What do you mean it hasn’t been a week yet??? Six days in

Ok, so here’s the deal, if you forego an exercise routine prior to starting the AT, you’re an idiot. I know this because I am that idiot.

Here’s what happened this week:

DAY 01, March 16th

Amicalola Falls – Springer Mountain
8.8 miles
0 AT miles

Holy flipping moley we made it to the start of the AT! It’s Warrior Hike tradition to start with a quick warm up on the approach trail. All ten thousand and one steps of it. Ok, maybe not quite that many but daaaamn did it feel that way!

This morning consisted of a tearful goodbye to Paityn, my four year old bundle of energy I’m going to miss ore than anything! But it’s ok, I have Barbie! Of all the small toys this kid has, a full-sized Barbie doll is what she gave me to “think of her.”

Before you start a hike like this, you tend to make Facebook friends with people you don’t know at all… MamaGoose was one of them. It wasn’t long after reaching Springer that she had my bare, aching feet in her hands and was taping the shit out of them. Her trail name is well suited! If you run into her on the trail.. well,chances are she’ll run into you because she’s a beast… she’ll fix you right up! It’s what she does :).

An amazing day it was! A haaaard day it was. Damn good first day indeed!

P.S. Mountain House  spaghetti with meat sauce is awwwwesome

P.P.S. With the exception of dinner, eating on day one is reeeeally hard.

DAY 02, March 17th
Springer Mountain – Justus Creek 
14.5 miles

Made it to Justus Creek today. 14 and a half miles is NOT easy! Not yet anyway. Sean, Joel, Dave, Gabe (who’s name I thought was Caleb) and two of the Nates (there’s three of them) are with me tonight.

Today’s walk was gorgeous. I walked alone for the first half through what reminded me of a rain forest. A wood pecker nearly had me a heart attack! Then came the brown. Blah blah brown. Miles of brown.

All in all its been good. Everything hurts but I expect I’ll be in a perpetual state of pain for the next 2,000 miles or so.

P.S. I hate peanut butter. Like really really don’t like peanut butter.

DAY 03, March 18th
Justus Creek – Woods Hole Shelter 
13.8 miles

Slept much better last night! Still could have slept better but it was good. Started off neeked but had to pee and ended up in my thermals. I seriously have to poo but there’s nowhere good here so I’m going to hold it unlit we pass the privy at Gooch Shelter which is only about 1.4 miles from here… Hiker issues haha. Joel and I seem to have a similar pace so we’re going to head out around 730 to get some of these hills! Everything is sore!

Had our first trail magic today! First from the awesome folks at Gooch Gap and then from some sweet ladies at Woody Gap. They made cookies just for us!

Joel and I almost made the mistake of going all the way to Neels Gap to avoid the incoming rain… Which means we would have hiked over Blood Mountain in the dark. Luckily Sean caught up and we ended up at Woods Shelter. It’s a freaking hike off the path but totally worth it since it was empty. We didn’t have to set our tents in the rain… Winning!

P.S. When someone who’s already thru-hike the AT gives you advice… Take it.

DAY 04, March 19th
Woods Hole Shelter – Neel Gap 
3.5 miles

First rain! We’ve been super luckily so far with the weather.  Today we went up and over Blood Mountain, it was gorgeous, cold and reminded me a little of the hiking I did in Maine.

We had some awesome burgers and dogs provided by Georgia Mountain Resorts Ministries at Mountain Crossings. That store is friggin sweet by the way. Sean, Joel and I thought we were the first ones there but turns out Dave beat us… Today he earned his trail name, Diesel!

Tonight Warrior Hike put us up in the Blood Mountain Cabins. They’re sweeeet! To top it off, Georgia Mountain Ministries prepared us an amazing dinner. People are friggin awesome!

P.S. Going downhill hurts worse than going uphill

DAY 05, March 20th
Neel Gap – Random spot around mile marker 46 
13.6 miles

Today was the exact reason why flexibility is KEY to this hike. Our goal was to reach Low Gap Shelter but when we got there is was like a metropolis. We pushed on to another camp site about 1.5 miles away but that was full too. We finally decided to take a gamble and just go until we saw an off trail camp area. Thankfully we found one!

It ended up being Sean, Gabe, two Nates, Joel, myself and our new friend Joe. Joe has a YouTube site and took some video of us. I’m interested to see how that turns out. He’s a pretty cool guy, three kids in the military!

It’s cold and super damp tonight. I’m pretty sure it’s still raining but it’s hard to tell up here.

P.S. Get water even if you don’t think you need it! We almost all went black on water tonight.

DAY 06, March 21st
Random spot around mile marker 46 – Unicoi Gap 
6.9 miles

Today was a damn good day indeed! The terrain seemed more difficult due to large rocks and mud but I think my body is finally getting used to this hiking business!

I started off my my lonesome listening to an audio book until I caught up with Diesel, Caitlyn and one of the Nates. I stuck with them down to Unicoi Gap where we waited in the blissful sun with most of our group until our ride came to take us to Hiawassee.

Tonight the Marine Corps League from Det 783 put us up at the Budget Inn and provided us with dinner at Daniel’s Steak House. Both the food and company were awesome!

Tomorrow we head into what’s supposedly the hardest part of Georgia before crossing into North Carolina and stopping in Franklin for another stop… And I’m about to go to sleep between two snorers… God Bless Z-quill :). Aaaand it’s gonna rain!
Happy trails!

P.S. Box wine is delicious