Day 11

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4/8/13 by Vic

Well if I learned anything from lasts night sleep, it's that you don't set up your tent on a hill. At the time of finding a site and setting up my Big Agnes (2 person) tent I thought everything was level. Well after crawling into my tent for the night and my muscles relaxed, I slowly rolled to right side of my tent. Ohh boy. Well in efforts to still salvage a good nights sleep, I actually slept on the foot of my tent and used my sleeping pad as a barrier to stop rolling to the side of my tent. Ahh innovation of the tired and sleepy.

This morning we all roll out of our tents Round 7:30am and slowly cook breakfast and take down our site. With some great company of friends (of which we bonded with the night before) we continue the banter from which we ended and all part ways ( heading in the same direction, but at various intervals as we all take off at our own pace).

A this point in our journey I have learned that I am a fast hiker. It's something about the uphills that I just want to conquer. Once I feel these muscles start to burn, and beads of sweat roll down my face and dive off my brow, nose or chin, I get into my competitive mode. It's sort of like working out or when your on a treadmill. You know there is an end to your strenuous activity, so you just keep going till you reach your mark, or summit of the hill - just to do it all over again in another half mile. I have also realized that I use much of my arms when going up hill. Using my Leki poles, I dig them into the ground just behind me and to my side and push myself up the hill giving me quads a break from all the work. I find this to be very advantageous for me as my swimmers build gives me some of the upper body strength I need to flow steadily up the ascents.

Knowing all of this, I have now started hiking on my own and have been meeting up with the rest of the crew in the evening hours. This allows me to prepare the bag line, fire pit, clothes line and check out the nearby water (if any) all before they arrive.

During today's hike I started listening to my audio books from LibriVox. If you don't know what this is, it's a online site where you can download audio recordings of books that are in the public domain (mainly older books that have been out for over 20 years and several renditions of the book can be found). Anywho, I started listening to "The adventures of Tom Sawyer" by Mark Twain. I thought this would be appropriate due to my current occupation. Additionally I have deprived myself of childhood stories such as this due to my lack of interest in reading as a much younger youth (and even now). Well let me tell you, today's 11.7 mile hike went by so quickly ( 28 chapters later). Don't worry though I only keep one ear on plugged in while the other senses are still fully looking for the dangers within the AT.

I have come to realize there are all sorts of people on the trail and they come from all "walks" of life. You find this out in your "elevator" speech as you leap frog each other in the trail or perhaps over the evening camp fire. Of course there are some people you click with and others you would just rather hide in your tent instead of interacting with. This same thing could be said if you took a sample of people in your office building or grocery store. With that said you easily find commonalities with everyone. Mine is usually a connection to where they live (Michigan, Chicago, San Fran, and LA). However if there is not a connection there you can always fall back on... Hiking the the Appalachian Trail.

TOTALS
Pooped in the woods: 7
Wildlife: Squirrel, Birds, Catapiller, Black flies, Beatle, Ants, spiders
Miles Hiked: 90.7
Don't want to admit: It has taken me many tries to light a fire VS my 1 match it usually takes.
Lesson learned: It's great not be the first person on the trail in the morning. Let other people walk through the spider webs first.
Hiking Quote: God made dirt and dirt don't hurt.
Trail names I have came across: grey beard, just, pro tip, wild man, homeward bound, mammoth, squirrel, 22, machete
Food: Instant Mashes potatoes and SeaBear smoked salmon
Blisters: 0