Dates ........ Wednesday, September 19, 2001
Miles ........ 8.7 miles, climb 2300 feet
From ........ Cherry Gap Shelter
To ............. Clyde Smith Shelter
Weather ... Sunny, 50 degF, windy, quite cool early, 55 degF, windy, heavy clouds, haze, showers later, heavy rain and thunderstorms overnight.

Wednesday, September 19, 2001

Little Bald Knob (4459'), Bee stings near Clyde Smith Shelter, met first southbound thru-hiker.

It was a very cool, windy morning. Though there were no significant mountains in today's itinerary, there were a lot of steep uphill climbs and steep downhill descents; a roller coaster trail. I started out with my usual tee shirt and shorts, figuring that I'd work up plenty of body heat to keep me warm - as almost always was the case. But today, I had to put on an extra long-sleeved shirt to be comfortable. The steady wind coupled with my perspiration was causing evaporative cooling and giving me a chill.

At Iron Mountain Gap, I contemplated hitching in for a call home and food supplies. That was in my original hike plan. But seeing the very little amount of traffic using the highway and remembering my inability to get a hitch at Sam's gap, I decided against it. I wound up taking a break along the roadside before pushing on. I met up with the older couple from Uncle Johnny's hostel. They were celebrating their 45th wedding anniversary with a hike on the AT. They were hiking sections, leaving their motor home at a convenient point along the trail and getting a shuttle ride further along the trail, and camping on the trail when necessary and when weather permitted. They were a sweet couple and I was very happy for them. Their hiking method allowed them the luxury of picking the trail sections and weather they hiked in, something other long-distance hikers do not enjoy. At about the same time I met a couple of other southbound section hikers and their friendly dog. They warned me of nasty bees their dog had stirred up in a log along the blue blaze entrance trail to the Clyde Smith shelter.

I had entertained the possibility of hiking past the Clyde Smith Shelter and climbing Roan Mountain, staying in the shelter on its summit. That would have added 6.4 miles to the day, making a total hike of 15.1 miles. That would not have been bad, but I would have added another 2850 feet of steep climbing. That would not be fun - and, remember - I'm doing this for fun! Also, the weather was not looking good. As the day progressed, it got cloudier, windier and hazier. It felt like a storm was coming. Roan High Knob was almost 1500 feet higher than Mt. Moosilauke in New Hampshire. Last year, September 15, 2000, I learned a harsh lesson there - don't climb mountains during a storm. I arrived at the shelter early - 1:40 in the afternoon, but I was tired and not up to the additional climb. It would have been marginal as to whether or not I reached the summit and shelter before dark, plus it was likely in the clouds with poor visibility. I decided to stay at the Smith shelter and climb Roan Mt tomorrow - that way I would have all day.

I found the blue blazed side trail into the shelter and the log crossing the path - at the same time several bees found me. I got stung many times, the most painful being the stings on top of my head. I deposited my pack at the shelter and headed down the hill to get water. I wanted to be all set before it started raining.

On this hike more than any other I was extremely thankful that I had my little 2-ounce AM/FM radio. I got all the news updates I could stand on NPR and was now even finding some stations that returned to nearly normal programming and carried music. It helped pass the time when I arrived at a shelter early and did not want to move on.

Later in the afternoon, after I had stopped hiking, I heard distant thunder and it rained. Toward dusk, another hiker came into the shelter. It was Linguini, the first of the southbound thru-hikers. He was equipped with an ultru-ultru light homemade pack, about 15 pounds total, and was sporting a black trash bag for rainwear. His trail philosophy was to travel light, steady and fast. He wanted to do the whole trail in 100 days or less, meaning he had to average about 22 miles a day. A very light pack, not taking "zero" days, and not hanging around trail towns and hostels made that doable. (NB: in fact, he did it.) In this rugged terrain, with so many ups and downs, making the daily mileage was a challenge, he admitted. He usually hiked all day, during every hour of available daylight and sometimes beyond, hiking at night. He was enjoying his hike, even with the discomforts due to his minimal gear, and was using the time on the trail to evaluate his life plans, as so many long distance hikers do.

I thoroughly enjoyed his company and the conversations we had. He had spirit, resourcefulness and determination that I admired. He was an extreme minimalist, his gear being only marginally adequate to cope with emergencies, yet functional and allowing him to hike long daily distances and make steep climbs comfortably. (His empty pack weighed only a pound, had no hip belt, he had almost no extra change of clothes, no real raingear, just plastic trashbags, no extra footwear- just lightweight, wet trail runners, and only a bare shell of a sleeping bag. But he was doing fine!) I knew he would have problems if it turned any colder or if he got into an unexpected early winter storm - which I know only too well can happen in these mountains. I'll definitely think of him and his gear as the extreme lightweight end of the spectrum when I write my AT backpacking book.

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