surrounded by great people the entire weekend. i had lunch with francois and john on friday, and then tim drove over for the weekend, and i hung out with coffee to go a lot, and jennifer drove down from roanoke and picked up yah and token on her way, and then i got to see jen & nathaniel, and friday night was the contra dance and it was so much fun!!!!! and then saturday i got to see all of my favorite starbucks people from bristol, and i even got to see one of my beautiful friends get married in kingsport. i am so happy for knicky and i feel so blessed to have friends who say that they would love for you to come to their wedding in your hiking attire because you have nothing else to wear. :) <br />
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my car broke saturday night on the way to the wedding because i went over a speed bump too fast, and it knocked my throttle out of place, and i had no idea what happened, so i called tim because he's a genius with just about everything, and i described the problem to him. he met me just off exit 19 and fixed my car like a boss. trail people rock. i love it. <br />
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sunday began with saying goodbye to coffee to go as he got a ride back to waynesboro, and me giving wren a ride to the trailhead. then i hauled ass back to raleigh so i could clock in at REI by 1 pm. <br />
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i can't really say anything else other than i am super blessed to live the life that i do. i am surrounded by wonderful people in a beautiful world and it just couldn't get any better than this. i do believe the woods and the mountains are good for a girl's heart and mind (but maybe not her hygiene...). they make me so happy, and i can't wait to get back to 'em.nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-66845798291497560932012-05-11T23:29:00.002-05:002012-05-11T23:29:58.890-05:00i'm back at it! :)<div style="text-align: justify;">
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a little over seven months ago, i was sitting in a library in western massachusetts and writing a blog entry that detailed the end of my 1500+ mile journey. those five months changed my life forever. :) i now think two shirts and two pairs of pants comprise a month's worth of clothing. i'm okay with eating things off the floor. pooping in the woods is sometimes preferable to using certain restrooms. i don't freak out if i forget deodorant for a day, and there have been occasions when i voluntarily brush my teeth with soap. for three months after getting out of the woods, i slept on the floor, and "within walking distance" has taken on a whole new meaning.</div>
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with the exception of a small pit stop in bristol spending time with awesome people, i basically went straight from massachusetts to mississippi and spent the holidays with my family and best friends that i grew up with. after six years, it was nice to finally wake up in my home town on christmas morning. my original goal was to only be home through the new year, and after january 1st, i began looking for a job elsewhere. i had a couple of options on the table and had applied to a few REIs in the DC area, the southeast, and out west. one afternoon in mid-january after a nice, long run, i got back in my car to head home and a call came in from a 919 area code. i answered, and i'll be damned if it wasn't an REI in north carolina, formally inviting me to an interview two weeks later. :)</div>
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suffice it to say, after driving 14 hours to north carolina for the interview, i got the job and started three weeks later. i packed whatever i could fit into my little blue scion, and not that i didn't love my life prior to the move, but God has been nothing but good to me since i got to north carolina. i LOVE working at REI... i work with the best people, i have the coolest job, and the area is so active! there's a state park ten minutes from the house that has a six-mile loop trail that swayze and i have gone hiking/running on a few times, and i've been rock climbing once, and last month a dozen or so of us took kayaks and canoes out on falls lake under a full moon around midnight. it. has. been. awesome. francois's sisters live in raleigh, so he was there the first two months or so that i was in town, so we hung out, and then reese came up from south carolina for a few nights. i've actually even run into college AND high school classmates in my store! taylor and carolyn even stopped by on their way from florida back to west virginia. :) </div>
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so basically, life is better than good: it's awesome. and tomorrow morning, it will get even better when i step foot into the woods and hike north to finish those 80 miles that i skipped last year in virginia. </div>
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i have missed the mountains and the appalachian trail oh so much. a few weeks ago, two friends and i had a couple of days off in a row so we drove up to grayson highlands and did a little over twenty miles. we got licked by "wild" ponies and we got caught in a pretty nasty golf ball-sized hail storm and we soaked our feet in ice cold streams. other than "perfect", it's hard to describe the exact feeling that comes with walking five miles into the woods, taking off your shoes, finding a nice rock to lay on, and letting the sun shine down on you while the wind tries to blow through your nappy hair.</div>
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despite working at REI, my gear hasn't changed much at all from last year. funds haven't allowed me to go completely crazy and revamp every item i own. i did buy a new headlamp yesterday, though, because i've somehow misplaced mine. so i'll be rockin' a 60-lumen petzel instead of the 50ish energizer that i picked up last year in pearisburg when i realized that 8 lumens isn't enough to night hike with. :) i did check out the new sawyer squeeze filtration system from the gear bank, so i'll be using that. it's actually an amazingly simple system, and i'm super excited about it because it was free and i won't have to clean it in the field! :) </div>
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so here's to hoping that these next 80 miles will be nothing short of wonderful. we'll hopefully be done with the trail by thursday morning, and that will leave just enough time to drive south, pick up jennifer's car, pick up a hitching hiker or two, and then head to trail days! i am SO excited about trail days this year! SO MANY DIRTY NASTY STINKY HIKER HIPPIES! i love it! and there's a weddin' a brewin' in bristol next weekend for nick & knicky, so hopefully i will be in attendance. </div>
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i mean, really. what have i done to deserve a life like this? :) </div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-46067004876252646162011-09-28T15:37:00.000-05:002011-09-28T15:37:24.520-05:00homeward bound!<div style="text-align: justify;">this will be my last journal entry for quite a while... i decided yesterday, in the midst of a particularly crappy day, that i would end my hike for this year. when i decided last week that we would skip new hampshire and vermont this year, i figured that we would get down to mass and pull consecutive twenty-mile days and be done with our hike in less than two weeks. well... our first full day in mass, we did pull twenty miles. it wasn't too hard, but by the end of that night, i was absolutely exhausted. my feet hurt and i misread my map and i walked a few tenths of a mile in the wrong direction, but there was a completely awesome end to the day in that we stayed at tom levardi's house and he made me the best ice cream sundae ever, complete with fresh peach cubes. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">the next day, we had planned on staying at upper goose pond cabin, a pretty nice shelter on the trail, famous for its view, fireplace, and the pancakes that are often served each morning if there is a caretaker on duty. ugp is another 20-mile day from dalton, and we didn't get out of town until at least ten that morning. we had only made it a little over halfway when i decided to stop for the day so i'd have a little bit of sunshine left to cook and wash dishes with. it was pretty disappointing to not be able to pull two twenties in a row, but that night, i looked at my guidebook and planned for a 22-mile day the next day, figuring that we'd balance the big and little days out. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">yesterday dawned and we were out of camp by 730 or so, and things just didn't go as i thought or hoped they would. by 10, we had only done six r seven miles, which was pretty disappointing. we stopped at a really pretty stream to get more water, clean up, grab a snack, etc. when i grabbed my aqua-mira out of my pack, i noticed that the bottle that part b was in had cracked, and i had no second part to my water purification system. basically, it was useless. i <b>hate</b> aqua-mira and won't ever purchase another set. i will forever stand behind msr's sweetwater drops. <3 so from that point on, if i wanted any water that i didn't feel 100% safe in drinking (such as from a spring, right out of a rock), i was going to have to boil every drop of it. which would have gotten to be quite a pain, considering i drink upwards of 3L a day. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i also discovered during our little break by the stream that my mosquito repellent had run dry. i got one final application out of the bottle, and three hours later, i had sweated off the 100% deet that i had applied and was being eaten alive. the next town with any sort of store was at least two days away, and it was five miles off the trail, which would mean taking an entire day to go walk to get bug spray, or hitching a ride, which i still haven't done and don't feel comfortable doing. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">so yesterday, i stopped on a bridge in the middle of the trail where the moquitoes couldn't get me, and i sat down and had a good cry. i pulled out my guide book and figured that if i bailed out in mass, i could just rent a car and drive down to virginia to pick up the 80 miles that i have left to do there, and then continue south to home. too bad car rentals don't do one-ways out of state?! what the heck?! i called enterprise and they were no use. basically, i was stuck where i was. so i cried some more. then i remembered that some good friends of mine from bristol were visiting their family in maine, and that they were due to drive back south soon. i called them, and it turns out that they are driving back tomorrow. perfect! i bailed off the trail, and i'm getting a shuttle to eastern mass tomorrow morning, and then i'll be bristol bound for some pumpkin soup and awesome friends, and then mississippi bound for catfish and awesome friends! =D</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">it turns out that yesterday, i was just PMSing. that may be a little bit too much information for y'all, but everything seems 10, and even 100, times worse when you're PMSing. maybe i blew everything out of proportion, but i missed everybody, i was tired, i was hurting, and i was annoyed as hell at the thought of having to boil my water and be a mosquito buffet. i can hike if i have to boil my water. i can hike with bugs. i can even hike through pain (i've done enough of that), but put it all together, and it just gets to be too much sometimes. i didn't come into hiking the AT with the thought that everything would be puppies and kittens and sunshine, but if i'm not enjoying myself, if i'm hating the thing that i'm out here doing, then it's time for me to do something else. