Introduction

I've always wanted to keep a journal, and this is the perfect opportunity...recording my section-hikes on the Appalachian Trail from Springer Mountain, Georgia toward Mt. Katahdin, ME. I'm keeping this journal to record the adventure and help me remember the experience. There's also something therapeutic about writing, the act of putting your thoughts and feelings down on paper that is relaxing and soothing to the soul. I suspect that reading this account in the future will help get me past the times that I'm not actually out there.

Background

The Appalachian Trail. I've dreamed of hiking it for years, even dreamed of thru-hiking. Although I've been a member of the Appalachian Trail Conference since 1988, it was only a couple of years ago that I first set foot on the actual trail. My closest experience until then had been buying the NC/GA and NC/Tenn trail guides and maps and studying them.

Not that I have been a stranger to the outdoors. I grew up in western North Carolina near Morganton, about ten miles north of what is now South Mountains State Park. I've spent a lot of time in those Burke County mountains, hiking and camping long before they became a park. I've also done a lot of hiking over the years in the Linville Gorge and Wilson Creek areas north of Morganton. In the Summer of 1999 I hiked every trail in the Wilson Creek/Harper Creek/Lost Cove areas. So I've spent a fair amount of time outdoors, just nothing as long as what I'm now planning to do; section-hike the Appalachian Trail.

The first time I set foot on the Appalachian Trail happened almost by accident. We were looking for a place to go camping over Easter Break in 1998 in Joyce Kilmer National Forest near Robbinsville, NC. We stopped at Fontana Dam on the way home. It was my first visit to Fontana. Dams and big projects fascinate me. Always have. It must be the engineer in me. My family isn't as thrilled as I am because anytime we travel I detour us to see this dam or that bridge, etc. I do it now just to hear my girls groan. Anyway, we came back from Robbinsville and Lake Santeelah to Fontana Dam. It's an impressive facility. Nothing prepares you for the view you get when you are driving from down river up to the parking area at the bottom of the dam. You round the corner and when you first see the dam towering over you, it takes your breath away.

After driving a couple of more miles up the mountain, we stopped at the visitor's center at the top of the dam. I knew the AT crossed the Little Tennessee River at Fontana Dam, so we walked across the dam first to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park side of the lake and back. We then walked down to the AT shelter affectionately known at the "Fontana Hilton". I'd read several hikers' journals on the Internet that mentioned the "Hilton", so I felt like I had already been there, having experienced it several times already through the eyes of others. I knew then that I had to spend some time on the trail.

My brother and I hiked thirty miles of the Foothills Trail in upstate SC in late May 1998, with the idea that this would be a warm-up for future trips on the AT. My brother lives in Goldsboro in the eastern NC flatlands. He loves the mountains and comes home regularly to trout fish and camp. He really wanted to take a fishing/camping trip instead of a backpacking trip. Since there aren't any hills in Goldsboro to get in shape for, he wasn't ready for the challenge I had laid out. I wasn't either. We struggled to get up and down those hills on the Foothills Trail in unseasonably hot weather, but it was a great time. Somehow we made thirty miles in four days, and got in thirty minutes of fishing as well. Last time my brother's gone "fishing" with me.

In the fall of 1998 we cycled on the Virginia Creeper Trail near Damascus, VA, and began to learn about that area. The Appalachian Trail follows the main street through Damascus and the Creeper Trail intersects the AT in several places north of town on the way from Damascus to Whitetop Mountain. We followed the AT through town and found where it came down off of the mountain into the park beside the river.

Next came a short hike we took on the AT up Roan Mountain, NC, later that year. On the day after Christmas 1998, we set out from Carvers Gap on the NC/TN state line up Roan Mountain. The temperature at Carvers Gap was about 30 degrees with a 25 mile-per-hour wind. Cold! When we got up to Roan High Knob Shelter the thermometer read something like 25 degrees at 2 PM in the afternoon. An entry made by a hiker in the shelter journal that very morning recorded the temperature at daybreak as 19 degrees. Dedicated hikers still headed south toward Springer in late December. Dedicated or nuts one...We crossed over the top of Roan High Knob and met the wind head-on at the parking lot on top of the mountain. We didn't stay long, immediately heading down the paved road toward where we had parked and underneath the wind along the top of the ridge.

Next, I made a one-day trip to Trail Days in Damascus in May,1999. That weekend-long celebration draws folks from all over the Appalachian Trail as well as thousands of other outdoor enthusiasts. I enjoyed wandering around and seeing fellow hikers and thru-hikers living out their dreams.

There were hundreds of tents pitched by the river and all over town for that matter. I talked with some guys who were picking up maildrops and resupplying. There were arts and crafts and all kinds of food to eat.The whole affair had the feel of a big family reunion. I guess in a sense it was. I stopped beside the river on the way back to admire the view. I have to admit it was a picture postcard view.

Over the Fourth of July, 1999 we hiked up the AT for a few miles to Laurel Falls near Hampton, TN.

On Thanksgiving Friday, we drove to Clingmans Dome in the Great Smokies Mountains National Park. Usually the road to Clingmans Dome closes on December 1, so we just made it in time. This has to be one of the most visited spots in western NC, but it was my first visit. We walked up the pavement to the top of the mountain and climbed the ramp leading to the top of the observation tower. The sky was crystal clear and you could see for miles. The wind was light, cool, but far from cold. I took some pictures and then walked down the side trail to where the AT comes up from Mt. Buckley.

The day after Christmas 1999 found us at Carvers Gap/Roan Mountain again. Driving up from Bakersville, we noticed that the top of the mountain looked white. I thought it might just be ice on the trees, but it turned out to be about six inches of snow on the ground at Carvers Gap. The wind was blowing thirty-five miles an hour sustained, and gusting to fifty miles an hour on top. We hiked on the AT north up Round Bald. When we got on top, the full force of the wind made it tough to stand up. Unbelievably cold! We tried to continue on, but the snow was drifted up almost two feet in places so we retreated to the warmth of the car.

Little-by-little I was learning where the Appalachian Trail crosses in North Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia. And I was beginning to plan longer and more difficult trips.