Ozark Highlands Trail: Day 2: Friday April 12, 2024

5:30- Crisp Morning

My alarm goes off. I spend 15 minutes playing around on my phone taking photos of the starry sky. It is astounding to see so many stars!! The more I look, the more I see. Like sand on a beach, they feel endless. I wake Washerrr up finally and we start packing up for the day. We find one tick in our tent and quickly dispose of it. I make breakfast and around 6:40 we get on our way.

Photo of the starry sky above our camp spot.

It is a coooooold morning. It feels like winter was still holding on, not ready to let go just yet. We both stay bundled up as this side of the mountain is in the shade.

As the sun comes up and things started to warm, I notice there is even more green in the trees. It’s like we are watching spring unfold slowly before our very eyes. It’s magic on the micro level.

Sun filtering through the budding leaves. They’re growing so fast!

Washerrr and I spend the next few hours hiking seperately. He is hiking faster than me and I’d rather not feel rushed. He moves on ahead and I plod along at a pace that feels comfortable. I love that we are taking time for ourselves out here.

10:51- An Unexpected Find

We find a really cool waterfall coming out over some flat rocks! This is not on FarOut, so I make a waypoint for it. I am having a hard time finding words to describe these falls. We are climbing up a hill, and the falls are on the left but down the hill. It is created by a stream flowing over the edge of a rock cliff. Below the ledge is a small cave-like area. There is only 4-5 feet from the top of the ledge to the earth below, where the water keeps flowing down the hill. We take off our packs and check it out.

A close-up of the waterfall.

13:18- Lunch surrounded by Magic

Spirit Creek and the falls. A screenshot from a video I took.

We stop for lunch by Spirit Creek and an incredible waterfall! There are stones to hop across, so our feet stay dry. There are so many waterfalls in this last .5 mile stretch. They are not what I expected—- rather than a large rushing stream flowing bountifully over the edge of a cliff, these falls come over primarily large layered rocks jettisoned out above the ground below. Probably 10-20 feet in the air. The water falls in various small streams off the ledges- creating multiple smaller water falls. And lots of them. I’ve never seen anything like this before in my life. We spend many moments in silent awe and gratitude for the beauty before us. We recognize that we are only on day two…! Before we leave this spot we see 15-20 little purple butterflies crawling on the ground in a group. How cool!! They are so pretty!

The group of butterflies. Stunning.

15:24- The Flattest Stretch and Realizations

We stop for some water at a beautiful stream. This is our last water source till Fane Creek which will be our home for the night. 4.2 miles left to go. Usually at this point in the day at home, I am tired and want to rest. My brain would feel cloudy, my body would feel heavy like lead. There is no resting out here, at least not in the sit-on-a-couch-and-do-nothing kind of way. I take my rest in moving more slowly, and stopping for short breaks when needed. I can tell this trip is challenging the routine I had built for myself at home and I like it. I feel empowered knowing that even when I am tired, I can still push myself to do more.

I spent the last 1.5 years mostly unemployed and healing my traumatic brain injury. It was a grueling task, that felt painstakingly slow and never ending. My day-to-day life shifted drastically after my last concussion, my ability to perform certain tasks diminished immensely. I lived in a surreal limbo, knowing that I had been capable of more and struggling to reconcile that my brain was … hurt and needed rest. I was scared that I would never be the same, that I would never have the same capacity to achieve intellectual or physical accomplishments like I had previously. So here I am, day two on trail, and already noticing a shift.

After our break and camel-ing up on water, we start on our final stretch for the day.

The following section, we’d find out later, is actually old railroad track. It is absolutely stunning! You walk along this flattish section carved out in between the ridge just above and, a partial ridge just below with the valley farther down. It is pure magic as the late-in-the-day sunshine turns everything it touches to gold. Plus, the levelness is a gift after the climbs we had today.

A panorama of the old railroad bed that is now trail.

17:40- A Dry Crossing and a Trail Maintainer!

We cross our last water crossing for the day. I find a dead tree to cross. It is farther down stream from where the blazes want us to cross. Washerrr scoots across on his butt. I trust my years of gymnastics and walk across it like a high beam. A little sketchy but I make it across. Things seem to work out just fine. I thought I would have to get my feet wet today, so it was a lovely surprise to have dry feet— ALL DAY!

Washerrr scooting across the tree on his butt. For safety.

We set up our tent at a site near the creek. The tent sites that are waypointed on FarOut all seem to have a fire ring and chairs made out of flat rocks circling. There is space for 2-3 tents here, so we chose the flattest spot with the least amount of poison ivy to set up our tent.

We hear a car park on the road just above us and a man comes meandering down. He says hello and we get to talking. It turns out he is the trail maintainer for this section of trail until the pipeline in 4 miles! He tells us that this next section has the most elevation gain in a single stretch but he also says it is not that bad of a climb. We shall see tomorrow.

It turns out his wife thru-hiked the AT the same year we did. We talk about gear and trails as hikers are wont to do. He mentions that Matney Knob is the official end at the moment but I think we will still try to do the other sections while we’re here. He teaches us that Ouchita is pronounced “Wash-e-tah”. I feel like I am becoming a native.

After a half hour he goes on his way and Washerrr and I get to making dinner for the night.

Our tent spot, and Washerrr holding the beloved dinner.

19:00- Patience Pays Off

PAD THAI!!! Pad Thai on trail is actually peanut sauce noodles and, dang, it tastes so good! We had been looking forward to this meal for … a month. I would have eaten some when we made it at home but I told myself no, that the meal was for future-PocketSnacks. And here I am, future-me, thanking past-me for this bountiful and delicious gift. The patience paid off in full. Who knew!

Before bed I decide to put some KT tape on my knee. It was giving me some troubles before trail so I brought some hoping it would help. I could feel my left knee tingling uncomfortably on the downhills so I’m glad I had a plan. This is my first time using the tape, though I watched videos on how to apply it to knees, so here we go!

We find a few ticks on us once we get into the tent. So we spend 10 minutes doing thorough tick checks before falling asleep to the sound of Fane Creek.

Today we arrived at mile marker 30.3— keeping our schedule of 15-miles-a-day on average.

Tomorrow we will get to our first food cache! Wow! How time flies when you spend all day hiking and eating in beautiful places.

The water count:

21 dry and 1 wet

Even though our feet were dry all day we count Fane Creek as a wet crossing. If the tree was not there, we would have gotten wet.

…

Special shout out to my parents— it is their 44th wedding anniversary! Thank you both for the gift of your company all these years, and for being the best role models a youngin’ could ever want. I love you both so much!

…

Started: 13.5

Ended: 30.3.

Miles Hiked: 16.9