Dr. Walk-a-lot

Long time no post... Let's go back a couple weeks, we left Gatlinburg on a Thursday and hitched bk up to the trail head. Trail conditions were still pretty terrible with 4ft. snow drifts and a blistering wind. Three days later we came out of the smokies, and stayed at Standing Bear Hostel lol quite an experience. After a few more good hiking days I finally made it to hot springs NC. Easter also known as black Sunday to gyro and I was most definitely one I will not forget. Long story short I crossed Max patch at 12:30 am in a blowing rain...temperature below freezing and about 8ft of visibility. Needless to say it was an adrenaline rush.

Hot springs was fun, my sister came to see me which was nice. After a couple days in hot springs it was time to head back on trail towards Erwin TN. Weather has been amazing finally...and I finally have my trail legs. Miles had been rolling off like nothing then the plague hit us. A stomach virus has taken over the trail, basically 12 hrs. of  vomiting and diarrhea yay. Shaggy and I pulled an 18 mile day to Sam's gap to avoid the shelter that was riddled with sick hikers. After making a fire and having dinner we went to our tents for the night thinking we had escaped the sickness for another day, boy were we wrong...about 10pm it hit hard ugh. I am now in Erwin recovering...tomorrow we are going back to Sam's Gap to finish the 25 miles we had to skip, it is gonna be our biggest day tomorrow 25 in one day but we can do it.

Time is of the essence now...between the 10 year record for bad weather and the plague I'm way behind schedule. My new goal is to be around 700 miles by May, that should get me a lot closer to my schedule.

thanks for reading...
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Carpenter