Georgia Wrap Up

It has been a challenge finding the time to keep up to date on journaling, so I will wrap up the rest of Georgia in this post.

Trail Magic

On day five I received more trail magic. The people were wonderful and provided us with one of the best omelets I have ever had, and a nice cold beer to accompany it. The group didn’t have a name (and were open to suggestions), but they had a very sweet dog named Daisy, and a very cool converted bus with flower stickers along the side, so I will suggest calling them Daisy’s Magic Bus.

Tray Mountain, and the Busted Tent

The day was long (over 15 miles) and the forecast called for a good bit of rain, so I booked it up to Tray Mountain Shelter, found myself a nice place to tent for the night, and claimed my spot. It was a small break in the trees overlooking the Appalachian Mountain range as far as the eyes could see. I pitched my tent, joined my friends for supper and went over the plans for our first town stop into Hiawassee, GA the next day. As night fell the rain set in. I pushed my second trekking pole against my back wall in hopes that my tent wouldnt collapse. I had already had troubles with my tent collapsing during my shakedown hikes and didn’t need to wake up in a pool of water. My rig held into the morning as I woke up and began to pack my bag, but by the time I had gone to grab my food bag my tent had collapsed with all of my gear under the puddle that had now become my tent. I quickly gathered up my gear, attached my wet tent to the outside of my pack and took off down the mountain.

Down to Hiawassee

We hiked all the way down the mountain through the rain and fog down to a free shuttle courtesy of Bob, who out of the kindness of his heart gave us a ride into Hiawassee, GA to the Holiday Inn, where Me, Walking Home, Viper, and Juli all rented one two bed room for the evening. It’s amazing the things you miss that before thru-hiking you would have just taken for granted like running water and linens. We got our laundry done, headed to the outfitter, so I could replace my tent and went to what had to be the nicest Ingles I have ever seen. Once we finished packing our food bags we headed out and grabbed dinner at Hiawassee brew where we ran into a few friends from the trail. After dinner we went on a mission to obtain sauce packets from the local Taco Bell. Walking Home went to the counter to order some Cinnamon twists and the rest of us went to work pocketing the famed Diablo Sauce. Once our mission was complete we walked back to the hotel and fell asleep. In the morning we woke refreshed and excited to tackle the remaining miles of Georgia and the hotels continental breakfast.

We got in the shuttle, rode to the trail and hiked through the rain into my home state of North Carolina. 1 state down 13 more to go.