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i saw something painted on a wall in a sandwich shop the other day. it read, "the worst experience is not defeat, but regret." i may not have finished all 2,181 miles of the appalachian trail this year, in one go-round, but i do not regret a single step that i have made on this journey. i don't feel defeated: i will just come back next year and finish what i have not completed. i don't regret stepping off that trail yesterday. it felt wonderful to be able to buy full bottles of actual shampoo and conditioner last night in the grocery store and know that i will be able to keep both bottles after i'd used them once, instead of having to throw them in the hiker box because they're too heavy to carry. i know i will have a hard time adjusting back to the "real world," but some of those things will be welcome. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">all in all, i am super thankful for all of my time out here. God has been wonderful to me, y'all have been wonderful to me, and i wouldn't trade these last five months for the world, even if it meant finishing the entire thing in one attempt. sometimes, you have to learn that not completing things doesn't mean you've failed at them. i will take these +/- 1,700 miles proudly. i have met too many people out here that have told me, "you're hiking the whole thing?! alone?! i could never do that!" i also saw painted on a wall the other day, "those that say things are impossible deem them so." </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">you can only do what you put your mind to, and next year, i'll put my mind to ~481 miles in the northeast. :) </div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-70157150462331985522011-09-19T12:03:00.002-05:002011-09-19T12:04:49.509-05:00<div style="text-align: justify;">yesterday around lunch, after i posted my latest entry, swayze and i loaded into janet's (the owner of one of the most awesome campgrounds in the world) van and she drove us to pinkham notch, roughly 15 miles down the road. our plan was to get dropped off at pinkham and then hike northbound back into gorham by today and then wait out the really crappy weather that's going to hit the northeast tomorrow. there was about 20 trail miles we'd have to hike and that section included wildcat mountain, which has i believe four peaks we'd have to summit. we made it a tad bit over one mile into our hike when i decided to bail off the mountain. the first mile was pretty much flat and in that distance, swayze had already thrown a shoe at least six times. i had tried the vetrap and once she started losing her shoes, i even tried the baby socks and gorilla tape and nothing seemed to be working. </div><br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">so i came to the conclusion, sitting on one of the rock stairs at the base of wildcat mountain, that she would not be able to hike the white mountains of new hampshire. if she can't keep her shoes on, she can't keep her toenails intact. and if her toenails can't stay in shape, she can't hike. i don't have time to fiddle fart around with this brand and that brand of shoes, as far as ordering her a few more pairs and waiting on them to come in and then doing test runs up the mountains. i did some more research last night and i found a few more brands that might work, but as far as ruffwear brand dog boots, caveat emptor. </div><br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">i have decided that i am going to skip both new hampshire AND vermont this year and come back next year and hike them with my cousin. perhaps by that time, i will have found a pair of boots that will actually do their job and <strong>stay on</strong> and swayze will either be able to come with me, or maybe i can find a babysitter for a month or two while i complete the trail. so i guess, sadly, i'm not a thru-hiker anymore? <strong><span style="color: #3d85c6;">=(</span></strong> i suppose i have become a lasher, or <strong>l</strong>ong <strong>a</strong>ss <strong>s</strong>ection <strong>h</strong>ik<strong>er</strong>. sometime this week, i am going to either rent a car or find a ride down to massachusetts and complete mass, ct, ny, and my sections in jersey (13 miles), pa (30 miles), and va (80 miles) that i have skipped. all that i will lack after that will be the 3 miles in maine that i didn't get to before we had to bail off the trail last weekend, the 163 miles of nh, and the 150 miles of vt for a total of 316 miles for next year. that'll mean that we'll have done 1,865 miles this year. i will definitely be sad by the fact that i won't get my "2000-miler" this year. but you gotta do whatcha gotta do, and if my dog can't hike, then i can't either. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">but we still have hundreds of miles of adventure left, boys and girls, so hang on to your hats and stay along for the ride! </div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-4081125401783144642011-09-18T10:30:00.000-05:002011-09-18T10:30:24.708-05:00variables in my new plan aso i have a very flexible new plan a. swayze and i have been in gorham, nh for the last week waiting for her feet to heal up, relaxing, and gearing up for some damned cold weather. we were planning on hiking a few days ago, but i used that day to walk into town and sort of shop for cold weather gear and whatnot. i swear my clothes bag almost weighs as much as my food bag!<br />
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anyways, as i was walking into town that day, a friend that i'd met up here adn the owner of the campground i've been staying at drove by me and pulled over on the side of the road. they said they were going to drive up to mt. washington and wanted to know if i wannted to tag along. eager to scope out the territory that i will soon be hiking, i hopped in the backseat and off we went. however, when we got to the base of the mountain, the park employees informed us that the mountain was closed on top because of inclement weather conditions but that we could still drive halfway up.<br />
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the guy who was driving has an altimeter in his car that came out of an old airplane. mt. washington's peak sits at 6,288 feet, the second highest on the entire AT. i've already climbed the highest peak of the AT, so mt. washington should be no big deal, right? wrong. mt. washington boasts that it is the home of the world's worst weather. back in the 1930s, a wind speed of 231 mph was recorded atop mt. washington and held the world record until recently. so by the time we got to roughly 4,200' the other day, the temp was 37 degrees and a ~40 mph wind was hurling snowflakes through the air. i also got the first taste of what rime ice is. google it if you don't know what it is... it's rreally pretty, but i do plan on hiking today so i don't have time to fully explain it. we parked the car in a small parking lot when we got as high as we could and got out of the car. bob forewarned me to hold onto the car door while i opened it because the winds wrre so strong. we lasted maybe five minutes out in that weather. i tried to get my picture taken in the first snow that i've experienced on the AT, but i couldn't hold my eyes open long enough because the snow stung so badly. i lost my balance a few times trying to navigate the few rocks that were on the ground while dealing withthe wind. i've never had to lean into the wind to remain upright. it was quite intimidating. <br />
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which i suppose is why i've stayed so long in gorham... it was completely FUN being out in that kind of weather knowing there was the safety and comfort of a car available. but the idea of hikig in those kind of winds scares me. hiking mt. washington will mean i will be above treeline for miles and miles... hours of exposed, windy hiking. i have been checking the weather on mt. washington's website continually since our little escapade and the wind chill hasn't risen above freezing.<br />
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if y'all can do anything right now, please pray for an indian summer for new hampshire. i am super worried about having to hike in these conditions. i'm gon' be prayin' like never before these next 50 miles. just pray for good weather, please. :) love y'all and hope to see y'all soon!!nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-31570261626425264912011-09-13T12:15:00.003-05:002011-09-13T12:15:42.568-05:00i heart wrenches.<div style="text-align: justify;">
i am currently writing (typing?) from the state of new hampshire! </div>
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we have been here in gorham for the last three days, and it's a wonderful little town. there's even a mcdonald's... i haven't seen one of those since millinocket! (not that i'm complaining... it's kind of nice to be so remote at times.) we're taking a break to let swayze's toenails heal up again. :( the granite rock here in maine just SUCKS. she feels fine and wants to play, but every time she starts to run around, her toenails open back up again and her feet start bleeding. i've been keeping her on pain meds and trying to keep her as still as possible. i bought her a rawhide this morning to keep her entertained while she's having her "down time." </div>
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i don't know how we're going to solve this problem. i bought her a full set of dog boots and we're having problems with them staying on, so i bought a roll of gorilla tape this morning at wal-mart that will hopefully help. i ran into guiness, a hiker who's got her dog with her as well, the other day on the mountain and she told me that she uses baby socks to help protect her dog's feet, so i'm going to combine the baby sock idea with the dog boots in hopes that the socks will help give the boots something to "grip" to and will keep them on. and by golly, if that doesn't work, i'll just superglue the boots to swayze's feet. :) </div>
