Tag: North Carolina

Riverbend Farm, Day 8

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For the next few posts I will be writing about two people with the same first name, Kevin. To avoid confusion I will refer to my Kevin (Kevin May) and the other Kevin (Kevin Shanahan or Julia’s Kevin). I may occasionally call them Kevin M and Kevin S.

Yesterday I made the trip to Raleigh/Durham airport to pick up my Kevin and fetch him back to the farm. He met the Shanahans last August when they visited Hayward, but their time with him was brief. I reintroduced him to the family and gave him a walking tour of the house, barns, property and our Haw River trails. It was gorgeous weather. We hadn’t been together for a while, except on the phone, so there was catching up to do. 

I have been helping Julia with the evening meals while here, so I enlisted my Kevin’s help in the kitchen. I think the hardest thing about mealtime is deciding what to make. Kevin has an idea for almost any kind of meat, so I was glad to hear what he would do with the several pounds of chicken breast in the fridge. We had a pretty decent dinner ready when Julie got home from work. Kevin S, his daughter Reagan and son Camden (aka Bubba), Gwennie, Julia, Keven M and I all sat down around the dining table and had dinner at the same time. I only mention this because it doesn’t happen a lot for various reasons. It was nice. 

My Kevin has been making inroads with Gwennie, big time. For some reason, unknown to any of us, she has decided to call him Mr. Jim. It’s okay—I had been wondering what she should call him. I really didn’t want her to think all grown men were called Kevins. He made the astute move of calling up “Itsy Bitsy Spider” on his phone. That was followed by “No More Monkeys Jumping on the Bed” and “Twinkle, Twinkle”. Her fascination with screens is very evident and her memory is great. She now asks Mr. Jim to play songs on his phone every time she sees him. 

My daughter Julia has always been great at making lists of stuff she wants done. Last Tuesday, on her day off, we rode around the farm in the mule. We made lists of everything that needed to be done. She says we need lists so that we’ll know what to do when we have a spare minute. After seeing the list I was pretty sure there wouldn’t be any spare minutes, ever. It’s a farm. Farms are where things go to break, deteriorate and sometimes die. Except for brush, weeds and thorns which seem to thrive remarkably well. 

My Kevin doesn’t like to be a freeloader. Today we looked at the list and chose a job to do which we didn’t think would be too difficult. I take that back. I have no idea why we chose that job. We decided to clear the weeds from around some piles of stacked black walnut lumber. 

This valuable lumber had been drying in the open for quite a while and needed to be protected. The plan was to re-stack it under a large semi trailer close by. Many of the slabs were two inches thick and very heavy. They were stacked on pallets that had rotted. High grass and evil thorny vines were all around them, but we conquered. We weed whacked, raked, and made a huge burn pile with all the bark and waste wood. We are tired but quite satisfied with our work. Welcome to North Carolina, Kevin M. 

Fortunately we put dinner in the crock pot before we went out to tackle lumber piles. Tonight we are having beef/ barley/vegetable stew and some good looking cheesy bread we picked up at Publix this morning. We will probably be having Ibuprofen for dessert. 

So, on to the weekend. The weather is still looking good and I’m hoping for a nice walk in a nearby park. 

Wood we saved. Some slabs were actually 3 inches and as long as the trailer was wide.
The burn pile.
I spent a lot of time under this trailer today. Shady and cool.

Riverbend Farm, Day 4

Shirleyjdietz1 Comment

This is the beginning of my fourth day, visiting in North Carolina. Everything is going pretty well.

Yesterday was exciting because I rode a horse again. There has been a period of time when I’ve stayed off horses. It ‘s because it seemed like the risk of injury was real and unnecessary. I felt the same way when I quit water skiing after nearly pulling my arms out of their sockets. But yesterday, I wanted to ride Andi. He is a beautiful gelding who used to be my horse and now lives with Julie on her farm. He’s been ridden much more regularly lately and there were four others going on this ride. It was on Riverbend property and all the horses are used to these trails. It felt safe. And it was fun. Andi is still quite energetic but he behaved well. It’s nice to not feel “too old” to do something I’ve always loved to do.

Where are my cowboy boots? I don’t know…

Some reflections on being two years old (not that I remember it personally):

Gwennie is 2, and in many ways I feel sorry for the stage she struggles with. It has to be hard. She is now so aware of herself as a separate person from her caregivers and parents. She has learned to say “no”, just for the feeling of power it embodies. But she’s still too inexperienced to know the good reasons for saying “yes” to many things. 

