Day 12

Tray Mountain Shelter to Dicks Creek Gap 11.1 miles – AT mile 69.4

Card of the day – Strength

Another glorious sunrise and a not-too-cold morning meant we were out by around 9:00.

This morning the Fellowship was accompanied by Bard, who is a really interesting kid, even if he did call me dad last night for asking people to be a little quiet and respectful past hiker midnight.

It was going to be our longest day and there were some killer hills to climb including Kelly Nob and Powell Mountain.  When you look back at the topography map it looks like nothing but there were any number of other hikers that agreed that Kelly Nob was the hardest climb in Georgia, and I’m sure the trail maintainers in this stretch forgot about switch backs!

Anyway, you gotta love a flat bit! And even Bard got involved with the shout out eventually!  As the Fellowship hit a flat bit of hiking after a climb one of us usually shouts out “flat bit” in celebration!  It’s silly, but it keeps us motivated.

I continue to be amazed at how few breaks we are taking up the hills and how quickly I now recover from the endeavour!

At the top of Kelly Nob, we were discussing the collective noun for hikers which we have now agreed is a “Landfill of Hikers” due to the fact we are Hiker Trash, which trust me is a term of endearment.

We also laughed about the fact that Dicks Gap is mile 69, and that it falls at 3.14% of the trail!  Simple things please simple minds.

Hard hills, up and down today!  Not good!

I was truly destroyed by the time we got to Dicks Gap.  It’s going to rain on Saturday, so we decided to take a zero in Hiawassee.  I think we all agreed we deserve out second proper Zero!