Day 31

Fontana Dam Shelter to Mollies Ridge Shelter 12 Miles.  AT mile 178

Card of the day – 4 of cups

Last night was to hot! Like not in sleeping bag or top!  Like Dante’s inferno.  Ok I’m being melodramatic again.  But actually it was refreshing to be warm over night.

There are propper plumbed toilets here!  They call it the Fontana Hilton for a reason.  There are also hot water showers, and a solar power charger for your phones.

The dawn chorus was loud and I’m not sure if it was beautiful or annoying, and then the rain started on and off.

Mike made scrambled egg with ham and cheese for breakfast!  What a hero!

Having mostly got my tent down in the dry we set off in the rain and it did not stop!

The problem with the rain was that it was cold and wet, as rain usually is.  We had had a fantastic breakfast but no coffee and I had not put any snacks in my pocket for the day.  This meant that at one point I just had to get a march on and split from the group when they stopped for a break.  As Underhill rightly put it, at that moment we just had different priorities.

Meg, who followed me fell on her bum twice, and naturally I laughed at took photos.  Then I did the right thing and checked in with her to make sure nothing was broken.  She just sat there and laughed.

We got to the shelter around 3, soaking wet, and guess what, the shelter was packed.  I stood in there for about 10 mins to get my bearings and went off to set up my tent.  There were a few spaces left but I knew the guys would want then and I really wanted the space of my tent.

When I got there there was a guy set up in his hammock in the external communal seating area.  I thought this was an odd thing to have done but just carried on what I was doing.

Then it downed on me, there was no where for any one to cook and all the guys that would be in their tents or hammocks would not have any where to hang any of their gear to try and dry.

But hay, that one guy was happy in his space.

It would not have been as bad if he had just waited till after hiker midnight to set up his hammock.

I was just very passive aggressive about this with other hikers and in hind site I wish I had spoke to to him about it.  You live and learn.

About 6pm I hit the shelter and made dinner, there was not much going on in there, although about 16 of them, but they did not really have the space to do all that much.

Following on from this I hit my tent and went to sleep.  See you in 12 hours I suppose.