Oats on the Pinhoti: Day 7

Friday morning I arranged to drop my car near the northern terminus and scheduled a shuttle with Sparky to get back to the trail, all before I crawled out of bed. It wasn’t long before my arms were tightly wound around Thru’s thick and unbelievably soft neck in the living room. I crouched on the floor, my face shoved straight into her fur. It’s hard saying goodbye, and I was ready for the solo time.

Once on the road, the only stop I made was a Dollar General (of which there were a shocking number on the drive.) Sparky was waiting for me at Toadshade when I pulled in.

It’s not like me to be late or hurried, but I felt that way. I could’ve woken up earlier (but Past Oats didn’t) and it cost me peace of mind as I rapidly went over my gear list in my head. If the 5-hour drive from Charlotte to Toadshade wasn’t enough, It was a 2.5-hour drive to where Sparky was to drop me off. My goal was to make it 6 miles to a site with water before dark, but with all the driving I didn’t get my hopes up.

I sorted, chucked, and fretted over my horde from Dollar General in the small gravel lot. After leaving a sizeable pile of snacks (and some s’mores toaster pastries as a special treat) for Future Oats in the passenger seat, I finally felt confident nothing was forgotten. I placed my backpack in the rear of Sparky’s truck, slid my (brand-new, not broken) trekking poles and ultralight umbrella along the floor, clicked the seat back, and climbed in. My heart was racing, but in the best way possible: in elated anticipation.

Seeing the tiny ferns of the forest unfurl at the beginning of spring brings me a special kind of joy.

Sparky and I passed the time in pleasant conversation as I discreetly picked at my hangnails and scratched at the still-healing bald spot on my head. A week before leaving for trail, I passed out while walking Thru on the sidewalk in the city. I woke up vomiting and surrounded by paramedics, and was quickly rushed to the ER. But not before, in my concussed state, I gave unmistakably wrong directions to my roommate who serendipitously worked down the road.

Being the angel she is, she came to grab Thru and save her from the clutches of animal control. (When I asked if she could come in the ambulance with me, they unfortunately said no.) “I’m at the dog park,” I said, still dazed from the concussion. On her end, Grace said she heard an exasperated voice in the background call out, “You’re not at the dog park!”

Anyways, that’s how I ended up with 2 staples freshly removed from my scalp a week before hitting the trail.

My roommate just so happened to have this sticker in her bag at the hospital. Truly, it was fate (and it is now my sticker.)

As we passed through Heflin on the way to the trailhead, Sparky spotted a thru-hiker walking from the Dollar General to the burger place next door. We pulled into the parking lot as I rolled down the window and asked, “Are you hiking the Pinhoti?” He looked confused momentarily, but quickly put together that Sparky was shuttling me back to trail (I don’t blame him, I took a shower the night before so I wouldn’t have recognized me as a thru-hiker either.) Sparky leaned forward to look past me at the hiker. “Do you need a ride?” The hiker thought about this. “Maybe in an hour? I was about to grab dinner and need to get organized,” he said, gesturing to the bags of resupply in his hands. They quickly came to an agreement that after Sparky dropped me at the trailhead, the hiker would cover his meal in exchange for a ride. Winners all around!

He also maintains a number of water caches on trail. Go Sparky!

If you ask how much a ride is, Sparky will tell you his services are donation-based and to give within your means. The number of times you encounter this philosophy while hiking speaks to the widespread generosity of trail angels, and I’m grateful to be in a position to give generously at this point in life. Up until this point, the majority of my working career I spent making under $11 an hour. The first raise I ever earned was for a dish-washing job that I started at 15, from $7.25 to an illustrious $7.50, and I learned to count my spending in the hours I worked. That prom dress is 19 hours of work. That gas to top off the car is 2 hours of work. It has been only recently that I’ve had the privilege to change my mindset based on my income.

We missed the trailhead the first time we drove by. With the assistance of FarOut and a U-turn, we eventually found our way to the small gravel shoulder where the Pinhoti crossed the highway. I slung on my pack and immediately felt my stomach drop. I didn’t see my poles or umbrella. My started racing immediately. After a panic-filled 30 seconds of frantically scanning the backseat and envisioning the chore of having to find the perfect 2 sticks to pitch my tent night after night, I realized they rolled underneath the backseat. Best case scenario.

We arrived at the trailhead around 5 pm and I had about 6.5 miles to where I wanted to be for the night, which meant if I booked it I’d cruise in to camp around 7 pm, and if I took it easy it would probably be closer to 7:30 pm (trail math).

When I finally came upon the campsite I was aiming for, it was too late to watch the sun set and the sounds around me were already shifting from songbirds to spring peepers. After a very pleasant serving of graham crackers and vanilla icing (courtesy of my roommate who only needed half the container for her cupcakes) and a couple handfuls of my favorite trail mix, I slipped my compression socks on over my chapped feet and down booties over those to create the ultimate foot spa. I also made a point upon first arriving to hang in a ragdoll stretch for a few minutes in the cold water of the creek passing through the campsite.

I felt like a kid on Christmas morning. Just me out there, just days of hiking ahead, and the flexibility and control to choose my own adventure day-by-day… it was incredibly freeing. It also happened to be the first hike since starting to freelance that I didn’t have to post on social media daily for a client. That too was a special kind of freedom.

It felt like the trip had finally begun.

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