Hot springs to Mountain Harbor B&B

It's been a while since I've made a post so I guess this will be a long one. So much has happened since Hot Springs. The day we left, we got a ride past the burning area of the trail with a former thru hiker named Yonder. He was about our age and gave us a lot of encouragement. We skipped a total of 16 miles to get past the fire. That day we hiked into a very crowded shelter as the sun was setting. The reason we got there so late was because of a very intense ridge that ended up in our path. The path went up and over very steep boulders making for some treacherous hiking. The views were worth the effort.

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 We became familiar with the phrase "town gravity" that day. Hikers love town days so much that they make leaving difficult, but once you're back out for a day, your pack starts to lighten up (due to eating food) and you appreciate the outdoors again.

The next day we hiked 15 miles to the next shelter. The only problem was that the water source was another half mile from the camping, so I put on an extra mile just to get 4 liters of water for cooking and drinking. 

The next morning was a bit lazy. We didn't leave until well after 10am which concerned me since the forecast was looking like rain. We got to the end of the day and had to hike up to Big Bald. The sky looked ominous and we could hear thunder in the distance. We got to the top and took some amazing photos. We could see a sheet of raining moving across the valley. 

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We made it to the shelter and got our tent set up and it started pouring almost immediately. We stayed dry that night despite the wind and rain. That morning the sun poked out just long enough to dry off the rain fly so we could put it away. 

We took another two days to get to Erwin, TN. The day we hiked into town gave us some beautiful views of the Nolichucky river. 

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We took a zero in Erwin to resupply, get some mail from Leap's parents (thank you so much, by the way!), and fill up with pizza. We made a crucial contact while in Erwin. The name Miss Janet won't mean much to most, but to thru hikers, she is the most amazing trail angel that exists. She has a van and shuttles hikers around in the south. We met her and exchanged numbers. She ended up shuttling us around, which allowed us to go to Walmart and get a better variety of food than we are used to (aka better variety of tuna and knorr pasta rice sides). 

We left Erwin with enough food for 5 days to get to mountain harbor B&B, which has a light resupply store. We made it to Beauty Spot, which is a bald. We had planned to camp on top but it was too windy. Fortunately there were some good spots right past the top of the bald. 

The next day was uneventful as we didn't  do many miles (mainly due to getting up late and not doing many miles since it started raining and it was a cold day). It did end up snowing too (and it was Cinco de Mayo). The snow and mist made for some surreal moments in the spruce forest we were walking through. 

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The day after was better. We did make a small side trip to a hostel a half mile off the trail. The trail leading there was incredibly wet and steep, which made the return trip more difficult than it should have been. Greasy creek hostel was a cool place, however, and was worth the trip. The rules were as follows: 1. Take off your shoes 2. Go wash your hands 3. Take a seat. We ended up eating some ice cream, drinking a coke, and getting a new fuel canister. 

On the 7th, we stumbled upon some trail magic in the gap right before Roan mountain, which is the last 6000ft mountain until New Hampshire. The ascent was ok until the last couple of miles, which was solid mud and snow. 

There wasn't much for views at the top, but I did get to make a small snowman. 

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We also checked out the highest shelter on the Appalachian trail. It was pretty cool since it had an upstairs.

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We ended up hiking almost 16 miles to get to Overmountain shelter, which is an old barn. There was a beautiful view of a valley facing south. 

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Today, we hiked into the bed and breakfast and had an awesome home cooked meal. It was also our last day in North Carolina. We have another 80 miles left in Tennessee then it's onto Virginia. 

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Until Damascus,

Leap and Frog