Day 1-4: Springer Mountain to Neel Gap

I’m getting better at taking pictures, but for now… enjoy some text-heavy articles! And gratuit

Day 1 — Springer Mountain Shelter to Hawk Mountain Campsite:

After a late evening arrival to the Springer Mountain shelter, I settled into my new tent for the first time. While the low temperature that night was relatively normal for a March 10th start— 37°F— the bitter gusts of wind cut through my shelter and into my very soul. Before my hike, I was prepped for rain. I was prepared for storms, heat, hail even! I’d experienced them all in these mountains many times before; but the wind on this Trail has been the elemental star of the show. Somehow, as I stretched on a sunny morning and wrote in my journal, my self-rushed start and cold night didn’t matter. I was here. I had just spent the night on the Appalachian Trail.

Baby’s first White Blaze!

It didn’t take long for my first trail magic to appear! It yielded fresh fruit, and my very first (but certainly not the last) honey bun. I could have stayed for so much longer soaking in this monumental first, but that same wind that had rustled my night now carried my feet at warp speed. Then again, that might have been the sugar from the honey bun kicking in.

About halfway through my day, I met a few other hikers including one who would soon come to be known as Four Squares! I give trail names to campers regularly as a backpacking guide, but it was an honor to bestow one upon a fellow A.T. hiker. It felt different. I’ll let her choose which of her two name origin stories to tell you, should you meet her along the way. 

We stopped at a waterfall for lunch and made our way to Hawk Mountain Campsite. Walking around those sites, surveying everyone setting up their abodes for the night on the way to the water source, it felt once again like a college move-in experience. Who of these people would I come to know better and hike with more? Windy (short for Second Wind), for example. Who would I hit it off with, only to fall behind the next day and cheer on through social media? It’s true what they say. This trail is social from the jump.

Day 2 — Haws Mountain Campsite to Gooch Gap Shelter:

A USFS sign reads “DO NOT ENTER: REVEGETATING,” and I can’t help but compare that to my own mental state. It’s only been two days, but I feel my mindset shifting. You can’t help but be more present when collecting water is the most pressing thing on your to-do list. It’s one of the things I love most about backpacking: the environment demands you show up with as much as you have to give.

Coming up and over Sassafras Mountain, I descended into one of the gaps just as a Subaru Forester plastered with stickers whipped into a small dirt parking space. My heart skipped a beat and then sunk a notch as I processed that this car was not my own sticker-clad Susan the Subaru, whose demise ultimately led to my thru-hike. If you’ve read my article about her you know she was not just a car, but my home. I’ve been thinking about her a lot more than I expected out here.

Max Forester still has a few hundred more stickers to go before he reaches Susan’s level, but he was still a sight for sore biker eyes (and feet)!

This car belonged to the trail angel Max Forester. If hikers asked him if Max Forester was the car’s name or his own, to which he would glibly reply: “yes.” His stickers were all A.T. related, and the collection seemed modest by Susan’s standards. Child’s play. But still, I told him about my own magical Subie and how it did my heart good to see her kindred spirit out here giving trail magic.

“Well, that’s too bad about Susan,” he said. “She and Max could have had little Subarus running around… What are they, Crosstreks?”

One thing I will forever be grateful for is how much people in the hiking community understand what a blow this loss was for me. If anyone understands that home is what you make it, it’s this lot.

Day 3 — Gooch Gap Shelter to Woody Gap/Above the Clouds Hostel:

I had a telehealth appointment, so I booked a night at Above the Clouds Hostel to get some work done and take the call. To get there, I had two options: Gooch Gap was a little over two miles away, and Woody Gap a little over five. I woke up early still assuming I would only make it to Gooch, but couldn’t believe how easily the miles came to me in the dawn light. Two pileated woodpeckers swirled around each other in the valley below, their vibrant red crests accentuated by overcast skies.