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i seriously hope it doesn't come to this, but i may have to either send her home or just pull off the trail myself. i would hate to end my journey this close to being done, but if she can't hike, i can't either. =?</div>
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other happenings include seeing a moose in the wild, falling down a mountain, feeding feral chipmunks, and completing mahooSUCK notch. :) the moose that i saw was a really big bull moose and it was cool as heck seeing him on the trail. i didn't take a picture because moose tend to blend into pictures, so i just sat there and enjoyed the moment. when i went to move on my way, i startled him and since moose are pretty dumb, the only way he knew to escape was to retrace the route that he'd taken to get to where he was. too bad i was standing right where he'd come from! so here's this umpteen-hundred pound moose running right for me. my eyes got really huge and my heart stopped and my brain stopped and i was thinking, "omg omg omg what do i do? what do i do?" but my legs wouldn't work and i'm not sure i would have ran even if they would have. luckily, when he was about fifteen yards away, he turned north and headed down the AT in the opposite direction. i had to make myself breathe once i couldn't see him anymore and i laughed out loud because of how absolutely scary the situation had been. </div>
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falling down the mountain was rough. i've still got a pretty decent set of scrapes and scratches to show off that will probably stay with me for another week or so. i was coming down baldplate mountain the morning after it rained the whole day prior, and i knew it was still slick, so i was trying to be as careful as i could be. but i still managed to stumble over who knows what, and it was a fall that i thought i could run and catch myself on, but i didn't catch myself. so i kept running downhill on this slick rockface. when i realized i was not in a good situation, i yelled out a four-letter word and tried grabbing hold of a charlie brown christmas tree, but it wasn't big enough to stop me. so my brain told me that i should probably wipe myself out before the mountain did the job for me, so i sat on my left side and slid about ten feet and my hiking poles went in opposite directions and i had a big crybaby fit, mainly because i scared myself more than anything. my ankle was the size of a golfball immediately after my fall, so i went into town that night and RICEd (rest, ice, elevation, compression) it and now it's perfect. good. as. new. </div>
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i've also decided that the true spelling of the mahoosuc notch should include a K, to be correctly spelled as mahoosucK. it took us SIX HOURS to go one mile in the notch. it specificially says in my guide book that mahoosuc notch is the hardest and/or most fun mile of the AT. there's no and/or about it. it's the hardest and my fun ended about fifteen minutes into it. i kept having to lift swayze up and put her on top of boulders and then take my pack off and go back and help her and help her down a four-foot drop and then lift her up again. this went on and on and on and on. i never thought we would be done. the only good thing about being done with mahoosuc notch is that i've been told by everybody that's hiking with a canine companion that the notch is THE hardest section of the trail when you've got a dog with you. so we have overcome the hardest section in the 2,181 miles. yay us.</div>
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oh! anddd... the entire state of vermont is closed due to irene. i won't be able to hike it, so that'll cut out 150 miles of my trip. my thought about vermont is to skip it this year and come back and maybe hike it with my cousin when she thru-hikes next year. :) technically, we'll still be able to be "thru-hikers" since it's not our fault that we can't do that section of the trail. the ATC says so. </div>
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so those are my wrenches: swayze and vermont. i love new plan As! </div>
nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-54830594867009808962011-09-02T13:29:00.000-05:002011-09-02T13:29:56.094-05:00ah, hiking...<div style="text-align: justify;">so irene didn't blow us away! we rode out the "storm" with taylor and carolyn in the rv and had a grand ol' time. granted, it rained a lot that day and the wind blew us around a bit, but it wasn't anything horrible. we watched a few movies and played a few games of phase 10 (a pretty fun card game, btw). the day that dawned after irene came through was absolutely gorgeous: hardly a cloud in the sky, sunshiney, and a breeze blew constantly to keep it at a perfect temperature... it even got kind of chilly later on that afternoon. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">when taylor drove us back to the trailhead on tuesday, we learned that irene had flooded two rivers pretty close to the trail and one of the rivers had actually washed out two bridges that we had to cross to get back to the point where i was picked up. instead of asking him to take the seventy-plus mile detour, he dropped me off at the base of sugarloaf mountain. it was actually pretty interesting how things panned out from there... there's a ski resort on sugarloaf, and the only way to get to the AT from where he dropped me off was to hike up the ski slope. it was a pretty steep climb in parts: the peak of sugarloaf mountain is one of the highest peaks in maine, second only to mount katahdin, which we climbed a few weeks ago. definitely huffed and puffed to get up that one. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">irene didn't have as much of an impact on the trail as i'd imagined she would, but there were a lot of blowdowns (fallen trees) just south of the spaulding mountain shelter. the northbounders were calling it "the mahoosuc notch of blowdowns." mahoosuc notch is known as the slowest mile on the AT because it's basically negotiating your way over, around, and through huge boulders. there have been stories of moose (i still think the plural of this should be mooses) falling into the notch and breaking their legs and, obviously, not being able to get out. sort of speaking of which, we saw a moose skeleton of the trail a week or so back. it was kinda creepy. anyways, swayze and i have mahoosuc notch coming up here pretty soon. i'm looking forward to it, but i know it'll be rough. i met two NOBOs yesterday with their dogs that said mahoosuc notch was harder than the whites for them. we'll see how it goes.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">on the bright side of things, i'm running into a lot of my friends that i met down south now! it's kind of weird to think that if i hadn't taken so many 0s, i'd be close to finishing right now. granted, swayze does slow me down a lot, but i still don't think my hiking pace rivals those that i've been seeing these days. i ran back into spice boy, walking home, whistler, and so far... all of those guys, i hadn't seen since damascus. i also ran into moses this morning at a bagel shop here in town. it's so nice seeing familar faces, but it's so bittersweet because you know you'll probably never see these people again. i love the trail family, though. :) </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">that's really all for now... please keep us in your thoughts and prayers! i heard the temperature up on mount washington a week or so ago was in the upper 30s with a wind chill of 27. that's way too cold for me, so i'ma pray that i get a really nice, good weather week for the whites. once we've got southern maine and the whites out of the way, i won't say the AT will again be a breeze, but i will be able to breathe a huge sigh of relief in knowing that we've done the hardest section of the trail. :) </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i miss all of my friends and family back home (all of my homes, btw... you bristolians and charlestonians included) so much! i finally got to talk to natalie, who is expecting her first baby in mid-november. i'm going to really try to be done with the trail in time for her baby shower in mid-october. and i'm looking forward to being home with everybody for mine and my mama's birthdays. love y'all and miss y'all! i want some catfish, dangit! <3 </div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-87062624549652229432011-08-24T22:28:00.001-05:002011-08-24T22:30:26.784-05:00<p align="justify">i'm still very much in maine. i finally broke down and ordered swayze a pair of dog boots in hopes of helping with her toenail issue. we picked them up from the post office this morning and then went on a 12-mile hike that wound up testing my nerves a little bit. she kept kicking them off and wanting to lay down instead of hike. she eventually got the hang of it with her front boots, but her back boots are too big and kept falling off on their own. i'm gonna call ruffwear tomorrow morning and see if they won't replace her two back shoes with a smaller size. God bless taylor and carolyn... i've been staying with them in their rv for the past five nights or so while i was waiting for the delivery of the boots. tomorrow morning, they'll drive me back to the trailhead and i'll take the ferry across the kennebec river and we'll hike into stratton, where we'll more than likely get picked up for another stay in the rv while we wait on irene to blow through. she's supposed to hit us sunday night/monday morning and in lieu of spending money for a hotel or taking a zero out on the trail (because the forecast for mon is a high of 65 with an 80% chance of heavy rain), taylor offered us another stay with them. :)<p align="justify">there has been quite a bit of bad news this week on the AT. two hikers have died and while both of their deaths bring sadness, one brings about a particular sense of uneasiness and concern. the first hiker's name was open mike and he was found up here in maine not far from where i'll be hiking in the next couple of days. the original theory of his death was that he fell and hit his head on a rock, but then the autopsy showed that he suffered a heart attack, which then led to him falling and hitting his head. he was hiking alone and no one found him in time. the other hiker to pass is a much sadder story. his name was stonewall and i met him roughly nine miles south of harpers ferry, west virginia. he was sitting on the trail rolling a cigarette and, as is usual when two hikers pass each other, we began talking. he was a southbounder and he loved the civil war; that's how he got his trail name. he said his pack was around 60# and that he wanted a pack that heavy to sort of experience what the soldiers in the civil war experienced. we didn't talk long... maybe ten or fifteen minutes. i gave him my aqua-mira (water purification chemicals) because he said he didn't have any purification method and i was going into town that day so i could get some more. we parted ways, and i learned this week that he is dead and the circumstances surrounding his death have been deemed suspicious and the FBI is investigating this case. he was found somewhere in virginia around roanoke. i heard through the grapevine that he was found half-buried. someone from the appalachian trail conservancy contacted me via facebook the other day because i commented on their link that they posted and they requested that i call the FBI and give them any information regarding stonewall. i can't really tell them much of anything, but calling them is on my to-do list before i hit the trail tomorrow morning. it's just so sad... it's one thing to die doing something you love because of natural causes or because of the inherent risks of the certain activity; it's a completely different thing to have your amazing adventure ended because of something that has nothing to do with you. both hikers died doing something they loved, but i almost feel like open mike's case is a cause for rejoicing, whereas thinking about stonewall brings tears to my eyes. it's so weird to feel the way i do because i only talked to him so briefly, but i find myself thinking as i hike now, "what if you'd just talked to him for ten more minutes? what if you hadn't been in such a rush to get to the post office for that mail drop?" thirty seconds can be the difference between being in the right place at the right time and being in the wrong place at the wrong time. these days, i try and not rush through my meetings on the trail. i hope and pray he his brought justice.