Today she always says “yes” to ice cream, fruit snacks, and watching Bluey on any available screen. Tomorrow it may be different. 

When she gives her attention to a person speaking to her, she looks at them seriously. You can see her focusing on what is being said. She is on task, learning what language is for. Because of that, her ability to speak has jumped tremendously since the last time I saw her. 

She has learned how to beg, saying “please” with just the right wheedling inflection. Inflection and body language are not lost on her. We don’t know when or from whom she learned to stomp her foot when she’s mad and saying no, but she’s got that down too. 

She has to be desperate before she asks for help with tasks she thinks she can do. She anticipates people stepping in to help. She often tells me “no Mimi, don’t help me” before I even think of helping her. I would describe her as “rough and tumble”, athletic and a risk taker. Last year when I visited, she would only spend a minute or two in the swing before being done. The motion seemed to make her dizzy and uncomfortable. Now, she climbs in the swing herself, buckles her own safety straps and wants a “big push”. There is always a lot of laughing and squealing for joy. 

How would you get yourself up into something at armpit level? She did it.

These first few days she has almost seemed resentful of me. She has not wanted me hold her. She says no to almost everything I ask her to do. She clearly prefers mommy, daddy, her siblings and Emma to me every time there’s a choice. That’s gradually changing, mostly because I don’t try to get her to do anything. I sit and watch Lassie with her. 

She runs most of the time.  She has more blue jeans than I do. She wears cowboy boots. Her “princess hat” is a brown, winter sherpa with ear flaps. But she has learned to sit still while daddy puts rubber bands in her messy, blonde hair.

She has learned to pretend. She takes daddy’s order for pizza, puts some in his hand, and takes his imaginary money. I know that’s not how I learned to pretend, but times have clearly changed. She plays alone in her bed, putting moose and frog down for a nap and covering them. She has her private places where she plays and sings to herself.

Watching all these things happening is fascinating and thought provoking. I am seeing how a child soaks up everything in their environment, for better or worse. I am seeing how important parenting is. 

Kevin and Julie are at their jobs already. Emma (super nanny) is playing with Gwennie. I think my task for today will be getting ready for Wednesday. A friend from Hayward is coming down to visit me and the family, and get a taste of North Carolina. My friend is a man, close to my age, and yes, we have been getting acquainted for the last nine months. I haven’t been writing about our experiences because I wasn’t ready to write. Maybe I am a little more ready now. More to come.

Back to RiverBend

Shirleyjdietz2 Comments

I finished the trip to North Carolina yesterday. The second half of the trip is always the prettiest, and challenging in a completely different way than going through the flat midwest. Coming down off high ground on I-64 is a little like a scary carnival ride. The traffic always seems to be almost bumper to bumper, around serpentine curves and at 60 – 70 miles per hour. Also, like the roller coasters, it’s expensive, with a $5 toll booth every few miles. Focusing that hard on driving gets me all tensed up, and I’m aware of all the beautiful views I’m missing.

The end of the second day of driving is the city of Greensboro itself, and I usually hit it at rush hour. That’s not relaxing either, unless you count the time sitting in a long line and measuring your progress in feet instead of miles. 

I was tired that night but it always takes me a couple of hours to position my things in new surroundings. I didn’t lie down to sleep until nearly midnight. My room is in the basement, and so is the room where the two outside dogs sleep. Penny, the loud lab who eats rocks, has been wearing a bark collar lately and it has been quite effective. But tonight the battery was weak and she started barking around 4 am. I have a soft heart toward anything that needs to pee and can’t, so I got up and let both dogs out. That required a trip outside in the fresh night air which left me wide awake and unable to fall asleep again. My fitbit said I got 3.5 hours of sleep. It said it was a fair night. I’m not sure I agree. 

I was glad that I arrived at River View Farm with a nearly full tank of gas. I’ll have to remember to do that whenever I come. I never know how quickly I’ll be doing some errand for the family, like early this morning.  I got to play taxi for Tessa, Julie’s elderly dog with a swollen back leg. Kevin loaded her up in my car and I drove her to south Greensboro to the emergency vet clinic. 

Tessa is used to sitting in the front passenger seat, but I thought that would be a little too distracting for me. I put her in the back with plenty of room instead. She didn’t like it. I could tell she was thinking of leaping over the seats to the front of the vehicle. Then she started barking, which always makes it seem like some next step is imminent. Looking back at Tessa, while looking forward at traffic, while watching my GPS for directions made the trip exciting. I guess I’m glad I can still do exciting. To her credit, she was much better on the way home.

What a nice, sunny day it was. In the afternoon, during Gwennie’s nap time, I decided to go outside for a walk, and maybe a drive to town. I went to the car to put my purse (with my key fob) in it while taking my walk, but remembered that shutting the door with the key inside causes the horn to alert. I didn’t want to wake the baby, so I decided to put my purse in Julie’s truck, which was parked beside my car. I opened the truck door and for some reason, which no one can figure out, the truck alarm started up. It honked for four or five minutes before I got inside, found the truck key and shut it off. Needless to say, the baby woke up.

I took my walk anyway. One change the last couple of visits is that I am no longer Gwennie’s main resource when I am here. Her regular nanny is still on the job, which leaves me free to help in other ways, or to actually rest. I still get to watch the cuteness but am not responsible for the “terrible two” times. Because I drove down this trip, I brought the small bike that I bought for her this summer when she visited me. She is very excited and possessive about her “Bluey Bike” and helmet. She hasn’t gotten the idea of how to pedal it yet, but wears the helmet and sits on the bike numerous times during the day. 

There you have it – some of the highlights of Day 1 at Riverbend Farm. 

Adventures at Julia’s Farm: The Haw

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There are quite a few things that fascinate me, among them are recreational fires (not forest fires!) and rivers. They don’t have to be big rivers either. As a child, I discovered a small creek at my grandparent’s farm and you would have thought I’d discovered a new ocean, even though it dried up completely in dry years. Just the thought of water coming from somewhere distant and flowing past me in seemingly endless supply was so alluring.

That is now one of the most exciting things about being in North Carolina, where there are rivers and creeks EVERYWHERE. You aren’t here long before you notice that most of their roads are named after churches or rivers and the mills and bridges connected to them. Indeed, Riverbend Farm where I am staying with my daughter’s family is on Brooks Bridge Road, and Brooks Bridge crosses the Haw River. The Haw borders the northeast boundary of Riverbend Farm and the riding trail that follows it is one of my favorite places to explore.

Pre-flood, the Haw has some whitewater stretches
The black line shows the river trail. Arrow 1 was our first try, arrow 2 ends at the junction of Shanahan Creek and the Haw where the lake was.

I get to look at about half a mile of this 110 mile river. It used to have quite a few dams blocking it, providing power for early industrialization of the area. One of the dams is along this half mile, just north of Brooks Bridge. There are projects planned to remove some of the dams and restore the river to a cleaner, more recreational use, but there is nothing like that happening on the stretch I see. I feel sorry for this part of the Haw, especially when there are heavy rains like we’ve had this winter. It is swift, muddy and choked with uprooted trees and debris.

The dam at Brooks Bridge

But it is still fascinating to see what a river does, when it is the recipient of a large watershed. “I should go down there and check it out”, I said to myself after our last two day deluge. I had heard reports of water high enough to cover the road, although I could hardly imagine it could happen.

Kevin, Julia’s husband, creates the riding trails through his property down to the river and through 30 acres of land that was clear cut a few years ago. The forest will grow back, but right now it’s treacherous with downed trees, undergrowth of berry bushes, holly and other thorny plants. I followed the trail down a steep hill to the path along the river. Did I mention that GwennieRu was with me in the buggy? Yes. And the hill was steep enough that I turned the buggy around and backed down it. I didn’t plan on having to go up that hill again. So much for plans.

We eventually came upon places where the river breached the trail. Even though the backwaters were not flowing, there was no telling how deep and muddy they were so I had to go back the way we had come.

We tried another trail accessing the river and at the bottom of that one there was a lake where there’s not usually a lake. A small creek drains much of Riverbend Farm and it enters the Haw at this junction. The banks are usually four or five feet above the creek but on this day there were no banks.

The trail down the hill
The muddy Haw at flood stage
Part of the flooded trail
Junction Shanahan Creek and Haw
Flood stage erosion

This ever changing nature of the river, along with the power of its moving water is both eerie and fascinating. Although not in danger ourselves, being close enough to hear the rapids, and see huge trees that have fallen in and been carried along – it’s breathtaking. I can’t get enough of looking and imagining.