It’s a scientific fact that coffee tastes better in a Waffle House mug

Sometimes it’s the little things. Or, a big ol can of beans in a container meant for little things.

When Scully picked me up (also in a Subaru Forester), we discovered a similar “wanderer” affectation and swapped stories of travels to the same places decades apart. At the hostel, I had just enough time to shower and fill a coffee mug to the absolute surface-tension-breaking point. I started my laundry, but it felt like cheating to already be so clean after only 3 days. Still, the hostel was warm and comforting, and watching a dark cloud roll in exhilarated that part of me that so deeply missed the summertime thunderstorms of the South. Come lunchtime, I underestimated the size of bowl I needed for my baked beans and was once again defying the laws of food container physics.

As more hikers rolled in, I reconnected with Four Squares, Windy, and our new friend Ladybug along with so many other delightful folks. Some were reattempting the Trail after injuries years prior; and some, like Gunga Din who was gently strumming “Amarillo by Morning” around the fireplace, were out for a second run.

There were forecasts of heavy storms and even potential tornadoes rolling in the next night into the weekend, and we all sat around the big dining table trying to figure out a game plan. We decided we would slack pack Blood Mountain southbound (SOBO), from Neel’s Gap back to Woody Gap. That way, if the storm rolled in earlier than expected we would have our most exposed point out of the way first. For the first time on the Trail, I was making plans with other people; with community and each other’s safety in mind. 

All in all, it was a day of full human spirits, and full of full containers of beans.

Left to Right: Ladybug, some clown who writes for The Trek, Windy, MacGyver

Day 4 — SOBO Time! Neel’s Gap to Woody Gap:

We arrived at Mountain Crossings early to begin our SOBO hike up Blood Mountain, the highest point on the A.T. in Georgia. Even though I was happy to be hiking with a group, I wondered if it had been the right call. Our ascent would be steep and fast, and my hip flexor and groin muscles had already been giving me uncharacteristic grief. I also had expected to first see Mountain Crossings— this hallowed ground and major milestone— as I walked towards it at the end of a victorious day. Instead, I had to put it in my rear view mirror for the time being.

Windy, Ladybug, Four Squares, and some vagrant writing this caption set sail for a SOBO stretch!

Ultimately, the views from the summit washed all those doubts away. It was gloriously sunny, even with the impending storm. At the summit, Ladybug and I sat on a rock for lunch. Our views alternated between the faint peaks of the Atlanta skyline on one side of the horizon, and skyscrapers of far off thunder clouds on the other. We spoke to a few Ridge Runners, and knew we had made the right call to zero the next day when we learned even they were being pulled off the Trail. 

We had come to learn of these storms through trail angels, the Mountain Crossings staff, Ridge Runners— all these folks that served as our liaisons to society. It led us to marvel at how quickly oral communication picks back up and thrives without technology to get in the way. Sure, the folks at home had their radars and weather apps. But out here, every hiker that passed asked “have you heard heard about the storm? Do you have a plan?” just as quickly as they asked “how are you?”

One state-high-point down, thirteen to go!

If you’re really lucky, thru-hiking is a community effort.

That can be between you and your tramily (trail family), or your support systems back home who are ready to put together an “all hands on deck” effort to get you out of a pickle. That’s exactly what happened when a teammate of my brother’s came to pick me up from Woody Gap after my hike. A native of the surrounding area, Timmy was no stranger to picking up hikers. Still, his willingness to help someone he’d never met at the drop of a hat was emblematic of the Trail spirit. Every connection feels so intimate, perhaps because of the world’s difference even the smallest act of kindness makes.

My brother Seamus intercepted me from Timmy’s place and I headed back to Atlanta to wait out the storm with him and his family. My hip muscles had stiffened significantly over the course of the day— my longest hike yet at 10.8 miles— and an epsom salt bath awaited me at his house. I wasn’t expecting to be zeroing so early in my trip, but I’ll never regret something that brings me closer to friends and family new and old.