Day 3

Origin: Gooch Mountain Shelter
Destination: Neel Gap
Today's miles: 15.9*
Total miles: 32.7

Another night of little sleep. Although we stayed dry in the shelter, it was a full house and there was a smorgasbord of weird noises all night long. A couple's dog sleeping next to me was snoring, there were gunshots in the distance, and a guy was vomiting every two hours. At least we didn't have a big hiking day planned for today.

Oh wait, we did. There's a 5 mile stretch where you can't camp without a bear canister due to smart bears who have figured out how to take down bear bags. Since we didn't bother getting one just for this short distance, we'd either have to camp before it, which I thought was too short of a day, or hike through it and stay at a hiker's hostel just past the bear area in Neel Gap, which is nearly a 16 mile day. It wasn't optimal to have that big of a day this early before we get our hiker's legs, but we decided to do it anyway.

Magge and I hiked together for the first six miles. We passed some "trail magic" (nice things done by strangers for hikers) and got some fresh fruit, perhaps the most prized commodity on the trail. Fruit weighs too much given its calorie content to carry, so we cherish it when we can get it. We stopped for lunch on a rocky clearing with the best view we've had so far, and then decided that I'd press ahead of Magge to make sure I'd get to the hiker's hostel before it closed at 6pm. If we missed it, the next site was another one mile farther on the trail, which we didn't want to do. Besides, the hostel also would have hot showers available.

I maintained a quick pace, making it up Blood Mountain, where there some great views and a stone shelter built in 1934 (which I'm guessing almost no one uses because almost no one has a bear canister). It was a steep decent from there and I made it to Neel Gap at 5. I reserved two bunks, bought some food and waited for Magge. By 7pm, the sun ducked behind Blood Mountain and I started to get worried. Then a man told me he had been hiking behind Magge before passing her and he had already been in Neel Gap for 20 minutes. I decided to head back up the trail to find her. After a mile, I found her steadily pushing ahead. I took her bag and we made our way back to the hostel, where grilled pork chops were waiting for us.

About that hot shower - I was in there for 30 seconds when the power was shut off and the hostel keeper inexplicably decided to pad lock me in. He eventually let me out, but I'm still confused.

Because today was so tough, we'll do a short day tomorrow. We'll probably need to pull back from our planned pace for now.

* I pulled about 17.9 including my backtrack to get Magge