I’m finally tenting again tonight, the same group of four from Hogback all ended up here at Whistling Gap. The 15mi plan showed a short 10 mile day today and then a 17 mile day full of downhill tomorrow. Even with a slow, lazy 9:30 start and taking my time the 10 miles to Bald Mountain Shelter was done by 2:30. Strider was there and ready to spend the night but I was pretty set on knocking off three miles and one of the big downhill sections today in order to get into Erwin earlier. He packed up and came along to the campsite where we found Sir Stooge and Rusty already set up. Very glad I got those miles done tonight – 13.5 into town sounds a lot nicer and leaves more time for eating and shopping than a 16.5.
There were some pretty neat places today, most notably Big Bald. It took some climbing to get to but at 5500 feet was worth the effort. The view didn’t quite compare to Max Patch a few days ago but it was similar. It was easily the longest stretch of trail yet outside the shadow of the forest. My favorite view was actually looking back at Big Bald once the trail started down the other side. Half the mountain was all grass and half had trees, wooden beams dotted the mountain, sticking up with white blazes to mark the AT.
I’m definitely getting the hang of the food supply. The once heavy food bag from Hot Springs seems like it will be almost perfectly empty after tomorrow morning, probably one pack of Ramen left. Town food is much more exciting but here’s a sample of stuff from my bag from Hot Springs: A bag of sandwich rounds, 2 small cans of shredded chicken, pepperoni, peanut butter, a mountain house dinner, 3 ramens, about 5 peanut butter crackers, gummi bears, gummi worms, a box of nutrigrain bars, a couple Snickers and Almond Joys, and several oatmeal cream pies. I’m probably forgetting something too. I did really like making pepperoni sandwiches with the rounds, and I started using little packets of drink flavoring for the Nalgene bottle. Nice to have something other than regular water from time to time – fresh mountain spring water is pretty good though.
Going to try to get into Erwin pretty early tomorrow. It’s one of the bigger towns yet and there’s a Mexican food place. It’s been 30 days since I’ve had anything Mexican, even chips and salsa. Even though Elmer’s vegetarian cuisine was delicious I’m very ready for three meals in a row of regular restaurant eating!