Log jams like this are not uncommon and difficult to clean up.

I would love to see this part of the river cleaned up and made navigable but it is far too big of a project for an individual landowner to tackle. Fortunately, most of the time the river is much lower, the trails dry out and life along the river returns to normal. It’s a beautiful place to walk or ride horse, and I feel blessed to finally have an interesting river in my life.

But you will not catch me down there when it’s chigger season, no, no, no. Been there, done that. Just sayin’… (Click here for that story.)

Where Am I to Sleep?

Shirleyjdietz3 Comments

That was the question in my mind as I traveled south to be with my daughter’s family for a few weeks. And not just to sleep, but to lay out my suitcase, charge my computer, and all the other things that people do when they live someplace. I have stuff with me. Where am I going to put it?

River Bend Farm has a large farmhouse with four bedrooms. However, the rooms are occupied with Julia’s three stepchildren, and of course, Julia and husband Kevin. They don’t even have a designated spot for the baby when she comes.

My plan was to look for something portable, like a camper trailer, and to do it as soon as possible after arriving. During the first week, while I was borrowing one of the children’s rooms, I started looking on Facebook marketplace for used campers. Having never owned an RV of any kind I knew nothing.

I looked at little, cute and retro. But there wasn’t even room to set my suitcase. I looked at large and roomy but it was 16 years old and I wasn’t sure I could handle that much brown in my living space. I was saved from further deliberation when my son-in-law said a friend had a nice later model camper and was willing to sell it underpriced, as a personal favor. It had space for 10 people to sleep, which was a little frightening, but we went to see it. I now own it and have jumped on the learning curve of RV life.

Quibble

I have named it Quibble (model 295QBLE). It came none too soon. I got sick and needed a place to retreat and quarantine. It came home with Kevin and I the same day we went to see it. He parked it close to the barn where there was an electrical outlet. That’s when I learned that you have to be somewhat of an electrician (which I am not) to match your electricity with your camper. Even after watching a You Tube video on amps, volts and watts, the thought of having to figure out that equation for every one of my devices was too much. Kevin kindly drove to town and got adapters, so I could run the AC. That was enough for one night.

You also have to be somewhat of a plumber (sorry, also not) to feel peaceful about your faucets, toilets, water and pumps. Kevin and I finally got a small stream of water to run into the kitchen sink by hooking a hose up to a hole labeled “city water”, no city anywhere close. But who knew that I needed a drinking water hose, a water filter and a pressure regulator. Not me. My water pump, which shouldn’t have been turned on at all, was supposed to be whisper quiet. It started making enough noise that I could hear it even above the AC unit. I may have made it permanently very quiet. I have watched videos on water, gray water, and black water. Even I could figure out what those were.

One day I figured out the refrigerator. The next day I got a ladder and gave Quibble a good washing. Yesterday I drove back to meet the previous owner and got the title transferred and notarized. Today I tried to figure out insurance and registration. And in the days ahead I will learn about the stove and the propane tanks and the outdoor kitchen, and why the lights in the slide out don’t work. There are YouTube videos about all these things. I am discovering a whole new world of fun things to do.

But now I have my space. I almost feel guilty retreating to my air conditioned fiberglass box

Out by the barn, where I belong.

A New Thing to Do

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I think it is good to do something new, every once in a while, if you can find something. Finding something new to do is not always easy, but it really helps to  hang out with someone younger. Someone who does things that you didn’t know about.

Now this could be an introduction to several things, but what I’m actually referring to is geo-caching.

It’s an odd sport, but I saw it in action the last couple of days and I think it has a certain charm. For me, at least, it attracts me in the same way as doing jig saw puzzles, playing Microsoft solitaire challenges, or hunting down sea shells at the beach. It calls for a focus, a dedication to the hunt, and possible putting up with some inconvenience.

We were walking in the forest, on a treacherous unpaved path with tree roots and rocks grabbing at our shoes as we climbed steep embankments. Julia, as usual, was paying no attention to the path but was fixated on her phone. She said we were near a geo-cache and she was going into the woods to find it. She handed me the dog’s leash, and the dog and went off the path and disappeared into the brush. The wait was rather long. I was developing a story plot in my mind about a girl finding a cache (whatever that was) and falling into an alternate universe as she grabbed it, never to be seen again. A man and woman came by on the path and as I felt awkward standing there doing nothing, I explained what I was waiting for – a person who had gone looking for a metal box hidden out there somewhere.

