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The following has been transcribed directly from the journal that I kept while hiking the Appalachian Trail (AT).
Tuesday, October 3rd, 2000
9:30 am 68º We stayed up until 10 minutes to midnight talking and waiting for the fire to go out. What a great night. It stayed right at 60º all night long and it was much warmer when we woke up. The deep valley that we were in protected us from the breezes we had experienced the 2 previous nights.
Origins of a Trail Name
After long and hard consideration, we finally find a name for Tim: The Pharmacist
Tim seemed to have a drug for every ailment you could possibly encounter. He had Alka-Seltzer for colds,
Tylenol for pain, Motrin for swelling, Excedrin for headaches...etc. He had everything a pharmacist so we decided that that would become his trail name. I think he likes it.
Tim restarted the fire and cooked up some oatmeal in it. Last night he constructed a cooking tripod and hung a pot from it and cooked his mac-n-cheese...worked out well.
As usual, we slowly packed up and moved out at 11:00am. We had about 3 miles to walk downhill to cross I-40 and get to Todd's truck. The downhill was steep and made for a bit of a rough time. Eventually we could hear cars on I-40 and twice we saw a Blackhawk helicopter pass overhead. We crossed onto a gravel road which lead us away from I-40 until it switched back across a small stream and then, to our shock, it began an uphill climb. Damn. Thought we were done climbing? Soon after, we arrive at the top of some rock steps that lead down to the I-40 off ramp. We descend the steps and get on the pavement and crossed under I-40, crossed over the Pigeon River on a bridge, and then walked down to the truck.
12:20pm At the Pigeon River. The river looked very inviting and we were all soon soaking our feet in it. Eventually I took all my clothes off and sat down in the river for a refreshing dip. Tim walked down stream and took his skinny dip under the bridge. Todd watched for cars and laughed. The water was cold, but it felt very nice. We stayed in the water for 30 minutes or so.
1:15pm We packed all our gear into the truck and took off for Susan and Daniel's house. We stopped at Subway along the way and then at the gas station for a 12 pack of beer. When we got to Susan and Daniel's house they were at work still, so we made ourselves comfortable in the backyard and drank our beer while laughing and reminiscing about the past few days.
Today’s total: 3 miles
Trip total: 34.3 miles
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