Day 21 - Mar 13

Last night we experienced our first thunderstorm on the trail. For most of the early part of the night, we heard distant thunder. Around 1 or 2 am, the sky broke loose. Bright flashes of lighting illuminated the night time sky while loud crashes of thunder could be felt from inside our bags.... and it rained as well. 

We woke up at 650, packed up our belongings inside our tent and put on our rain gear. Then we had the lovely joy of stepping out from our dry tent into the rain. I really dont mind getting wet... it just hurts your morale just slightly when you have to do it so early in the morning. 

By 8 we were on our way on the trail, eating pop tarts as we went. The fog and rain clouds created quite the dark atmosphere for the morning. Coupled with thick rhododendrons, it almost felt as we were hiking at night. 

All things considered, we still made faily good time. By 1045 we had gone 7 miles. We are also officially in cherokee national forest. Cherokee has excellent trail maintenance. I forget if I touched on this awhile back, but the trails in the nanthahalla section of NC were not the best. There were several blow downs every day that we had to go around or go off trail to get around. Likewise, the trail was not marked great, sometimes we would go 1 mile without seeing a blaze. I could go on for a bit or get more in depth but it is what it is. I'm also sure they are doing their best to keep the trail clean and when we went through their they were just hard pressed or short staffed due to the time of the year. Either way, Cherokee has exceptional trails and is very well marked. 

The rain cleared by 1030 this morning and this afternoon was actually nice. There were periodically patches of blue sky and we even got the chance to dry off our gear. 

The most memorable mountain we crossed over today was big butt. Yes, you read that right, North Carolina has a mountain called big butt. Big butt as a mountain isnt anything impressive, but what big butt does have is a large rock that is cracked down the middle. This rock, if why big butt mountain is called big butt. 

Another memorable moment of the day was crossing the 300 mile mark.... feels good. 

We hiked 20 miles today, from the paint creek trail junction to flint gap. We will probably hike another 20 miles tomorrow as well but we will figure that out tomorrow. For now, it's time to get some sleep. 

Goodnight, 

Tyler M.