I finally heard a shout, which sounded excited, and I attributed it to a successful find. But there was still a long wait before she was seen or heard returning. It is customary to open the box when it is found and leave a record on a small notebook, or leave an object as proof of your presence. As with much of today’s fun, an app on a mobile phone is responsible for announcing the nearness of a geo-cache and guiding the way to it, within a small margin of error.

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Yes, we are never free from our phones, even out in the forest it seems.

Today we went hiking again. Wanting to see how easily this sport could be called up, I asked if there were any geo-caches in the area and Julie turned on her app to find out. There were several, and they were not too far away. The hunt was on.

It took us 30 minutes to find the first one after we reached the area. We are in a forest downed trees, brambles, ravines and all sorts of natural obstacles strewn about. The forest floor is covered with leaves and debris. The clue given to us, as I remember it, was to look on the downhill side of the path for a fallen log, with some parallel sticks on its uphill side. We also had a picture of a little boy holding the box by the log. It’s a forest. There are fallen logs everywhere, parallel sticks are not scarce either. As I said, it took us 30 minutes. Julie found it. She was quite pleased because this improved her record, having now found more caches than the ones she had tried to find and missed.

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Find a log with some sticks by it. Sure, no problem.

A mile or so later we were following another clue – find the cache not more than 50 feet from the path, on a fence line between a pine and a hardwood. I saw the fence line first. That was my only contribution. Julie found this one too and our only disappointment was not finding a pen in the box so we could record our presence. We took a picture instead – at least we know we were there.

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One of Julie’s finds – the one by the log obviously.

We finished the hike discussing where we could hide our own geo-caches, and how we would carry pens with us next time – enough of them so we could leave one in the box if necessary. I would dearly love to get rid of some of the many pens I have accumulated and this would be a fun way to do it. My only problem is that my phone’s storage space is full of apps I don’t use and can’t get rid of (thank you Verizon) so I have no room for the geo-caching app. I may have to get a new phone, just sayin’…

The Wind

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Who has seen the wind? Neither you nor I. But when the trees bow down their heads, the wind is passing by.   Christina Rossetti

It is a noisy morning here – blowers, saws, vehicles coming and going – and out on the street emergency trucks are dealing with the downed electrical wires and traffic is down to one lane, taking turns going east and west.

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Emergency vehicles converge on a dark morning

Last night it started to rain. I was awake and heard it intensify, hitting the metal roof. The main gust of wind was frightening and I remember being thankful we were in a cement block structure. It was short and quieted down immediately after. The intermittent beep of the smoke alarm, like a low battery signal, was all I heard until my daughter got up and took it down. The electricity was off, but we went back to sleep without a clue to the chaos we would see at daylight.

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The beautiful farm where daughter Julia rents a small house, sustained heavy wind damage in that storm.  Our view of the main house, out her front door, was obscured by the giant oak that had fallen. Oh, the trees, it makes my heart sick – anyone who has read my blog knows how I feel about trees. Just last night we had the sad job of burying Rodgey the cat in a garden area next to several beautiful trees, on a mound with a swing attached to them. The garden is now invisible and covered with the limbs of those trees that were ripped off. A large cattle feeder from an adjoining field was deposited under what is left of one of them. Oddly, the swing is still there.20170505_095601

There are several areas of downed board fencing, a couple of them right on the road. A herd of mini horses that were kept in that field evidently left through the break and came back in again in a different place. They were racing around loose in the back of the barns when Julie found them.  Her own horses were safe and in place, but the shelter in their field was dismantled and distributed all over the pasture to the north. The fence was gone there too.

 

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The owner of the farm has come to survey the damage. She is a businesswoman who has a construction company of some kind and has already dispatched many of her workmen to the farm to clean up the damage. Indeed, there are already blowers and chippers running everywhere and loads of limbs being hauled off. “It will look better by the end of the day,” she told us. But it will look different than it did before the storm.

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As we look around outside, it is very obvious that we were spared loss of life, and even serious property damage. It’s a strange sort of day here.

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Dr. Julia taking Rocker and Fea to a safer paddock.

North Carolina Hiking

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Today was a good day. I accomplished two things. I tested out a new pair of hiking boots and I stretched myself physically to see if anything was going to break. So far, nothing has.