<p align="justify">there's really not much else going on... i am almost through the mid-maine section, which means that my new england climbs are about to get serious. i talked to spice boy briefly last night via text. he went over mount washington yesterday and the actual temp was 38 with a wind chill factor of 28ish. what. the. heck. i can't wait to get out of the cold weather area. give this girl some heat! oh... and also let me see a moose.nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-31635657628531325172011-08-17T20:12:00.000-05:002011-08-17T20:12:20.283-05:00<div style="text-align: justify;">swayze and i hiked out of the 100-mile wilderness today and we still haven't seen a moose! we're 115 miles into our hike in maine, and it's been every high and low imaginable. the climb up katahdin was amazing... when we got to maine, the weather was really crappy, so we waited two days so that we could hike in good, warm, sunshiney weather. if i couldn't finish on katahdin, i was going to have sunshine for it, by golly! the climb was awesome... it was an entire-body workout and i could hardly roll out of bed the next morning. there were parts where you had to lift your foot up to your chest and plant it in a rock and pull yourself up on the ledge above your head and there were parts where if you weren't careful, you could have fallen off the mountain and died. the views were 100% amazing and i kept thinking to myself, "what's this mississippi girl doin' all the way up here in maine?" i cried when we hit the top... it's just such an emotional high! the only "downside" to our hike up to katahdin was the fact that by the time we got to the summit, there were at least 30, if not 50, day hikers up there and it was completely crowded. taylor and i both got our pictures by the sign, but all the groups were being so loud. i really wish people would treat katahdin like a library. i wanted to yell, "could y'all please be quiet? i'm trying to have a moment here!" :) if anybody's reading this that hasn't done katahdin yet, i've got two suggestions: get up EARLY, as soon as they post the weather forecast, and hike before the day hikers even wake up, and don't bother with your poles. i didn't use them at all... you can't, really, except on the tableland, but it's flat enough that you don't need them. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">the 100-mile wilderness was... sigh. long. i didn't realize how much "out of shape" i was for that kind of hiking... i think flipping from jersey kind of screwed me for making decent mileage. the last couple of hundred miles that i hiked before i flipped were relatively flat... va, md, pa, nj... with the exception of va, i don't think any of those states have peaks above 2,500', much less the 5,000'+ peak that katahdin is. they tell you to pack in 8-10 days' worth of food for the wilderness, and i took six and a half days' worth. it wasn't enough. i didn't sleep well two nights in a row, so trying to hike when i was pretty worn out wasn't a very good idea, but i didn't have enough food on me, either. the weather was pretty decent the first couple of days in, but a few days ago, rain was forecast with at least a 60% chance, and all i ate that day was probably 400 cals worth of granola for breakfast, then a pack of ritz cheese crackers when i realized my granola wasn't going to get me up the mountain. it started sprinkling around lunchtime, so when we got to a shelter on top of a mountain, i decided swayze and i were going to take a nap and catch up on our sleep and warm up (it's already cold up here!!). we didn't move for the next eighteen hours; we stayed in our sleeping bag until the next morning. that night, i rationed out my food and ate a nature's valley granola bar. my reasoning was that if i didn't hike much that day, i didn't need a lot of food... i ate less than 1,000 calories that day. good thing, too, because all that food i saved myself from eating then really helped me through the 15 miles we did today to get out of the wilderness. it's just really weird how i've been out here for so long, and i'm still not good with figuring out what to eat and when to eat it and how much of it to eat. i honestly thought i had enough food with me when i walked into the woods... and maybe i guess i did, had they been new jersey woods. but they were maine woods. and maine woods are different. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">maine has been good and bad and everything in between already. it's been gorgeous and sunny, but we've gotten a lot of rain, too. and rain makes things so slick and slippery. i've fallen countless times on wet, mossy rock and broken both of my hiking poles that i found on the trail in hot springs! my first register entry in maine (other than the one at katahdin) said, "maine is the place where poles go to die." there are even bogs up here where you can sink pretty deep in some pretty mucky, unrecognizable stuff. they try to place big logs across the bogs that you can step on, but all the moisture in the air eventually weakens the boards over time and they can break. and then you step on them, and they're not as sturdy as they look, and then your foot gets covered in nasty black stuff. factor in the rain and the cold and muddy feet and slipping and falling into the mix, and it can put you in a pretty foul mood. but the views make up for it when they're there. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">and swayze is beginning to have trouble with her feet. she was absolutely fine in pennsylvania on the rocks, but these rock scrambles in maine have gotten the better of her. thank God it happened today and not three days into the wilderness, but i noticed that two of her toenails have gotten so short that they've started bleeding. her pads are fine; it's just her toenails. :( i don't know what to do about it, so i opened a forum discussion on whiteblaze, where hopefully i'll find some answers here in the next day or two. if anyone reading this has any recommendation, i'm more than open to them. i don't want to have to resort to buying those $65 dog boots because with one misstep into a bog, it could suck them off her feet and that would be money gone, but if that's what i have to do... ? </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">we're going to take a 0 tomorrow and i'm going to an AYCE (all you can eat) breakfast at shaw's here in monson.... it's all i've been hearing about from the nobos for the last couple of days, and i'm super excited about it. i guess i should go to bed so i can wake up in time for it... breakfast bell rings at 7:30! </div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-38807182770941817562011-08-07T07:38:00.000-05:002011-08-07T07:38:20.724-05:00there are many ways to thru hike the AT... the traditional way to do it is to start south in georgia and head to maine and be northbound (or a nobo). the less common way to hike the AT iis to be a southbounder and start in maine and head towards georgia. then there's the flip flop and the yo-yo. flipping is hiking a section one way, then skipping ahead and hiking the remainder of the trail in the other direction. yo-yoing is completing the entire trail one way, then turning right back around and hiking it again in the opposite direction. <br />
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i have chosen to flip flop and will summit mount katahdin in the next few days, then head south to new york where i left off. i've decided to flip to avoid as much cold weather as possible. my friend joshua who started his thru hike in mid-march will finish his hike today or tomorrow and his weather reports for maine include temps in the 40s on a regular basis in the mornings. i also met a guy yesterday who did the presidential range in the white mountains a few weeks ago and said it was 42 degrees in the morning time. i am not a fan of cold weather and i have no desire to eventually have to hike in and/or pitch my tent in the snow.<br />
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i've spent pretty much an entire week off the trail and have turned into a marshmallow. my friends taylor & carolyn picked me up and we spent four or five days at lake champion, a young life camp in southern new york. it's a church camp that targets troubled youth and the program that they have going on is amazing. i was only planning on staying one day but even as an adult guest, i had a ton of fun listening to the messages and participating in the activities (i still suck at rock climbing). the food was amazing, too... everyday, an all you can eat meal that was fit for a king. there was even one morning where the adult guests had the option of waking up early to make the kids' breakfasts. i got to the kitchen @ 630a and was assigned to cooking eggs and by 830, our team of three had cooked more than 700 eggs!!<br />
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just as taylor was driving me back to the trail the other night after picking up my new pack, the phone call from joshua came in that made me question whether i wanted to remain on a northbound track. taylor and i had supper at a local pizza place where i had my first slice of NY-style pizza in the actual state of new york. chicken, bacon, ranch and delicious. :) over supper, the decision was made that i'd think my hike out over another night at the RV (tough call there!). in the next twelve hours, i thought and thought and thought about it and decided that i didn't want to hike in the freezing temps later on. also, my cold weather gear is limited, as are my funds for buying more clothes. and finishing in new york would put me that much closer to home, which will make for less gas (and thus less money) to get me where i'll eventually need to be.<br />
