seeley-woodworth shelter to devil's backbone brewery

we woke to what sounded like rain. the weather forecast had us hoping for a day that we could dry out, but it wasn’t to be. while it technically wasn’t raining, the fog was condensing on the trees and dripping enough to make you wet. it was also still quite cold. it was really depressing and everyone stayed in their sleeping bags late. i was the first up and out of camp. bugs and lyric were still cooking breakfast when i left.

i prefer spending my days hiking alone. occasionally i’ll hike with others, but i find slowing my pace saps my energy. my theory is that since i can’t get into my full stride i’m movong less efficiently.

i tried calling magz in the morning, but with limited success. i wanted to touch base with her as i hadn’t been able to talk to her at all yesterday due to no cell service. i had only been able to text briefly once i was at the shelter.

i spent the morning hiking and being vaguely upset at the weather, but ultimately coming to terms with it. around 10 i stopped at the priest shelter and was able to get a call through. michael picked up. the family was at our place doing a mothers day shindig. i even heard some arthur noises as i tried to be an exciting cell phone for him.

from there i had a long descent into a valley, immediately followed by an equally difficult ascent right back out.

i got to a trail intersection where i could blue blaze and cut off about 3 miles of trail. i had told bugs and lyric that if the weather looked like i could see the views, i’d take the longer AT, but if not, i’d skip it.

i peered through the trees and the fog had lifted so i could see neighboring mountains, so i opted for the longer path. i stopped around 13:00 for lunch at harper’s creek shelter.

after lunch the trail got much more difficult. there were loose, slippery rocks all the way up, but i still made good time. as i approached the top i watched as the fog rolled back in, denying me all the views i hoped to get. i continued to the top and this is all i could see:

i went further to chimney rock. i thought i was there when i saw a huge perpendicular flat rock that looked like it should have a fireplace in it, but the map said i was still .2 mile away. i hiked the extra distance and was disappointed when it was just the fogged in pile of rocks that was the top of the mountain. there were also trees that would have obscured every view had any not been cloud. i started back down the other side. my extra 3 miles were a bust.

at some point i called magz and we were able to stay connected long enough to have a decent chat. i’m almost at the halfway point. in the near future we may be able to see one another.

i was getting to the end of my day. i passed the place where the other end of the blue blaze reconnected with the AT, but i had no way of knowing whether bugs and lyric were ahead of me or not.

i continued on and finding good cell service again, called my mom to wish her a happy mother’s day. we chatted all the way to the parking lot that was the end of the day, where there was some trail magic. someone had left some bottles of gatorade. i kept chatting withy mom while i noticed a whole ton of cars passing going down the hill where i needed to get. i said goodbye to my mom and waited for a hitch, but no more cars came! it was just after 17:00, and i was suddenly worried i would have trouble getting a hitch. some day hikers were returning to their car with their dog, and i asked them, but they were going in the opposite direction. i resumed my post waiting for a hitch. eventually i was aware that some other folks had come off the mountain. i had thought they were thru-hikers, but they had a car! i asked them for a ride and they were happy to oblige.

they drove me 8 miles down the mountain to devil’s backbone brewing. as it turned out, one of them had thru-hiked in 2017. they weren’t even ftom around here, but he remembered going to the brewery himself.

they dropped me off and with some help i found the tenting area and the bath house. i set up my tent and had a shower. i was the only hiker, so “tent city” was all mine. just as i was getting out of the shower i ran into bugs and lyric, who had been here long enough to set up their tents.

we walked across the campus to the main building where we had dinner, some beers, and of course dessert. all of us were dead tired, and as soon as we were done we retired to our tents.

only one additional photo from today.