We are visiting our daughter in North Carolina. I have been looking forward to this visit for several reasons – one of them being the hiking terrain that’s available there. Today was Julia’s day off from work so we went looking for some mountains.

About an hour from Greensboro is Hanging Rock State Park and there are mountains there very similar to other places on the AT that I have hiked in the past.  The rock outcroppings at the tops of these wooded ridges are so dramatic. I couldn’t help but thinking of the violent seismic forces that must have pushed them up at such angles. And what a beautiful ride there! North Carolina is all leafed out and green, fields are planted, and rhododendron is blooming along the roadside as you get to higher elevations.  The sun was shining and there was just enough breeze to keep us cool.

The state park has no admission fee so we drove in, parked near the visitor center and got a trail map. The girl manning the information desk marked out a trail for us. I told her we were ambitious and wanted some up and down time, so she suggested an 11 mile route that visited five outstanding spots. We honestly had no idea how this was going to feel for us, and I was glad there were several optional places to quit our route and get back to the car.

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Photo op after peeling off first layer of jackets

We set off around 1 pm, Julie had Tess the dog with her, and I carried the backpack with water and snacks. We soon peeled off our first layer of jackets, mostly out of embarrassment as we passed people in shorts and tank tops, and partly because we started climbing and sweating right away. The main feature, Hanging Rock, was first on the list. We saw lots of people on this trail, all ages and hiking abilities. There were benches at convenient resting spots.  The trail is well maintained but it is rocky in places with uneven footing. It’s sometimes steep, but the view at the top is worth the climb. The rocky outcroppings allow one to see wide expanses of the valleys on both sides, east and west. Although there is ample room at the top for people to spread out and rest awhile on the rocks, there are no barriers anywhere and the vertical drops are scary. (What I’m saying is that if you had carried your young child up there, you would want to hold on to them. Every. Minute.)

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Tess was so good on this trip, but she was on leash up here, for sure.

We had a snack and then doubled back on the trail to the next outcropping, Wolf Rock. It and the next two, House Rock and Cook Wall, were reached along the next five or six miles along a ridge. Ridgewalking is somewhat of a relief because it has fewer steep climbs or descents. This trail is forested and shady except on the outcroppings. The path varies from soft forest floor to tangled root stair steps and ragged rock slabs and boulders. You spend a lot of time looking down for safe places for feet to land. There were fewer people to share the trail with us after Hanging Rock since the other features are visited less. However, they were all worth seeing.  We decided to head back without going to Moores Wall, the last on our route. Our feet were beginning to feel the rocks and over eight miles (five hours) of unaccustomed hiking were making my legs feel a little rubbery.  Besides, the dog was really tired.

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A gorgeous spot along one of the ridges

It is true that the descending path can be harder or as hard as the climb up – you feel the strain in other places though. The last mile was mostly level ground that followed a clear brook, spilling out of Magnolia Spring and emptying into a beautiful lake.  I saw there a sign for a trail I hadn’t heard about before, The MTS or Mountain to Sea, not that I need another trail to add to the list.

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Julia, with a milkshake on her mind. Can you tell?

Julia is a wizard at finding her favorite treats and evidently a milk shake had been on her mind for the last few miles of the hike. We found one of those at the Milk Bar in Walnut Cove. It was the perfect end to a great day of hiking.

 

 

Times and Travels: Hiking the AT cont.

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Four hikers set out in the rain. Bonding misery takes place.

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Esther, goofing around at a dry, warm lunch stop (just trying to keep mom alive).

 

Day 3

Did I mention that the temp dropped? 38 degrees F.! Most everyone has hats, gloves, sweaters and warm stuff on and I am thinking sadly of the clothing I decided to leave home. Jerry and Shelley, Gingerbear and Mercury , the newlyweds and others who shared the shelter with us, all got themselves fed and headed out. We draped our wet things on our packs and, wearing all our dry things, headed for Bly Gap. We reached it around lunch time and had just taken a few bites when it started to rain, again. We put our wet clothes back on in order to save our dry ones, and quickly got going for the next shelter.

The next four hours had three long climbs, in wind that nearly blew us over, and very little environmental shelter. It was easier to stay warm if I kept moving but when the only choice was to move up, I was hardly going fast enough to be considered in motion. Esther was ahead of me singing “the hills are alive with the sound of… blah, blah”.  I was thinking it was good the hills were alive, since I was almost dead.  But her singing kept me going. I think she was afraid I would sit down and succumb to hypothermia.

