Hiking the Good Hike

Sorry we're so behind. Thru-hiking is busy, we haven't had much free time lately. We basically walk, eat, and sleep. It's great though. We're still having so much fun. The weather has been nice for the most part (except for one day
as you'll soon read), the people are amazing, and the scenery is beautiful. Here's an update on days three through five:

Day 3
Gooch Gap to Neel Gap - 14.5 miles

We didn't sleep well again. The wind blew like crazy all night. The tent held up well but it is a bit drafty with heavy winds. We woke up to about an inch of snow and temperatures in the low twenties. We packed up camp and went back to the fire to warm up before taking off. We had plans to hike fourteenish miles over Blood Mountain to Neel Gap. After collecting some water and fighting our quickly freezing drinking tubes we were on our way. It was extremely windy and very cold, but the snow was beautiful. When we arrived at Woody Gap, it appeared the weather was worsening. Irish and Monkey chose to catch a ride to Neel Gap with plans to slackpack that stretch the following day. (Slackpack is a term meaning you hike with food and water for that day while the rest of your gear is held at or driven to you destination.) They invited us to join them but we chose to move on and Monkey said she would try to secure us a spot at the Neel Gap hostel
for the night. We hiked the remaining 10 miles without even stopping for lunch because we wanted to be off of Blood Mountain before dark and we got cold quickly when not moving. It was a tough hike, the temps were only in the twenties all day and we've been told the wind gusts were sixty mph.

When we got to Neel Gap they immediately directed us toward a cabin. Irish Charm and Monkey had secured a four person cabin for the same price as the hostel stay. Awesome. More space, our own bathroom, and a warm bed. We went back to the hostel for a baked spaghetti dinner provided by a church group. We met more thrus and hung out. We plan to hang out here until lunch time and resupply at the gear store before getting back on the trail.

Day 4
Neels Gap to Low Gap Shelter - 11.2 miles

Sleeping in a bed in a warm cabin was really nice. We decided since we had a long difficult day yesterday we would sleep in and stay until check out at 11. Monkey and Irish were up early to catch their ride back to Woody Gap for their slackpack. They were planning to try and hike to Whitley Gap shelter where we also planned to stay. We left the cabin at around 11 and headed for the store for our resupply.

We finally got on the trail again at noon. We took our time checking out the views and taking some photos, we were in no hurry because we only were hiking 6.4 miles. We arrived at Whitley Gap where we found the sign indicating we would have to hike 1.2 miles further to stay at that shelter. Because we didn't want to hike that far out of our way we decided to move on the the next shelter 4.8 miles away. It was already 3:30, we would have to make good time to get there before dark. Cassandra led us there in less than two hours. Many of the hikers we had seen at the Neel Gap hostel are here. The shelter is full and many are tenting. We set up, ate, hung our food, and socialized a bit. It's cool tonight, but not bad. We now worry when we will see Monkey and Irish again as they are at least a day behind us. We have really enjoyed hanging with them these last few days. They are extremely knowledgable about the trail and have been a tremendous help. We're not sure how far to go tomorrow. We'll see how we feel. Today ended up being longer than planned.

Day 5
Low Gap shelter to "cheese factory site" - 13.4 miles

Last night we had the best sleep so far. We were up, packed, breakfasted, socialized and on the trail by 8:20. The first part of today was fairly easy. We made it to Blue Mountain Shelter for lunch in about 3 hours.

We stopped for a short rest at Unicoi with Rooster and Molly and then hit the trail again to try and make it to camp before dark. We hiked at a good pace and had some great views. Made it to "cheese factory site" at about 4, our earliest stop yet. Rooster and Molly were planning to press on but chose to camp with us after seeing our nice site in the rhododendrons. We ate and talked with them a bit before bed. We schemed for tomorrow. We can't decide whether to go 13 miles and catch a ride to Hiawassee or shorter and have a nero (near zero miles) the next day. We'll see what happens.


Thanks for reading,

Chris