AT trip from Oct. 18-27

“Hey, bitpusher & father goose! This is Lisa, w/a trail name!
Wayne(Blueduc)& I really enjoyed your acct of the trip~the detail was amazing! BTW, the pancakes tasted fine each morning...it was me who was nauseous all by myself..probably from the strenuous activity & the mtn. air,LOL!
We ended up at Whitley Gap Shelter w/Carlos (the older guy you mentioned hiking w/from Neels Gap), & ALSO saw a bear~trying to get in his food bag! He came back 3 total times before giving up!
After we left at Unicoi, we shuttled back to Amicalola to our truck, then drove to Franklin, NC to stay at a motel & heal a little(my ankles were both SWELLED~had to ice them! On top of my knees, ha!). The following night, we met our friends from Gainesville at Standing Indian Campground. Next a.m., we drove to the nearest parking place to head (1 mi) up to Standing Indian Shelter! As I was limping up, I realized how sad I was that we couldn't have gone further~in spite of pain, I loved the AT!
We met two different SB thru-hikers after we said good-bye to you guys (Hollywood/? & Spider/Bfree). They were all young & doing 20 mile or longer days! And wearing New Balance tennis shoes! They made it look so easy! (Like P-Natural), we enjoyed our time around the campfire that night, too. Our plans were a little too, er, ambitious for first-timers on the AT, but, hey, live & learn!
Hope you guys are well! Happy Trails!
p.s/ your Slumberjack didn't delaminate~Blueduc figured it was yours when we saw it hanging out of the can @ Neels, & it was LOTS more comfortable than our Ridgerests...LOL! You guys have GREAT gear!”

“Hey! Glad to hear from you! Blueduc is welcome to my old pad, it was driving me nuts!

I'm pretty sure that we ran into the same SB hikers you did, I just forgot to put them in my story. That was the same evening we saw our bear, so I guess I can be forgiven for forgetting them.

I'm glad you had such a good time. I figured your nausea was from overexertion, and to be honest, I was a little concerned. When I read in the Blue Mountain shelter register that you had decided to get off the trail, I was both relieved and sad for you. I know how it feels to not be able to reach your goal. But you guys were doing great miles for first-timers (for anybody, actually), so you should feel really good about that.

I'm going again in March, it looks like, and I'll pick up the trail at Unicoi, where y'all hitched in to Helen. There will be a group of hikers there who will be going slow, and depending on how my time works out, I may hike with them from there to the GA-NC border and finally polish off Georgia. It would be great to have y'all along.

One last question: Why did you change your trailname from Gazelle? I thought it fit you very well.”

“Hi. Actually, we were comparing our miles to the thru-hiker journals we've read, to the 15-20 milers, & didn't think 10-12 was supposed to be a big deal! I guess if you've already hiked a few hundred miles, it might not be. The March hike offer is very tempting. Thanks for the invite. We'll see if it works into our schedule. We definitely will be doing a section every yr, although will probably bring our kids (13 & 7 yrs) w/us next time to see how they do. We'll HAVE to go slower next time as a result!
I'm still in a dilema as to my trail name. I'm thinking about if I made the right decision!
Does your wife hike? It would be great to have more women out there. How many will be in the group going in March, if ya know?”

“No, unfortunately, my wife doesn't hike. I've tried to ease her into it some, but I just don't think it's going to happen. She does encourage me to go hiking though, so I consider that to me pretty good. I'm going to try and get my daughter interested in backpacking, but she won't be coming along with me on the AT until she's got a few easier trips under her belt.

I'm afraid I don't have any idea how big the other group is going to be. It's being put together by someone I met on my first AT hike, and while he announced the hike on this board, he's not a regular here. I checked the dates and I feel like there's a fairly good chance I will try and finish up Georgia on that hike.

After a few hundred miles, the days y'all were doing would be a lot easier. We were doing short days because I knew I would be able to make those kinds of miles without really pushing myself very hard. I probably could have gone farther every day we were there, but I was glad to be able to stop and rest after 4-5 hours instead of 6-7 hours. I'll worry about making longer miles after I get in better shape.

Glad to see you're posting on the board. Don't be afraid to poke around some of the other threads, but do be warned, it gets a little wild sometimes! lol....”

“Actually, our muscles were ok with the miles...we go to the gym regularly & have for the past 3 1/2 yrs! We're used to the soreness. It was our connecting tissues that screamed for mercy! We plan to do hikes all winter on the Florida Trail to keep in 'hiking shape', & to break our kids into it. As of now, we've only gone on one bping trip w/them..on the FT last April. Actually, that was our very first trip, ourselves! We definitely prefer the AT over the FT, but we have to work w/ what is do-able! It's a major production to plan an AT trip, as you know, when we live this far away! I envy those like P-Natural & James who live in Atlanta & can bop up there just for a wkend w/out any trouble. How many hrs do you live from there? It's amazing how it gets in your 'blood' & almost calls to you! I hope you don't think I'm too weird, lol! We would like to finish GA on our next hike, but it depends on the time, the miles, & the situation. Did you know that the GA Appalachian Trail Club offers a 'thru-hikers certificate' when you finish the whole GA section? I thought that was neat.
I have visited a couple of the other threads, & you're right about it getting wild! Really, though, I find some of the guys on this website offensive (like in all of life), & try to stay away from reading stuff that's not good for my soul..lol!!
I hope I can make some female hiker 'friends' who I can relate to, eventually. We're trying to encourage our church friends to join us, but it's been a challenge so far!”

“Yah, muscles build back quickly, but connective tissues just get worse and worse...The Navy has done some preliminary studies with a couple of dietary supplements that seem to help with that, glucosamine and chondroitin. I bought a bottle of the stuff to give it a try, but never got in the habit of taking them. I need to though, I want to see for myself if they help any.

I live about 4 hours away from the Georgia AT section, and about the same from the GSMNP and North Carolina sections. It does make it somewhat easier to plan trips, but I still have the shuttle issue like you do on any long non-loop trip.

As far as it "calling" you...yes, I've run into that phenomenon as well, and so did Father Goose. My wife was tryin to describe is once, and she hesitated to use the word "obsession". I told her that it was okay, "obsession" is an accurate description. It waxes and wanes, but its siren song is almost always there.

I knew about the GATC's certificate, and I think they have a patch too. I hope to be able to get one after my next trip up there.

There are a lot of women who post here, and a few who live in Florida. Hang around, read some, post a little, and you'll find them. I think there's a trip to the Ocala NF in February, you might want to think about going along on that one. Use the thread search at the bottom of the page to find the thread about that hike.”