We got to Muskrat Creek Shelter about 4 pm. I played Elijah (from the Bible story) and made some wet wood burn – truly a miracle which amazed everyone.  Electing to go without mice this time, Esther set up the tent for us. We crawled into our sacks feeling almost too cold to sleep.

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She, whose fingers still worked, set up the tent with this wonderful attitude.

Day 4

Ice on the picnic table! I am so glad we slept in the tent last night. It was warmer and less drafty than the shelter, but that is still not saying it was warm. I slept in fetal position all night. My fingers were so cold I could hardly get the damp tent folded up and packed. Esther made breakfast. At least it was a clear and sunny morning.

On the trail by 9 am. By 10 am we were stopping to take off layers of clothes – how quickly things changed. Lunch at Deep Gap and we were finally warm! It was so beautiful there.

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Hiking long ridges is absolutely the BEST!

This was our longest day, hiking 12 miles, but it was mostly flat or downhill with only gradual climbs. Esther started to feel some twinges in her knee on the downhill stretches and we had to consider what we would do if it got worse for her.

We made Carter Gap at 6:30 and we had the shelter all to ourselves! Esther and I scouted out the nearby spring and, never one to forego cleanliness, Esther decided to wash her hair (not easy in a freezing mountain spring, coming out of a hole in the ground, brrr).

My legs and feet were sore and I felt generally awful. We had been warned that there were bear around with no fear of humans, and that a pack had been torn apart, so I hung a bear rope all by myself and prepared to string our food packs up. Esther set up the tent again. We ate supper and talked with Dave from Australia who wandered in. To sleep around 9 pm.

to be continued

Times and Travels: Hiking the AT

Shirleyjdietz6 Comments

I have tried for days now to find my journal of the first AT hike – I’m coming up with nothing, although I know I’ve seen it somewhere. But I have the record of the second hike from 2004.

Finding people to hike with can be a bit of a problem. Someone has to be able to get time off and really want to do this. That narrows down the prospective pool of hikers. I found three women online who were interested in planning with me and we corresponded for a couple months before our hike. One of them hurt her ankle right before the hike and couldn’t go. 

Day 1

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Our packs look a little overwhelming, but we need it all, probably.

A good start from my daughter’s house in Tampa. Just enough clouds to make easy driving. We met Lorraine for the first time in person. She was nice and talked easily so we got to know each other pretty well.  I forgot all my vitamins and pills at Esther’s so we stopped at a grocery store to replace it all (plus a cake server, don’t ask…). Other than that we only stopped once for breakfast in Gainesville, and once for gas in Tifton, getting into Franklin N.C. about 4:30 pm. Another of our hiking buddies, Elyse, and her husband were waiting at the motel. The last member, Kenton, came a few minutes later.

We decided to do the car drop at our end point, Wayah Gap. What a beautiful drive up in the mountains! We had a real dinner (maybe our last for a while) and then went back to the motel to go through our gear one final time. Our packs still look too heavy.

 

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Hopefully not our last meal, but perhaps our last GOOD meal for a while.

Day 2

I am up first and out to the lobby to journal. There are big storm clouds out there and 70% chance of rain. Are we being stupid?

I barely survived the ride to Dick’s Creek crammed in Elyse’s small Blazer (actually I was stuck to the ceiling). Dick’s Creek. Who is Dick? I want to know. We took parting pictures and got on the trail by 10 am.

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Kenton, Lorraine, Elyse, me and Esther. This is a hike, not a fashion show. 

We had only a few sprinkles for the first two hours, which was kind of cool and pleasant. Then it started to pour, which was nothing but cold and unpleasant. We put garbage bags over our packs and that worked fairly well. But our ponchos only kept part of our bodies dry. By the time we reached Plum Orchard Gap we were soaked head to foot, either with rain or sweat, it didn’t much matter which.

We crowded into a trail shelter with 10 other wet, smelly people at about 1 pm. This left a lot of afternoon and evening to sit and do… yes, what? Dry off? Hardly. The temperature started dropping so we huddled in our sleeping bags after supper and listened to mice for the next eight hours. May I never have to repeat a night like this. Saw my first “bear bag” cables.

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Esther in her deluxe upper shelf (where most of the mice were). This was before five other hikers joined her. My cold, wet finger on the lens, sorry.