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so here i am! we're in maine right now and it's cold and rainy but i'm excited about katahdin and i'm really excited about possibly seeing a moose (the one animal left on my "gotta see" list) and we'll see how this all goes in the next few weeks to come. :)nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-50666297143881652782011-07-28T21:04:00.002-05:002011-07-28T21:19:48.390-05:00movin' on up...<div style="text-align: justify;">i exited the great state of pennsylvania today. on the appalachian trail, pretty much every state is known for something. georgia has its big ass mountains and climbs that make the weak ones quit, virginia is a mileage hog and claims the most blazes, west virginia has the atc, the traditional halfway point where you get your picture taken and put in the record books, new hampshire has the white mountains, maine has katahdin... and pennsylvania has rocks. and lots of them, from smooth as a baby's bum to sharp as a knife. some you'll never notice because they're so small, and others you have to put away your trekking poles because you'll be using both hands on the ascent or descent. but they weren't as bad as i thought they were going to be. pennsylvania is known as the state "where boots go to die" and granted, my shoes fell apart in pa, but come on... they had 1,000 miles on them. it was kind of expected. but people make it sound like you'll bloody your feet and that 2-mile hours are good ones... not so. i'd say 75-80% of pa wasn't any worse than virginia.<p>i ran into a lot of awesome trail magic in pa, specifically jillian and her dad taking me to get new shoes and to the stock car races, and renee and john feeding, clothing, annd shelterig us for a four-day, three-night mini-vacay. let me clarify that less than a week ago, i didn't know these people existed and the only reason i know now is because renee has a weakness for dogs. :) last week was a record-breaking week for pa: when the high hit 106 with a heat index of 114, that was the hottest it'd beenn here. <b>ever</b>. so when i walked into the pet store in a town that wasn't too far off the trail so that swayze could make use of the air conndition, renee approached us and asked iif we were hiking the trail and where we'd come from. my friend francois was with me, and when we told her we'd both come from georgia, she invited us back to her house where she and her husband, john, pampered the heck out of us for the next few days. she did our laundry and cooked so much food for us and made coffee every morning and they took us to jim thorpe, pa and we toured the entire historical town and they let us slackpack lehigh gap, one of the most challenging rock scrambles south of the whites in new hampshire... the list of their favors seriously goes onn and on. we exchanged phone numbers and addresses before we left, and she packed us a sack lunch and cried when they dropped us off at the trailhead. i love how God puts people like that in my path. :)<p>so basically we're doing a-okay. my pack broke annd osprey won't ship me a new one without charging a credit card a $250 deposit until they get my old one back (boooooo), so i'm gonna have to go into a town sixteen miles off the trail to get a retailer to exchange it. we'll see how that goes, since that'll have to be in new york and it's illegal to hitchhike in nnew york. also, my friend taylor that i met who's hiking as a fundraiser for young life invited me to one of the yl camps there in new york for a day or two to see what it's like, just in case that's something i'd be interested in post-hike.<p>i'm loving life and missing my friends annd family but loving the new people i meet each day as well. out of 2,181 miles, i have less than 900 left to hike. i was smilin' from ear to ear today when i hiked into new jersey. that grin'll only get bigger the closer i get to maine. <p>oh! and to add to the awesomeness of pa, i saw my first two rattlesnakes. the first onne i saw on a "cold" (70*) day when it was raining and he never even moved, even though i was 3.5' from him and the other one actually rattled at me and tried to get away. i think it's cool that i finally got to see a rattler, but i'll be completely okay with never seeing one again. :)<p>also, big, big thanks to jennifer, wendy (evenn though the PO sucks), amannda, kelly, and gray for the awesome mail drops. :) each one of them made me oh-so-happy and made swayze wag her butt.</div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-3340388025849176602011-07-18T13:51:00.000-05:002011-07-18T13:51:09.649-05:00<div style="text-align: justify;">so the lady didn't really call animal control on me. i walked outside the library after my last update, and swayze was laying outside in the shade chillin' like a villian. not even panting. the lady was crazy... the librarian even walked outside and told me so. she apologized and was really nice. a few miles north of there, i met up with danielle from v.i. she lives in harpers ferry, and she picked us up and took us to the post office and the ATC and i got a hot shower at her house and an awesome bed and amazing cookies. mmm... haha i think i ate half of a batch of cookies that first night. harpers ferry was an awesome milestone for us; it's the traditional halfway point where the appalachian trail conservancy is. i met back up with a few hiking friends that i hadn't seen in a while and met some new faces. i got to hike with birch and magic mix for a few days... i was so excited to finally meet stk lady killa, magic's kitty! :) we did a 30 mile day to get to pine grove furnace state park, the home of the half gallon challenge. i am the proud owner of a little wooden spoon that says "member of the half gal club." :D i ate a half gallon of cookies 'n' cream in less than an hour... 2,700 calories, 160g of fat, and 128% of my daily calcium needs in pure, cold goodness. i even got freezer-burn tongue. :) i hiked with magic and birch until boiling springs, where i wound up taking my first zero in FIFTEEN days! i was so proud of myself... haha. i took a zero for a good cause, too. jillian sent me a facebook message saying she lives half an hour from boiling springs, so if i needed anything to just let her know. when i asked her where an outfitter was, she gave me her dad's number and her dad came and picked us up and took us to dick's to get a new pair of shoes... my shoes were dead. the soles were coming off and my feet got wet every time it rained. after i bought my new kicks, we headed to the stock car races! =) hahaha... we went to the track in mechanicsville, pa. it was kids' night, and i got to jump in a moon jump! and we got free snow cones! and there were FIREWORKS! :) it was basically an awesome time with awesome people. after the races, jill's dad took us back to boiling springs and we pitched our tent in the yard of a really nice local. we just now hit the rocks that pennsylvania's famous for this morning... we'll see how bad it gets here in the next few days. i met a southbounder today who said the rattlers are really bad from here north to jersey... he showed us the rattle of the snake that he killed yesterday and ate for dinner. he's pretty hardcore, haha. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">hmm. i should go find somewhere to take a shower. i'm pretty stinky. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;"> </div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-7107760092242678842011-07-06T15:08:00.000-05:002011-07-06T15:08:35.521-05:00<div style="text-align: justify;">sooo... this past week has been pretty decent to me. :) i FINALLY got out of the shenandoahs and i'm so glad for it. if i ever thru-hike again, i'm either going to aqua-blaze the shennies or find some good side trails and do them instead of the AT. i felt like all i saw in the shenandoahs was the road. we had to come out of the woods to even get good views for the most part. i'm hiking the trail to be out in the woods; i don't feel like it's wilderness if every half mile i hear a motorcycle start up and drive by. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">regardless, i had a really good time and met some awesome people in the shennies. i met a guy named will. he was a local that was just sectioning the shennies. he showed me a really cool blue-blazed rock scramble that went over the top of a mountain. and we had an awesome adventure that included trying to out-run a lightning storm and trying to find a campsite at the same time. right when we thought we'd found a nice clearing to pitch our tents in, we began to see headstones and realized we'd come across a cemetery. no thanks!!!! but it was getting dark, so we had to decide what we were going to do, so we hiked to the road and did another two-ish miles into a sure campground. fun times. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">thennnn, the fourth of july takes the cake. :) that was the morning after we outran the storm, so we woke up at the campground and went to the restaurant for breakfast... i had a big cinnamon roll, a bacon, egg & cheese biscuit, and an awesome glass of water. we started hiking, but will had to leave the trail halfway through the day because he'd forgotten his wallet or something at the campground. so swayze and i hiked on by ourselves and met some other really cool people throughout the remainder of the day. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">we stopped at the skyland lodge to wait out a rainstorm. meanwhile, i called my daddy and my mama to wish them both a happy 4th of july and i bought a bag of trail mix and a king size hershey bar. while we were sitting there, i met a retired marine whose name i can't recall right now, but i wrote it down in my book so i wouldn't completely forget. he referred to himself at a techie and let me charge my cell phone with one of his gadgets while he went inside and drank some coffee. he was really nice, and gave me two pieces of advice: i) get a marine hat. it'll make people question you. and ii) once dark sets, move your tent. it'll make people question your whereabouts. hahaha... i don't think i'll go through the trouble of moving my tent after dark, even if it IS free-standing, but bless his heart giving me the advice. :) </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">once the rain quit, we hiked on. right before we got to the pinnacle picnic grounds, i saw two men gathering firewood. even though the rain had quit by then, a really huge cloud of fog had blown in and the visibility had been reduced to crap. i couldn't see thirty feet in front of me; when we got into the area of the pavilion where they'd built a fire, i couldn't even see it. one of the men sent his wife over to ask if we were hungry, and when i told her that hikers are always hungry, she invited us for leftovers. :D everybody was SO awesome!! they fixed me a plate with steak and scalloped potatoes (side note: when i was little, i thought they were called 'scalped potatoes' and it always made me think of indians) and fried chicken and fresh tomatoes!! :) we sat there and talked by the fire for at least an hour while the rain started back up, and one guy told a really funny bat story that still makes me laugh when i think about it. right before they were ready to leave, the men were so amazing that they went into the woods and basically brought me back two whole trees to use as firewood. we were so lucky that the rain AND the fog cleared right before 9:30ish, and we were able to walk over to the trees and see some of the fireworks in the city below!! :) </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">once they left, we illegally camped out on the picnic table there at the grounds. there were three or four mice that i saw, so i had to rig up my backpack with a line that the mice couldn't get to. i was actually quite proud of myself for remembering that i had all the things that i needed to make the mouse line: my paracord, a coke can, and a tent stake. so i hung my pack from the line, and i laid out my tent footprint on the picnic table, inflated my sleeping pad, and then swayze and i climbed up and tried to go to sleep. that entire night's sleep was completely restless, though. the previous day, TWO people had reminded me that fifteen years ago, two women hikers were murdered less than three miles from where we were camping. so the entire night, every sound that i heard made me turn my head or open my eyes. plus, i was worried that a park ranger would come and write me a ticket for camping there. you're not supposed to camp anywhere within a quarter mile of park facilities. i was semi-concerned about bears coming for leftover food, but the main concern was creepers. which is funny, because i know that i'm statistically safer on the trail than i am in jackson, ms or north charleston, sc or even driving on any given road for that matter. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">but anyways. :) my time in the shennies was well-lived, and now i must go because someone has threatened to call animal control because swayze is out by herself in front of the library and it is "too hot" for a dog to be outside. some people need to keep their nose on their face and out of my business. some people make me laugh. guess i should go cool my dog off. ciao, friends! =) </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-11870714860192272502011-06-30T06:22:00.002-05:002011-06-30T07:52:33.246-05:00blues and yellow... make miles?<div style="text-align: justify;">so as of today, i'll sort of be considered a "yellow-blazer." which means that instead of following the white blazes of the trail, i'm going to skip a section of the trail and take the "yellow blazes" of the highway. i'm only going to skip eighty or so miles (roughly 3.5% of the trail), and i'm going to finish them when i get through hiking, so i guess when i get to katahdin, i won't "technically" be done, but what's 80 miles when you've walked 2,100? i've just definitely got the virginia blues. (it's not an actual, depressive state, mind you, so don't actually worry about me there.) between having to take zeroes for my foot to heal a while back and then just messin' around and taking unplanned zeroes, most of my hiking friends are four or five days ahead of me. </div><P><div style="text-align: justify;">so my wonderful friend jennifer is gonna drive us north and do an overnight with us. we've been in the same general area for a bit now, and she came out and did a day hike with us at the beginning of last week. it was a really interesting day, haha... it started out awesome and sunny, then we got rained on, and then for the second time thus far in virginia, i was hailed on. then it cleared up but we could still hear thunder, and by the time we got to dragon's tooth, it was raining and thundering and lightning. dragon's tooth is a challenge in perfect conditions; coming down it in a thunderstorm with a dog was even harder. there was a section where the foot ledges coming down the rockface were only 4-5" wide, so i would have to inch out there, drop down three feet, call swayze out onto the ledge that i had just done, and then use her harness to basically guide her down to the ledge that i was currently standing on and hope that she'd stay there while i dropped down another three feet. but i really enjoyed it. :) i like rock scrambles. after walking in the woods all day, they're like miniature puzzles that you've gotta figure out.</div><p><div style="text-align: justify;">even though i'm yellow blazing, i'm still thoroughly enjoying the trail thus far. i stopped the other day and talked to a park ranger for over an hour about the trail and the flowers and the trees and the butterflies. a really pretty black and white butterfly flew by and he informed me that it was a zebra swallowtail and that when you see a lot of butterflies gathered around a spot on the ground, they call those drinking clubs. and he told me that the really creepy owls that we hear at night are called bard owls. and we talked about a lot of other cool stuff... his name was mike donahue and he was awesome. and i'm still meeting a lot of really cool people. virginia's just so monotonous at times. it was really awesome, though, coming down to the water of the james river and walking across the footbridge. the footbridge across the james river is the longest foot-use only bridge on the AT and was donated by a guy and his wife with the last name of foot who hiked the trail a while back. their trail name was the happy feet. :) </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><p>we need to get on the road and get goin'. more updates later. :)</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><p><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">oh, and someone brought it to my attention that y'all can't comment on my posts now. i don't know how to fix that, but maybe i'll transfer this blog over to another blog soon. we'll see. until then, i've got facebook so you can leave comments on my wall or something. </div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-81658777990223919422011-06-16T18:25:00.001-05:002011-06-16T23:44:37.772-05:00i spy with my two eyes... a bear!!<div><div><div style="text-align: justify;">ok first of all i'm so excited cause one of my bestest friends just found out their little bun in the oven is gonna be a girl. congratulations times a billion to natalie and andrew. :)<br />
<br />
so it took me over 500 miles, but i finally saw a bear! and four of them, nonetheless! a mama bear and her three cubs. swayze and i came around a corner and i think her tags alerted them to our presence. i wouldn't have known they were there had it not been for the fact that they made so much noise as they hauled butt up two tees. it was really cute... they were probably thirty or forty yards away (i'm not real sure... not good at distance) and two cubs went up one tree and the third cub went up another tree and the mama bear stayed at the ground keeping an eye on both trees. when they realized we weren't coming any closer, the lonely cub came down his tree and went over with his brothers and sisters, and the mama bear just sat there at the bottom of the tree and watched us. it's so crazy how fast they can climb! tip: if you're ever being chased by a bear, don't climb a tree. it won't get you away from them. it was a really neat experience seeing them. :) </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i finally washed my hair last night after not having washed it for over 160 miles. i felt disgusting, and i washed it three times and took a 90-minute shower. i didn't think it was possible to run a hotel's hot water out, but if you have hair like i do, it's completely doable. i ran out of hot water halfway through and had to turn the water off and finish combing through my hair while i waited for the hot water to replenish itself. needless to say, it was one of the most glorious showers i've had in a very long time. the last time it took me that long to take a shower was back on spring break of 2006 when i'd spent an entire week on a dive boat in the bahamas without any conditioner. i have yet to do my laundry. it's sitting here in a bag beside me in the library... it's quite disgusting. i went to goodwill today and specifically bought a $6.50 outfit to wear while i do my laundry so i can wash every bit of clothing i have. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">crazy man and i went to pizza plus last night and spent an hour and a half there eating. we both had two platefuls of salad and a pizza sub with chips and lots to drink. i'm eating so much. a few days ago, we hiked through an extremely dry section of trail. swayze was able to drink a little bit from streams that were almost dried up, but i hiked sixteen miles on less than 2 liters of water. on any given day, i drink at least four, if not five liters. thank God it was very windy and cool that day; otherwise, i think i would have been even more grumpy than i already was. anyways... there was a gas station/deli half a mile off the trail and all i could think about the last five or ten miles was a turkey and swiss sub, a bag of cheetos, a big glass of water, and a root beer float. when i got to the store, i ordered my turkey sandwich, bought the biggest bag of cheetos i could find, a 24 oz. sprite and when i was done with all of that, i went for another 24 oz. sprite, a pint of ice cream, and a root beer and made my own root beer float. :) it's crazy, but i've lost right at 20 pounds out here and i can eat whatever the heck i want. i will have to join a gym as soon as i set foot off the trail. no doubt about that. it doesn't come without downsides, though... suffice it to say, my waistline isn't the only thing that's gotten smaller. :( hahaha</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i'm beginning to get worried that i won't reach katahdin on time. we're going to have to step up our pace. i've heard that there are days in the whites in new hampshire where five miles is a good day. the most we've done thus far has been 24, and that wore us out mentally as well as physically, mainly because we weren't prepared for it. i'd woken up that morning thinking we would do 14, but when we got to the hostel that we wanted to stay at, they were going to charge me $32 roundtrip to take us into town that was only 10 miles away, so i said, "screw it. i'll walk the ten miles." and we did. like i said... it wore us out, but i wasn't $32 in the hole like they thought i'd be. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
