Day 29

Today was a long, miserable day. They say, “don’t quit on a bad day.” Well I’m not quitting because today was a REALLY bad day. I woke up to rain and wind so heavy it was blowing around my vestibules and into the tent. I should have pitched my tent lower since I knew it was going to be windy. Just another lesson learned. I stayed in my tent until 9am then braved the rains and packed everything up wet. The good thing was it wasn’t super cold. My rain pants ripped at the seams but at least it protected the legs of pants. Actually, it protected more because I posted a picture of a nasty blowdown. Lots of trees crossing the path on top of each other. I could see where people had climbed up the hill to a place where you could get over the trunks so I did that. It was like trying to climb a playground slide that was covered in baby oil. Once I got over those trees, the ground slipped under me and I went down on my butt and slid all the way down to the trail hitting a tree on the other side. If it wasn’t for that tree, I’d probably still be sliding! Everything got covered in mud. Luckily, I still reached my goal of getting to the Spence Field Shelter. I passed two other shelters on the way here but I have a big day tomorrow so I had to make this goal. Luckily, most of the trek today was well graded. It was just the 30+ mile gusts that made it difficult. The rain should be over but we still have wind gust warnings all night. Since my tent is soaking wet and muddy, I made the decision to try staying in a shelter. We must have at least 8 people right now setting up in here. (No idea how many mice. They’ll make their appearance later, I’m sure. I have my earplugs ready so we’ll see how this goes. I hear my 12 mile hike tomorrow to Silers Bald Shelter is going to be extreme so hopefully I get a good sleep. Wish me luck. Oh, almost forgot! I finally saw wildlife. I mean, something beyond birds and squirrels. With the sound of the wind gusts, I didn’t hear the two white tail deer until they saw me and started running off. They were gone before I could get my camera out unfortunately. I also saw wild boar hair. Yesterday I took a picture of a tuft of black bear hair. Forgot to mention that too. Hopefully I get a peek of some more wildlife. Not just their hair.