When we finally got to the trail itself, we all got excited, gathered around the sign for pictures and then headed straight up the trail.
The forest here is so different from Georgia! It is really thick and has a million plants that I have never seen before. When you feel the call of nature, ducking off the trail is quite an adventure! Fallen trees, vines, undergrowth
and moss as far as the eye can see! The cool thing is, though, there are really no snakes to worry about. I guess it is too cold up here for them to be happy. It
makes stepping over all of those half-rotten logs a little easier when you don’t
have to worry about a slithery friend lounging under it. We crossed about a zillion creeks today on log bridges, some of which the amazing trail volunteers have nailed hand rails of sorts to. I really appreciate it cause walking across a log makes me very nervous!
Later in the day we have our first ford. The river we are crossing has four different sections, the first of which has no bridge. As we prepare to cross, HBB give us a lecture on fording safely and the other three take off their boots. I prefer the stability of keeping mine on, however. I don’t mind wet
boots as long as I can feel secure crossing a river.
The water here is fascinating! This is glacial run-off, so the water is full of rock flour. It makes the streams and rivers look like weak chocolate milk, which is cool to look at, but a bit nerve racking in that you have no idea if the water is 2 inches deep, or twenty feet. Since the rocks surrounding the water are the exact same color, sometime you have to concentrate to actually see where the water starts and stops.
The crossing goes off without a hitch and only comes up mid-thigh deep. It is still a bit disconcerting since you can’t see anything below the surface at all! It is very cold, and quite fast, but the bottom is smooth and sandy, and I only squealed once when I almost lost my balance.
We scramble across piles of rocks and cross three more sections, all of which have bridges. The last one was wild because the water was so fast and turbulent that when you looked down it made you very dizzy Not a good feeling when you are on a log balanced over a torrent of chocolate milk!!
Where is Willy Wonka when you need him?
The rest of the hike was beautiful and peaceful with the only excitement coming at the very end. There is a famous suspension bridge here that is 207 feet long. It is narrow and very, very swingy and bouncy. They advise only one person on it at a time and I totally understand why. Unlike other suspension bridges I have been on, this one is not fun. By the time you get to the middle,
it not only bounces and sways, but pivots side to side, making it feel like you
are going to be pitched into the roiling, mad water below. Before I go on the bridge, there was a man there waiting for me to cross before him. As I reached the center, the movement got really intense and I thought to myself, “How RUDE!! That man did NOT wait til I was across!! The sign says ONE PERSON at a time and he decided to come anyway…..REALLY!!!!” As I stepped off, I turned around to give him a piece of my mind and realized that he was still patiently waiting at the other end. That is just exactly how wobbly that bridge was. Well, I was a bit ashamed of my thoughtless assumption, but in all honesty, I was so happy to be across that I didn’t give it a whole lot more thought. 🙂
Our campsite for the night was nice, and had a privy of sorts and a bear pole near by. ( which
incidentally would not have kept the bears out or food, cause it was too short!!) The privy was a simple seat with two walls forming a sort of ‘V’ around it. It faced out into the rich, green woods and while it didn’t offer much for privacy, it was by far the best view you could get while answering the call of mother nature.
After a dinner of instant mashed potatos and mini snicker bars, we all went to sleep listening to the water of the tributary and the wind in the trees. It was one of the best nights
sleep I have had in a long, long time.
Anna aka Mud Butt