Monday April 18, 2011 -- More tough climbs to Rocky Top and Thunderhead



Looking down on Fontana Dam on day 2

 DAY 2

Monday, April 18, 2011

Starting Point:  Mollies Ridge Shelter

Destination:  Derrick Knob Shelter

Today’s Miles:  11.7

Total Miles:  22.7

Something has happened to Survivor Dave.  As chatty as he was last night, he’s quiet and moody this morning.  Yesterday he told us he was a thru hiker and this morning he announces that he is going home. 

Before we started this hike, we had studied the elevation changes and figured that the toughest day would be the first day, because of the climb from Fontana Dam.  But on Saturday at the hostel, Turtle Feet and others warned us that the second day would be just as difficult, if not harder.  Ridge Runner Carl told us the same thing.  Great.  I was already having a very difficult time with the inclines.  All these warnings are not helping my mood or motivation.

We had been told that the morning’s hike from our shelter to the Spence Field Shelter, where we would have lunch, would be a “cake walk”, but that the afternoon would include tough climbs over Rocky Top and Thunderhead Mountain.  Well, the morning is no cake walk for me.  I try to walk too fast instead of keeping a steady pace, and I quickly get short of breath.  I have to keep reminding myself to slow down. 

Since AK keeps a slower pace, I try to walk behind her.  But, she has a shorter stride and so I keep walking up onto her heels.  I can sense that she is getting annoyed with me but she doesn’t say anything.  However, later she draws a picture in a shelter register in which she depicts me right on her heels!  Oh, this is turning out to be a difficult hike!  Not exactly a walk in the park!

AK



Rocky Top



Earlier in the day I pass an elderly couple having a snack on the trail. They later join us at the shelter for the evening.  They are Tom and Brenda, retired professors from Auburn University.   This is their second thru-hike attempt.  Last year they had made it 900 miles when Tom got Lyme Disease.  If I were Tom and Brenda, I would have started where I had left off the previous year instead of starting all over again!   They walk very slowly, but manage to make it to the same shelter as us every night.

So far, the weather has been very good.  The Smokies can be changeable, with a lot of fog.  Spot, who is attempting his fourth thru-hike, says this is the first time he has actually seen the Smokies.  The views are amazing.  Here we are, walking along the top of mountains, looking over range after range of more mountain tops.  It reminds me of the John Denver song, the Eagle and the Hawk, and I sing it to myself as we walk:

I am the eagle, I live in high country
In rocky cathedrals that reach to the sky
I am the hawk and there’s blood on my feathers
But time is still turning they soon will be dry
And all of those who see me, all who believe in me
Share in the freedom I feel when I fly

Come dance with the west wind and touch on the mountain tops
Sail o’er the canyons and up to the stars
And reach for the heavens and hope for the future
And all that we can be and not what we are

Words and music by John Denver and Mike Taylor

Come dance with the west wind and touch on the mountain tops

AK and I take our time getting over Rocky Top and Thunderhead.  She and I are the last of our group to arrive at the shelter, at 7 p.m.  Janet and Jenni are already there, as are Mark Trail and Sweet Tea, Sir and Lady No Name, Spot, the professors and a couple of firefighters doing a section hike.

Derrick Knob shelter has no privy either.  Yuck.  On the other hand, we have fun company tonight.  We sit around the fire telling stories. 

We had been warned that the Park Rangers would give us a ticket if we did not sleep in the shelter.  But once again Janet and I decide to take our chances and sleep in our tents.  It is a windy night. Unfortunately for Janet, her tent pole breaks and so this is the last of tenting for her.   

Derrick Knob Shelter

A view from day 2 on the trail