3-1-12

Last night was crazy, rain, thunder,, lightning, all night, and wind. Don't forget the wind. Fell asleep around 5:00pm and awoke promptly at 8:20pm and could not fall asleep t'ill around 2:00am. Back up at 6:30 for sunrise to a surprislingly nice day. Made it to Gooch Gap shelter 13ish mile up the trail.Currently sitting here a little drunk thanks to some matus mark  provided by Aaron, we've decided on a 15 mile day tomorrow to push thru to bee's gap. which means more food. My knees are a little sore, but nothing terrible and  my feet are sore. I'm ciijubg nt 2nd dinner was ayiahi noodles(sp) now its rice and beans. Good group of 8 of us in the shelter tonight. Got here at 3:45 p.m. 

February 29, 2012

7am wake up at the hostelfor breakfast. Got to Amicalola and signed into the register as the 2012 seasons 101st prospective thru hiker. Started hiking at 9am and made it up the 620 stairs of Amicalola Falls by 9:30. Kept going until we decided it was snack time around 11am. Twisted my ankle going over a rock that my boot got caught on. It is now 4:30 pm and I am laying in my sleeping bag in the Stove Creek shelter. 11.8 from where we started this morning. 2 shelter mates tonight, Guy, from Maine, that I have been with all day and a firefighter that I cannot remember where he is from.

THANK YOU!!

Chappy, my first ever hitch hike, happened to be a sales rep for an outdoor company and not only did he give me a ride out of Gatlinburg, but he hooked me and my sunburnt ears up with this sweet hat! Trail magic at its finest. Thank you Chappy!!

Obviously not a city dweller

I got off my bus in Atlanta and attempted to figure out their subway system. It only set me back a little bit when I realized I was in the southbound terminal instead of the northbound. After I finally made it to the right place, this urban explorer excitedly boarded the first train to appear. Well with planning like that what could go wrong? Yep. Wrong train. Got off at the next stop and figured out the folly of my ways and calmly WAITED till the correct train came rolling in. All is well.

If I didn't have bad luck I wouldn't have any

Close to the start of the trail looks like my first week will be in the rain.

12 days!!

It's so hard to believe that after almost a year and a half of planning I'm leaving in 12 short days. My last day of work is on Monday!

All of my food for the first week is packed up, I just need to mail half of it to myself sometime next week.

I need to set up automatic billing for my car payments. As well as replacing a tire.

I've decided I'm going to bring my phone after all. Everything I read talks about how few payphones there are anymore. So I guess I'll be finding somewhere to charge it while I resupply.

From here on in its just minor details and waiting to leave. Can't wait to start! I hope I get good weather the first few days!

I'm also trying to publish this from an app on ny phone. So if it works I'll be able to update as well as sending my journal home to be posted.