March 19, 2008

Well that was a disaster. Owing to a number of delays, I didn't get out of Neel's Gap until nearly 5pm, which meant I only got about an hour or so of walking in before I made camp. I did so, but poorly. I picked an awful spot to camp, and to make a long story short, had a miserable night, owing to rain and very heavy wind all night. By morning, I'd gotten a lousy night's sleep and a lot of my stuff was a little moist.

Come morning it was still drizzly, windy, and extremely foggy. Visibility all morning was only about 30 yards. It was eerie and lonely being out in those conditions; I was half-expecting an Orc to emerge from the mist at any time.

By 10, there was a freight-train wind and the drizzle felt like pebbles. By 11, the drizzle had changed to wind-whipped sheets of rain.

I've been fighting off a bit of a cold, and my nose has been running pretty steadily, so all day, my nose dripped with mixture of rain, sweat and snot. I made Tesnatee Gap by noon - from there I was only 2 miles from Whitley Gap Shelter - it was uphill, but if I could make it by 2, I could get out of the storm.

Wildcat Mountain was the most brutal experience I've had since...hell, I don't know when. Soaking wet, cold, sniffling and sneezing, it was a steep drag uphill.

The book says Whitley Gap Shelter holds 7; and from experience I know that when they list a capacity, it truly is the maximum. I already knew of at least two, if not three, other hikers that were heading for Whitley Gap. As I staggered up Wildcat, two more passed me. It says something about the surrealness of the day that one of them was wearing an Abe Lincoln beard and a stovepipe hat; I said "Good Morning," he did the same and passed me.

That made five people in the shelter - two spots more left. Just as I reached the crest of Wildcat, another passed me. One spot in the shelter left. I turned onto the side trail, don't ask me why - and a quarter-mile down the side trail, a group of three 19-year-olds blew by me.

The next shelter after Whitley Gap is 5 miles. Even if I could make that - doubtful - it would almost certainly be full. Door number two was pitching tarp and hammock in what looked to be an all day storm. Door number three was another mile up the AT - Georgia road 348, and stick out my thumb.

The priest drove a Lexus, the Levite a minivan, but my Good Samaritan was a white Ford pickup belonging to a lawn-service company. I had to sit in the bed (there were two in the cab, and I was really wet), but they gave me a lift off the Mountain to Blairsville. They dropped me off at a Motel, where I struggled mightily to sign the credit-card slip - my fingers having cramped up from the cold on the drive down. But half an hour later, my clothes were drying, and I was in the shower.

By 6pm, the rain had stopped, and I took a stroll around the little downtown. Blairsville City Hall is on the National Registry of Historic Places, and the Police HQ is next door in a doublewide. Dinner at a Mom and Pop, and tuck myself into my king-sized bed by 10:00.

All day, I've felt in my legs and in my lungs how out of shape I am. I envied every one of those younger guys their strength and speed, but as I settled into sleep, I was glad for what I did have - an American Express card.