26 de abril

Ahh that sweet night's sleep in Spence Field. The next morning we hiked past "Rocky Top" which is the name of a peak in the Smokies but apparently not the namesake of the song (apparently there are two or three "rocky tops" in Tennessee). I was incredibly disappointed at this. Anyway the Smokies were surprisingly easy hiking. The path is so well-defined (namely I think because it's so old) and you're already so high up on the ridge that there isn't a whole lot of elevation change. We also had completely clear weather which was amazing. The whole forest floor was covered in wildflowers. The ones in the picture were called "spring beauties." Basically hiked on through to Clingman's Dome today. We met Hatchet a few miles before reaching Clingman's. He was stopped trying to catch a wild turkey on video.

Clingman's dome is kind of an odd place. It's the highest point on the AT but they built this weird 70's-style overlook tower thinger on top and you can practically drive up the mountain. There were a lot of babies up there. It was bring your baby to clingman's dome day. We had decided earlier we were going to go into Gatlinburg so we hiked down to the parking lot to try to catch a ride. It definitely took a few minutes. We tried to talk a Canadian couple into taking us but they said they weren't heading to Gatlinburg. Finally this nice guy from St. Louis on a roadtrip with his girlfriend and his buddy said we could catch a ride with him if we were interested in checking out Cherokee, NC and Mingo Falls first. Not a bad deal.

So we started down mountain the back of this guy's pick up truck. That was a gorgeous drive. We finally get down into the valley and I accidentally dropped my camera into a hole in the bed of his truck. It must've bounced off something under there and off to the side of the road. When we told him at the gas station we stopped there it was super nice of him to drive us back to look for it. A couple miles later there it was on the side of the road - and not broken! I decided at that moment that odd lucky things like that just happen on the trail. It was just that kind of place. We finally got to the waterfall when I realized I had actually been there when I was 12 on the middle school orchestra trip. Weird flashback. Nice waterfall.

We had to drive up and over the Smokies again to get back to Gatlinburg. They dropped us off on the main drag and we walked to the motel we had heard about in our guidebook. Can't remember the name :( Got some beer, went to dinner at the grill on the corner. Had a super weird sketchy waiter who mentioned drugs, probation, hookers and strippers before even taking our drink order. He was either super sketchy or just making anything up. Either way it was entertaining. Then we had to figure out what the Gatlinburg nightlife situation is on a Sunday. Took a few tries but we finally found Puckers, which is where everybody that works in town goes after getting off their shift. Good time. Did "Dixieland Delight" on kareoke and made some friends. All fun and games until hatchet starts asking Green Lite repeatedly if he 'has his back." ALways a good sign. Managed to skip out before hatchet caused any real trouble. Those Gatlinburg nights.

April 25

Today woke up right off the trail in the Smokies to a deer walking by on the trail. Started hiking, climbed the rickety firetower on top of Shuckstack Mtn and took some pictures. About a half mile later was heading through a gap when I saw kinda dark shapes maybe 30 yds to my left. Took a few seconds to sort out that it was a family of bears. Sorta tweaked, turned around and walked quickly back the way I came. I think I waited 10min or so thinking what the hell does one do here. Went back to see if they were still there. They were. Entirely unphased by my presence. Finally a hiker named Too-Bob came along and actually seemed as freaked out as I was. So once Smiling Bandit came along we decided to walk by them with safety in numbers. The walk-by went off without a hitch though I think my heart was racing. I finally started to come to terms with bears that day.

Came up on the first shelter. The shelters in the Smokies used to be caged in to protect from the bears until hikers started feeding bears through the cages, which only encouraged the bears to hang around the shelters more. Cages are gone but they're pretty old stone shelters and sleep a lot of people. The black flies in the smokies were awful though. You couldn't really sit still. That much I remember very well. That day we hiked on to Spence Field shelter where we spent the night. Smiling Bandit, Forest, Willow, Gaucha and some weekend hikers were there. Some nice woman from South Carolia (Georgia?) gave us a muscle relaxant to split and it was the BEST night's sleep I had had in weeks. I literally was out like a light in a shelter full of smelly, snoring people. The smokies are beautiful.

April 24

Woke up at Fontana Village the next morning and Georgia Pine, Hustler & Brian were all gone :( The way of the trail I suppose. I'll stop here to note that Fontana Village was actually built in the 40s when construction of the dam began to house the workers. On our way into Fontana Village the night before we met a random group of folks from Alabama who Georgia Pine struck up a conversation with. Turns out they were "dam children." Their parents (well, fathers I s'pose) had been dam construction workers for the TVA and they had grown up together. They were back for a dam children reunion.

Aanyway. Got up. Couldn't even sleep in really. Took advantage of some lodge amenities (sauna). Got brunch in the main dining room (buffet!). Checked out of the room. Shipped Chad's pack with some other stuff in it back to DC at the post office down the hill. Hit up the general store briefly and then caught a shuttle back to the lake. I remember we were in the shuttle with Forest and Willow. Willow lives not too far from me now near Kent, CT. Then it was pretty much back to the marina for the day for another round of high life. It was beautiful out there. We had been trying to angle our way into a boat ride when Greenlite ran up the dock to help some people with their luggage that were heading for a houseboat. Next thing I know we're invited along to have lunch on their houseboat. They were all from Greenville, SC and kind of hilarious. Can't remember the details but I remember one guy particularly enjoying telling the story of his wife disembarking from a plane down those stairs onto the tarmac when she stumbled and took out one of the poor airline workers that tried to break her fall. She retaliated with some other absurd story about him I can't remember. I think it involved falling off a boat somehow. Aaaanyway they were so nice to us and we had quite the lunch.

We eventually got a boatride back to the marina where Greenlite's friends from Clemson were hanging out on the dock. We were probably there for 4 or 5 hrs or so when we finally decided to pack up and head towards the "Fontana Hilton" as the shelter near the dam is so named (apparently it has a shower). So we all started hiking the mile towards the dam and Greenlite and I decided we'd just keep going and head into the Smokies. It was pretty cool walking over the dam - I have a strange thing for the TVA. It just seems so old school, old America, New Deal, all that jazz. Thankfully the terrorist alert levels were low so we were allowed to walk across. I was maybe a third of the way across when two guys on motorcycles cruised by us. I started running after one of them, really wanted a ride across Fontana at sunset. He slowed down and I hopped on. Not one of my safest moments in life I suppose but oohhhhhhh was it nice. On the other side he slowed and I was able to hop off.

They kept on going but then turned around five minutes later or so and came back to see more of the dam. We got a few pictures with them. My ride was a nice man from Eastern KY named Jim. They were probably hitting up the tail of the dragon. He kept saying "I don't know why y'all want pictures with strangers but ooookay." So we pushed on from there and entered Great Smoky Mountain National Park. We hiked a mile or two in, gaining some elevation and we could look back down on the dam, glowing from lights as it got dark. So cool. Cowboy camped that night right off the trail. That was a good day.