i can easily see how people get the "virginia blues." all we do is walk in the woods and over rocks. in georgia and north carolina and tennessee, we'd climb a really big hill and have some grand view that made it all worth it. in virginia thus far, we just walk a lot and loodk at trees. granted, grayson highlands and white top were gorgeous... i know not everyday can be an albert mountain or a charlie's bunion, but hopefully virginia will give us a few more photo ops in the next stretch.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />speaking of photos, i'm trying to get some on facebook. i've got roughly 80 up, but i've got over 1,000 pics on the camera and all the computers i've been on take forever to upload them. enjoy them as they come. :)</div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-15139420533161193762011-06-06T12:38:00.000-05:002011-06-06T12:38:33.664-05:00God is good! :)<div style="text-align: justify;">i finally have a working cell phone, so i'll be able to update more and talk more and text more. not that i want to fill my days with talking and texting, but it's nice to be able to contact the world outside the woods every once in a while. :) </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">my foot is getting better, but it still sucks sometimes. i'm icing it as often as possible and taking prescription-strength doses of ibuprofen at night... i can tell that the ibuprofen helps, so i try not to take it while i'm hiking 'cause i don't want to hike through the pain and make my foot worse than it already is... </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i stayed like three days in erwin, tn and took a short break there to help my foot heal a bit. we did a 20-mile slackpack day and swayze loved it. :) then we got to see brandon 'cause he came from johnson city to pick us up and take us to the trailhead! it's always really nice seeing familiar faces when you're out on the trail. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i still haven't been able to get to a decent computer to upload all of my pictures... which i need to do soon because i've got almost 4gb worth of pics on my camera and it says i've got less than 200 pictures to go before the memory's full. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">so i've decided to begin taking sundays as my zero or nero days. neros are where you take a "near zero" and hike a few miles but not as many as you would on a normal basis. i'm gonna try my best to start going to church every sunday. i went to church last sunday and it was the most awesome thing... i walked about half a mile and walked into the first church that i saw. everyone was really welcoming and i didn't feel out of place at all in my shorts, tshirt, and crocs. after church, i met a lady and she asked me if i would be interested in coming back with her to her house and having memorial day dinner with her and her family. i said yes and when we were walking out to her car, she was holding the hand of a little boy. she introduced him as her grandson willy and when i looked at him, he looked SO familiar. i asked her if by chance her daughter's name was keli, and when she said yes, we both looked astonished. this was willy bailey! i worked with keli at starbucks when i lived in bristol!!!! how <b>crazy</b> awesome is that?! so i went back to their house with them and we made pancakes and bacon and eggs and ate lunch, and then later that afternoon keli came over and we had bbq chicken and corn on the cob and cantaloupe and salad and other amazing foods. they dropped me back off at the place where i was tenting later that night, and i hiked out the next morning. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">then a few days later, i was reunited with a guy i'd met a few towns back and i finally got to meet his dog! sad thing, though, that his dog has since been pulled off the trail because of a bone spur. :( i also met back up with taylor, the slackpacker, and he invited me back to their RV for the night. i accepted that offer as well, and we watched "planes, trains, and automobiles" and ate dollar store pizza that night and it was amazing. i had the best breakfast the next morning of frosted mini-wheats and a banana and a cup of french-pressed coffee.... yum!!! </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i've noticed that i need to stop taking neros and zeroes... hahaha. it's just so awesome out here and everyone's so amazing that it's hard not to just sit back and relax and enjoy it all... when i got to a big lake the other day, i had full plans of hiking at least another ten miles, but there was an awesome shade tree that was calling our names, and we had to sit back and read a book and just lay in the shade for a few hours. the next day was our biggest mile yet... right at 23 miles. we hiked from 7a to 9p with a few long breaks in between. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">and as soon as we hiked into damascus, we ran into wendy! :) it was so awesome... we had hardly crossed the bridge to get into town and she stopped in the middle of the road and rolled her window down and we got in her car and she took us to the post office where i picked up the card that erin had sent us (thank you so much wendy and erin!! :)). thennnn she took us to the gas station and bought me a sobe and a little debbie and she took us to bella's off exit 19 and it was so much better than i hoped for!! then i went home with wendy and got clean in a hot shower and slept in a super comfy bed and the next morning she dropped us off in damascus. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">saturday, my friend birch that i met out here introduced me to a set of locals that let me pitch my tent on their yard since the only place in town that would allow dogs wouldn't answer my phone call or their door bell. turns out that was good for my pocketbook, though, because it would have been $25/night and i can't do that. we got to see nick saturday afternoon and he brought me my new cell phone and we had lunch and awesome ice cream, and i got to see jolie and we had a good ol' time. then that night my hosts even let all the hikers come over to their house and i roasted my very first s'more on the trail! fun times for sure. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">sunday morning, i woke up and went to an outfitter to take a shower and then went and had coffee at a coffee shop. i brushed my teeth in their bathroom and then walked to church, where i met up with two other hikers that were there. the church was having a picnic that night and invited us over, and we went and we got to eat so much food and i even got to ride a horse! it was so much fun and i looked so redneck up on the horse in shorts and a tshirt and barefoot but i had a grin plastered on my face the whole time and it made the entire accidental zero completely worth it. the people out here make this experience absolutely, without a doubt, worth every minute of the time i spend sweating and in pain and struggling. :) </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">so to sum it all up, God is great and He's taking care of us out here by putting the appropriate people in our paths to make this journey easier on us. please keep praying and know that y'all are in my prayers as well. :) love y'all and miss y'all!! </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">current trail things that i recommend: <br />
filling your platypus with gatorade before you leave town<br />
stopping and getting water whenever you can because you never know how crappy the next water source will be</div><div style="text-align: justify;">mountain harbour bed & breakfast in roan mountain, tn</div><div style="text-align: justify;">slackpacking as many miles as possible</div><div style="text-align: justify;">bob's dairyland in roan mountain, tn</div><div style="text-align: justify;">going to church and singing awesome songs</div><div style="text-align: justify;">sitting in the shade on a hot day</div><div style="text-align: justify;">staying with locals </div><div style="text-align: justify;">socializing</div><div style="text-align: justify;">riding horses</div><div style="text-align: justify;">bella's off exit 19 in abingdon, va</div><div style="text-align: justify;">the community pool in damascus, va</div><div style="text-align: justify;">having the time of your life</div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-2867726713684997172011-05-24T09:00:00.001-05:002011-05-24T09:02:51.877-05:00update! yay!whew... where to even start? <br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">i'm taking a zero today because i somehow hurt my right foot. i stepped on a rock right in the middle of my arch a few weeks ago and now it's hurting on top of my foot. i could hardly walk the other day and my foot's all swollen so i'm taking the day to overdose on vitamin i (ibuprofen), ice it, and rest it. zeroes make me so antsy sometimes, though, because i think to myself, "i should be out there hiking. i could be doing miles right now." except that right now, it's pouring down rain, so i'm glad i'm not out in it. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i thought from the beginning that i would hate the smokeys. turns out, i only hated the stuff south of clingman's dome. my first day in the smokeys included a 17 mile hike out of fontana dam. there were hardly any views after the shuckstack tower and i never, ever thought i'd make it to the shelter that i'd planned on making it to. that first day in the smokeys was the first day that i had to pull my cell phone out and listen to music to get me in a better mood. everything north of clingman's dome was absolutely amazing. i tried ordering pizza from the newfound gap parking lot, but they wouldn't deliver. :( what kind of pizza place doesn't deliver 15 miles out? shame on them, haha. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i would have run out of food in the smokeys had it not been for a group of three hikers from florida that we met. they gave me four of their nature's valley oats 'n' honey bars and that lasted me until i got to standing bear. i walked out of the smokeys and the only food i had on me was an empty nutella jar, a box of hashbrowns, and one packet of instant coffee. everything was just so expensive at fontana! i couldn't justify spending that much money on food, so i didn't. i bought the bare necessities, but i guess i didn't get enough. they wanted $4.57 for a box of pop tarts!! anyways... i won't run out of food again. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i completed the smokeys in four days exactly, then made it to standing bear farm to wait on my cousin and pick up my dog. my cousin, cecelia, from alabama drove in and picked up our group (minus one) and drove us all to trail days. in the three and a half years that i lived in bristol, i never went to trail days in damascus. i never knew it was a set weekend (the weekend after mother's day) and by the time it rolled around, i was always working. it was SO MUCH FUN. there were drum circles every night and we went to a bar that had karoke the first night we were in town. hahahah... there was the token drunk local that was trying to dance with everybody, so i entertained him and then so did cecelia. it was awesome. there were so many vendors there and i finally got a sno-cone! i've been wanting a sno-cone for over a year... no one in charleston had them! so i got a pineapple one and shared it with swayze. then the hiker parade was on saturday and it was basically a big, huge water fight between the hikers and the locals. nick drove jolie over, too, and we had an awesome little visit. oh!! ANDDD we got to eat at the AYCE (all you can eat) shoney's breakfast buffet! i'd been dreaming about THAT for a few weeks, too. fresh fruit and french toast and biscuits and hashbrowns... mmmmm. :) ANDDD we stopped by starbucks and i got to see roxanne and she made me the most delicious frappuccino that i'd been thinking about for days on end while i was hiking... i'd been thinking about a half strawberry, half orange mango creme sweetened with coconut instead of classic and made with breve instead of whole milk for the longest time. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">just as a side note... i originally figured that my food cravings on the trail would be mainly junk food for the fat and calories, but it's been completely the opposite. i crave fresh fruit in the mornings (especially oranges) and i think about ceasar salad like there's no tomorrow. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">anyways, after the trail days weekend, cecelia came back and hiked with us until hot springs. it was really crappy weather the entire time. :( it was cold and rainy and we all got soaked. i woke up in the shelter one morning and it hadn't quit raining the entire night, so after i put on my rain jacket to go use the tree, i just started packing up. i didn't want to dry off and get back in my sleeping bag and take a zero at the shelter in the rain, so swayze and i hiked nonstop from the shelter into hot springs, nc. it was an 18-mile day and we did it in 6 hours. i stopped once for water because i'd run dry, but if we stopped at all, we almost got hypothermic because it was so cold. i felt so bad for swayze but we made it into town and stayed at elmer's and got warm and dry and had good meals and met great people. i tell y'all what... the hiking community is amazing. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i took a zero the next day in hot springs because the weather was still crappy and it was my cousin's last day in town. we went to the... well... the hot springs... that the town is famous for and spent an hour just hanging out in a hot tub. just what the hiker doctor ordered. :) i went to the post office and picked up a package that my friend aj had said would be waiting on me. it made me so happy to open a box and realize that i haven't been forgotten by the "real" world. i love hiking and i love the people that i've met, but i almost feel disconnected from my friends and family members because my cell phone is a piece of crap and doesn't work and i haven't gotten internet access nearly as often as i thought i would when i first started out. anyway... the salt 'n' vinegar chips and m&ms hit the spot, and the toilet paper made me giggle. :) and swayze loved her treats as well. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i also bit the bullet and bought a new pack in hot springs. the coleman pack that i got just didn't cut it. it was functional but not practical. it'd be alright for a weekend pack, but when you wear something for days on end, you want it to be comfortable, and it was killing my shoulders and was off balance. i love my new pack so much. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">thank God i'm not on the trail right now... it was hailing here just now. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i guess i'll try and upload some pictures and see where that gets me. the shuttle leaves for the AYCE pizza & salad buffet in two hours and i'm not ABOUT to miss that. :) also, i am going to work on a finalized mail drop plan for the first half of the trip (up until harper's ferry, wv) today. it's just been really hard between not having any internet connection and not knowing my hiking pace and not having a cell phone to really update anything at all.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">i miss y'all and love y'all a ton. keep the prayers comin' and i'll see y'all soon enough. :) </div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-1252958356712441342011-05-19T13:10:00.000-05:002011-05-19T13:10:14.324-05:00owaijef;oij!!i feel like there's so much to update! i've been having cell phone issues and i've not really been in any position to have computer access for a while. plus there was trail days in damascus and hiking with my cousin and getting to see nick and jolie and roxanne for a bit. i also got a new pack today!!! the cheap pack i started out with just wasn't cutting it as far as comfort goes, so i requested an early birthday present from my parents today and bought an osprey 65l. so excited! i will try to keep the updates more regular, for my sake and memory as well as y'all's, but for now i gotta say my goodbyes to my cousin and then hit the mountain. thank God for sunshine! =)nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-34029929800188364232011-05-08T07:56:00.000-05:002011-05-08T07:56:02.889-05:00gsmnp should be reported for illegal hazing activities<div style="text-align: justify;">to sum up the last little bit... i've learned that if you make ramen noodles and then add instant mashed potatoes to it and a little more hot water, then cover it in a few ketchup packets, it actually makes a heck of a carb-loaded meal. also, the kennel came and picked swayze up (since she can't go into the smokies) and she started cryin' and it almost made me cry. when we got to the fontana dam shelter the other night, the shelter was nearly full so we all just decided to cowboy camp (just sleeping bags under the stars, no tent) by the fire. it was awesome. :)</div><br />
i do believe i'll be in damascus this upcoming weekend for trail days! :) my awesome cousin volunteered to drop by wherever we are and pick us up and take us. i would love to see as many bristol people as i can, so drop by and come see us! i won't have a car, but maybe i can convince my cousin we need a coffee date at starbucks or something.<br />
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i don't think i like the smokies. or maybe it's just because yesterday was my longest day yet and it included the monster uphill to shuckstack fire tower. yesterday was the first day where i actually got grumpy and felt like a two year old. i was tired and the shelters felt more and more spread out ........nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2901398041780700203.post-85724174499494396472011-05-02T00:58:00.001-05:002011-05-02T00:58:42.274-05:00i crave ketchup.<div><p>this upcoming tuesday will make two weeks that i've been on the trail. i may not be as far along as i'd like to be, but i'll take it because i haven't had any injuries other than some minor blisters, a few bruised toenails, and a case of sunburn. some of these people out here try and do big miles from the get go and end up blowing their knees out and having to pull off the trail within the first week. there was a kid that came all the way over here from tiawan and he slipped and messed his knee up on the first day out and had to go back home. and just tonight, we had to go pick up a guy that we met three days ago at the hospital because he sliced his knee to the bone. four stitches inside, seven out, and he's off the trail just like that. </p>
<p>a lot of things change when you live in the woods for right at two weeks. the number one thing i can think of right now is how you view grocery stores. walking into a grocery store is SO overwhelming... knowing you can have any food in the store that you want almost seems too good to be true. and i'm so aware of prices and weights. generic poptarts are only $1.25ish, whereas name brand can be upwards of $2 a box. and the other day i wanted some fig newtons, but the only generic pack they had was a two pound pack. they had it advertised on the pack as "2 pounds!" like it was a good thing or something. i don't know a single person who would willingly carry two pounds of fig newtons. ounces make pounds. </p>
<p>my "hiker hunger" hasn't really set in just yet. apparently, when you're in the woods, you get cravings like a pregnant woman and your appetite increases tenfold. the only thing i've been craving in the woods thus far has been ketchup. i stocked up on plenty of that from wendy's tonight so i'll have it when i fix my hashbrowns sometimme this week. maybe i'll add it to my fake mashed potatoes as well. </p>
<p>i'm having a really great time out here. yesterday, i did some of my first ever night hiking. had the trail not been as well-blazed as it was, it might've been a little unnerving, but it was really awesome. when we got done, it was neat to just sit down and look up at the stars and know that i had nowhere to be and nothing i needed to be doing. </p>
<p>i'm also meeting some really awesome people. i met ranger and slow snail, a mother and daughter from vermont. the mother fell coming off blood mountain and really hurt her knee, but instead of packing up and going home, they're taking their time and doing just a few miles a day. i met a guy named dwight from alabama. he reminded me so much of mr. tommy. :) he and i got to talkin' SEC football and he was telling me that he loves it when the players get so into the game that they cry. he told me if i ever get the chance, i should watch the ole miss vs. alabama game where it was neck and neck until the last minute where alabama held the lead and archie manning cried. as he described the game to me, he teared up and didn't apologize for it. :) his family is all accounted for from the tornadoes except for his mother in a nursing home. y'all please pray for dwight and slow snail. dwight's wife picked him up this morning (he was only section hiking), so he should have some news about his mama, but everybody affected by the alabama storms still needs so much prayer. and yesterday we did some of our first rock scrambling (having to use all fours to climb), and i don't know how slow snail will safely be able to manage with her bum knee. </p>
<p>i haven't really gotten a firm trail name yet... till and miss janet both called me patrick ("hey look... it's patrick and swayze") so i signed a few log books as patrick, but then tonight "our" group of four were standing around in the parking lot just havin' a good ol' time and they called me giggles 'cause i tend to laugh... a lot. so we'll see... maybe i'll give it some more time?</p>
<p>andddd i finally found a raincoat/jacket for swayze tonight. i'm so excited that she won't be cold anymore and that i won't have to share my fleece. :)</p>
</div>nobo gamehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10104914146730432551noreply@blogger.com8