As you become more familiar with the lore of the Appalachian Trail, you begin to understand some of the things that folks talk about out here. One of those things is what is known as "trail magic". Trail Magic includes any random acts of kindness, usually involving food and drink, produced by people who are not hiking the trail (the civilized folks). These individuals are known as "trail angels". Our first official experience with trail magic occurred two days after we left Hot Springs.
Upon leaving Hot Springs, Megan and I noticed a type written sign posted to a tree near one of the road crossings. The sign read: "TRAIL ANGELS will be at Sam's Gap on May 1st serving hot dogs, hamburgers, soda from 11:00am - 4:00 pm." We looked at each other, checked our watches for the date, and decided right then and there, we were going to do everything within our power to propel us to Sam's Gap by May 1st. The only problem was that the date was April 29th and we had about 42 miles between that sign and Sam's Gap to cover in 2 1/2 days. To make a long story short, we experienced decent weather (even though the forecast had called for thunderstorms each day), made good time, and covered the distance needed to walk into Sam's Gap by 1:00pm on May 1st for the delicious food. Best tasting hamburger I've ever had. Fresh lettuce, onions, tomatoes. Chips, cookies, Crispy Creme Donuts, soda. The food was never ending. The trail angels were a group of men (50s-70s) who were involved in an Appalachian Trail Club where they do trail magic, such as this, up and down the trail throughout the thru-hiker season. They were headed to New Hampshire in July! I was amazed!
As Megan and I sat on the roadside at Sam's Gap stuffing our faces with the gifts of food and drink, we formulated a plan for the next couple of days that sounded heavenly. We had been dying to try this thing called "slack packing". Slack Packing is where we get to a town, leave our packs at a hostel or hotel, get shuttled to the trail head, and hike as many miles as we can with only a day pack (day pack = 5 lbs, regular pack = 30 lbs: big difference). Then, at the end of the day you catch a shuttle back to the hostel/hotel and get to sleep in a nice warm bed, have a shower, and eat real food. Therefore, we get the best of both worlds. We still do the mileage, without our heavy packs of course, but we also get to sleep in comfort at the end of the day. Brilliant, eh? Needless to say, yesterday was awesome, we hiked 24 miles from Sam's Gap to Erwin, T.N. without our heavy packs, and still made it in time for dinner and a shower. Life is looking up!
Next Trail Town: Damascus, V.A.
ETA = May 13th
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3 comments:
Leslie,
It is Jaime Swango here...keeping up with your hike. I don't know if you check these comments but I had a question about the slack packing. When you leave your items and hike, then get shuttled back to the items, do you get shuttled back to where you hiked so that you don't have to walk it twice. So glad I saw the story on Rochsent.com so that I could follow this. We will miss you at the reunion, that is if you are not there. It is July 8th at the Elks, in case you don't know. Hope you get this and can answer that, if not...that's ok. Jaime
You are absolutely right. We will be shuttled to the part of the trail that we haven't yet hiked. So basically we are increasing our mileage north, without carrying our full packs. Kind of a fun way to break up the daily grind. The only thing about slack packing is that you end up spending two or three nights in a town, which costs money of course. But that is a trade-off I suppose.
FYI...Krispy Kreme is spelled w/k's. :) It's sacrilegious to misspell the name of those delicious doughnuts.....glad y'all are still healthy and happy out there....keep avoiding urgent care!! :) Be well....be safe.
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