Well, I sent Tim away this week to go hike the Appalachian Trail for a week with the hope that maybe he’ll experience shakabuku (or maybe just the swift kick part…heh heh ::grin:: Geez- who doesn’t like that movie??!). He’s continuing towards his ultimate goal of hiking the whole trail from beginning to end. He obviously doesn’t have the time or money to thru-hike the entire trail (that takes 3-4 months) but he’s going to do it in chunks over a period time when he gets the chance.
He drove up to Mom & Dad’s on Sunday. There was hardly any traffic out that day so he made pretty good time up there (about 7 hours) and had no problem finding their place. Dad was still in Kansas visiting family, so Tim took Mom out for Mother’s Day dinner at the local chinese restaurant and they had a nice time.
The next morning, Mom dropped Tim off at Woody Gap where he, Bob, & Nathaniel left off in late December. She emailed me as soon as she got home and I got this message at work:
We left here about 7:05 a.m. and got up to the Woody Gap about 8:15. It was so windy up there that I had to hold the back door, so he could get his backpack out. He put on his hat and got another coat out and put on. It rained a little here this morning and the wind is still blowing. I told him he was lucky the backpack weighed quite a bit – that way he wouldn’t fly off the mountain. He will be TRYING to walk into it. Bet he will be one tried puppy tonight. Said he went thru his backpack 5 times last night to make sure he had everything and didn’t go to bed until 11:00 – up at 6:00 a.m. Your dad called at 5:00 a.m, he was 30 miles from Kansas City. Told him he probably woke Tim up. yak later. Love, mom
Later Monday evening, I got a very quick call (trying to save the phone battery) from Tim letting me know that he made it to the top of Blood Mountain. He got up there around 1pm and said that he could have kept going but it was just so beautiful up there, he decided to set up camp near the shelter and chill out. He said the shelter was in pretty bad shape but it didn’t matter because he was using his tent that night (despite the wind). He didn’t run into anyone all day.
I can’t wait to hear how his bear bag worked out. He practiced on the trees out back Saturday night working on the knots, etc. I’ll try to keep an update here as I hear how things are going up there.
BTW- The following picture is NOT from Tim. It’s just a picture of the Blood Mountain shelter I found online. Tim brought his camera with him so we’ll be sure to post HIS pictures when he gets home. :)
