Sunday, October 16, 2016

Day 27: Hiawassee, GA. 2119.6 miles from Katahdin, 69.6 miles from Springer Mt.

To exemplify the ironic laziness of long-distance hikers, we rented a golf cart to do our laundry at our last stop, rather than walk a half mile round trip to the laundromat. The next day, we got up, scarfed down pancakes, and walked almost 18 miles on the trail. 
We were cruisin' towards Georgia and just had one more resupply, which we had already shipped to the Nantahala Outdoor Center, a white water kayaking and rafting destination right on the AT.
I had a great cheat planned that would cut out 15 miles of trail where the AT took a ridiculous bend, and another trail went straight across and connected. I was so pleased that my map (which Forrest does not think we need) was helping me outsmart the trail. Then I got a stomach bug. So, I walked to the nearest road and hitchhiked to town to rest. It is much less satisfying to outright skip days of trail due to being confined to a Holiday Inn Express than to sneakily skip parts on forest service roads.
Forrest marched on into Georgia without me-- I rode across the state line with a nice church lady whose good deed of the week was "rescuing" a pregnant lady from hitchhiking. Being in Georgia has already revealed two interesting facts: 1)chewing tobacco can be purchased by the half-gallon; and 2) my husband thinks that "Gone with the Wind" is an airplane movie.
We are shooting to make Springer Mountain before the week is out... We just have to keep our tobacco weight under control.

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