2016 Spring AT Walkabout: 03/13/16

Hiked from Gooch Gap up and over Blood Hiked about a mile past Neal's Gap and the infamous shake down trading post located there.

Quite the hiking crowd at Neal's all in various states of pain, with foot ailments toping the list including mine. It had rained all last night and we rolled out this morning in pea soup fog. End result is everything is wet. Blood mountain is the toughest in GA. heck of a hike up to the top. However the worst part was still in store- it's the pounding the legs/feet take coming down the 2.4/mile steep decent with many boulder sections to Neal's hence all the carnage limping about. This is the 32miles in point. Most are on their 4th day here (average is 8 miles per day with many starting at 5 and building from there) So it's that point where gobs are going Holy Sh*#t, what did I sign up for. So you have people just hanging on here in their bunk house, lots shuttling into town for a zero day or two. And unfortunately many also bailing out.
They do pizza here which was tough to pass on but playing the Mountain man thing we got out of there just a couple hundred dollars lighter. Dan with new shoes(his old ones now in their shoe tree, socks, summer sausage, cheese, some sweet nut mucho granda thing and more in the end he dropped $250. I did break down and bought some "guaranteed not to blister socks" to go over my duck tapped feet. We both then got an autographed hat from the infamous shake down man Squirrel (he spells it Squaral). In lieu of people quitting they offer assistance to many who are begging to get rid of pots, extra cloths, big tents etc. Last yr. they UPS over 9500 pounds of gear back home. People who are willing to let go of all there favorite trinkets which result in 50+ lb packs are shaken down to 30 something pounds if Squaral has his way. A fun place with many stories to tell.
We pushed on out of there about 5:00 and hiked about a mile to top of another mountain where we are now watching a glorious sunset.

Funnies:
Dan is as happy as a clam this evening with all his new gear. When I noodled him regarding the cost, he reminded me that it was my credit card he used to buy it all! Oh yeah;(

Mr. Positive (Dan) seemed to be a bit extra stiff coming out of his rabbit hole tent last night with his eyes looking all puffy too. This has been a running story line for two years now as he try's to convince himself and me that the conventional way of sleeping on the rocks is better than hanging in the air. After the usual question of how he slept and his patented response of "Great, I'm ready to go" He shares with me while we hike out that his coveted Big Agnes blow up ground pad, (takes the wind out of him each night to blow up, and looks like a personal water raft when inflated) apparently went flat cause he was on the ground and had to try to get everything off it inside his tent and try to blow it up again. Said he must not have had the mouth valve sealed off.