Day 15: Tennessee!

Hiked 13.8 miles, staying in Russell Field shelter.

In the middle of the night last night we had two airplanes fly directly over our campsite no more than a few hundred feet off the ground.  It was quite the surprise.  I caught a glimpse of the second one (or the first one circling back) and out kind of looked like a WW2 PBY Catalina which would be odd, but I guess would have made some sense if it was landing on the lake.

A lot of hikers left in the middle of the night.  Some were trying to put in a bunch of distance before Thursday's thunderstorms, some were just trying to race to the shelter.  Either way we took no part in either activity.  We probably rolled out of camp around 8.

We had a brief mileish road walk to the entrance of Smokey Mountains National Park, hereafter abbreviated to SMNP cause I'm lazy.  This included walking across Fontana Dam which was a lot bigger than I expected.  When we got off the road we had to stop at a drop box to drop off the bottom half of our permit with the park entry date.  We are finally in the Smokies!

Crossing Fontana Dam

Moth on Fontana Dam

Entering the Smokies

As usual with a town stop we had to hike back up to altitude so we spent most of the day climbing.  About 3 miles into the park is Shuckstack mountain which has an abandoned fire tower on top.  This was really cool because unlike the one on Mt. Albert which was in use, we could actually climb to the room that sits on top.  For an abandoned tower, it was very sturdy and we got some great views of the first half of the Smokies, including Clingmans Dome which we will be climbing Saturday.

Why Not on Shuckstack Mountain firetower

Me on Shuckstack Mountain firetower

View of Fontana Dam from the firetower (3 mile hike away)

Long Gone on firetower

Enjoying the view from the firetower

I hiked most of the afternoon with Long Gone, stopping at Mollies Ridge shelter for lunch and to let the ladies catch up.  At some point we crossed the border into Tennessee!  This isn't the last we will see of North Carolina though, we bounce back and forth between the two states a lot until we get to Virginia.  It was still only 1 in the afternoon and it was only 2.9 miles to the next shelter so we pushed on before we lost motivation.  The nice thing about the Smokies is that because you are required to stay in the shelters there are a lot of them.  The downside is that almost none have privies, so you have to dig yourself a cathole which is a pain.

Lunch at Mollies Ridge Shelter

The shelters are big though, most fitting 12 or more people.  As a thru hiker though we have to give way to any day hikers with reservations at specific shelters.   You aren't allowed to camp unless the shelter is full, but if a day hiker shows up at 11 pm and the shelter is full, the last thru hiker has to get out and set up their tent.  Hopefully we dont run into this situation.  The shelter we are at tonight has a plexiglass skylight and I'm looking forward to watching the stars, they have been great the last few nights.

We ran into Vagabond again today.  I don't remember if I wrote about her before but she is 70 and is yellow blazing the first section since she has already done it.  I should probably explain that.  There are three main types of thru hikers.  White blazers are the purists, like us, that want to hike past every white blaze on the trail.  Blue blazers skip occasional sections by taking blue blazed trails, which is a common color for side trails.  Yellow blazers skip sections by hitchhiking or driving (following the yellow road lines).  You only have to complete 2000 miles of the trail to be considered as finishing it, so the non purists can skip the occasional section and still be considered thru hikers.   Not how I want to do it but you gotta hike your own hike.  Anyway we keep passing Vagabond over and over because she keeps skipping ahead of us.  It's weird to come around a bend and see her after passing her a few days before.

We have run into the bubble ahead of us and are meeting and passing a new round of people.  Staying here tonight are Nightrider, Sassafras, Giants Bane, Knowles (short for know it all), POM and Slim Jim along with a couple day hikers.  We also met Glowworm, Yukon and Tin Man on the trail.  Large numbers of people were moving on to Spence Field shelter today so even though we would have considered another couple miles in the nice weather, we opted to stay in the not full shelter.

Russell Field Shelter (all the packs hung up for the night)

Funny story for the day: We met a woman today at the shelter we stopped at for lunch.  She had few teeth left and was yelling a lot.  At one point someone mentioned taking some Ibuprofen and she listed about 30 pain medications, the only two of which I recognized were Vicodin and Oxycontone.  Apparently she started the trail with all of them, but sent them all home, not because of the weight but because she was afraid she would walk off the mountain.  Also on an unrelated note, Long Gone received a care package from home with three huge packs of skittles in it so we have been tasting the rainbow all day to help him drop weight from his pack.  In the process I found out mint m&ms and skittles make a delicious combo.