Day 6 – Town Day!

It happened, I got a decent amount of sleep! I’m trying to not make a habit of using a muscle relaxer as a sleep aid but it was very much needed for both purposes last night.

Day 6 started earlier than I would have preferred. Buttt, our group was motivated to make it to Unicoi Gap early to stay in town and resupply. We left camp around 9 AM with a brisk yet comfortable pace.

We made excellent time and covered the 9.7 miles to Unicoi Gap in a little under 6 hours with a few breaks. A few days ago I started dipping by base layer shirt and hat into streams and wearing the wet fabric while I hike. It’s a practice I’ve been calling “cold soaking”. Traditionally cold soaking is taking a meal that would require hot water to cook (under ideal conditions) and using cold or cool water to rehydrate the meal. While the term isn’t exactly the same, I enjoy telling everyone “I need a quick cold soak” when we stop at a stream. Also the evaporative cooling is like free air conditioning until the fabric is dry (which usually takes an hour or so). Such a clutch hack.

Every now and again I’ll hear a little chime sound going off in my bag. Before I left, my girlfriend Kristen packed an Apple AirTag in my pack to track me on the trail. It makes me smile when I hear it go off because I know she’s thinking about me. I miss her and our dogs (Beau and Butters) immensely.

We arrived at Unicoi Gap to find our second day of Trail Magic in a row. We could see the tent through the trees taunting us while the next 1/2 mile of switch backs along the trail delayed our reward. “Running Bear’s” Trail Magic was top notch. Hotdogs, fresh fruit, honey buns, Oreos, beef sticks, soda, Gatorade, etc. 10/10, would definitely accept this Trail Magic again.

We piled into the bed of Paul’s pickup, who drove us into the town of Helen, GA for the evening and to resupply. Paul and Will are from Illinois and completed their 50mi section hike with us today. They will be missed as our crew presses on tomorrow.

We had dinner at the Hofbrauhaus and found a couple other hikers and invited them to our table. I was stuffed and turned in early at 9PM. As of this writing Ganfolf, who I’m sharing a room with, is still out and about, I can only imagine the stories I’ll hear in the morning.

Until then, stow away with me in my pack for Day 7 on the AT.