Holy crap. One year ago. Life feels so incredibly different now (not necessarily a bad thing). So we woke up to rain in that bunkroom at Hiker Hostel in Dahlonega. They served breakfast pretty early - 6:30 or 7? - and I ate eggs! Felt like if I could set out on the AT, I could try eggs...wasn't terrible. I remember I ate at the table with a big guy named Jim who on the third day of his hike (you can head back to Hiker Hostel from Woody Gap 20mi or so in) and looking forward to his granddaughter being born in a few months. I would run into Jim again my first day in PA. Very random. Josh who ran the hostel hooked us up with some denatured alcohol in little grapejuice bottles, we settled up, and off we went in the van with Josiah (Red Lion), Pierre, and some other dude I can't remember...I think.
We didn't go to Amicalola State Park where a lot of hikers start but instead hitched a ride to the Springer Mtn parking lot where you have to backtrack .5mi on the trail (southbound..woooot) to get to the summit. As we were strapping on our packs Josh informed me I needed to readjust mine and after attempting readjustments for 15min or so he concluded my pack was just too small for me. GREAT! Off we went in the rain as Josh made mental predictions as to how long we'd last. Reaching Springer was rather anticlimactic since you couldn't see a thing but the caretaker up there registering thru-hikers looked like the knight at the end of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. So if I hadn't felt like I was on a journey yet, it really kicked in there... Met Sam from Ohio who starting as well (would run into Buckeye again down the trail). Signed the registery, Pierre disappeared to place some box somewhere for someone to find (still unclear on that), snapped a picture, and headed north (from whence we came).
Rain was light. First person we met hiking was Joe who was thinking he would name himself Banjo but would ultimately become Smiletrain. He was from Minnesota and into folk history. There were a few climbs on the first day that I can remember. After 7mi or so heading north we decided to stop for the night at Hawk Mtn Shelter - Smiletrain pushed on. It was maybe 4pm when we got there, a fire was already going - Maui Bob, One Step, his dog Rooster, four guys from Florida and a bevy of boy scouts would share the shelter with us that night. Hung the first bearbag on the bear cables. Made a really shitty first dinner. Remember going to bed that night wondering how I was going to possibly going to make it past this first week. Felt like most of the thru-hikers were ahead of me and had to catch up. Anyway, first day...no sun.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment