Day 3

Aug 25 Tri-Corner Knob Shelter to Davenport Gap Shelter 15miles Weather: rain I woke up to the red glowing eyes of the peacock...just kidding, I haven't gone insane yet. Got up, made the oatmeal, packed the bag, looked like I was in for a wonderful morning. Wrong! As James and I leave the shelter, it begins to downpour. Thank you tropical storm. I don't care how waterproof your hiking boots claim to be, they don't stand up to tromping through the water like this. We start off with a steady uphill which turns into downhill for the rest of the day. By noon the rain lets up, but my boots are sloshing full of water. Continuing for the rest of the day, I was in the clouds, literally. The tops of several trees were hard to make out. There were few views in spite of hiking on top of a ridge all day. I did get a nice spectacle of the clouds rolling up and out over a valley. It looked as thought this big white ghost was climbing the mountains with us. On the way down my knees were ready to blow out at each boulder. As slow as uphill might be, at least it doesn't hurt like downhill. We finally hit Cosby Shelter for lunch at 1:30. James left to hike down to his ride at Cosby so he can make it to school tomorrow. Ha ha, sucker. I tried to dry my shoes out, but it's so muggy I had to make do. There didn't seem much point to wasting a fresh pair of socks on wet boots so I threw nastiness onto my feet and climbed near Mt. Camerer. If you want a view you're going to have to look back a few months, because all I saw was white. The last 6 miles seemed to take forever. Finally I made it to Davenport Gap Shelter. To my surprise, there's nobody here. I've never stayed in a shelter by myself, and this one is kinda spooky. After getting over a tummyache, I got some food and laid down to relax. It's raining again, but it can do that all it wants at night while I'm in here and dry. It too hot and muggy, but I suppose that is what I should expect at this low elevation. Tomorrow morning I'll be out of the Smoky Mountains and crossing north of I-40. I have a funny mental image of me trying to dodge interstate traffic with my pack on. I have spared you all a picture of the blistered feet for fear that google might ban my site for indecency. Thanks James for the great start to this journey. You're definitely welcome to join anytime. High: running into a big buck and a doe on top of the ridge Low: painful pruned feet