Day 13

Weather:
It rained all day again (and all night).

Today's Hike:
Big Spring Shelter to US 64 - 9.1 miles

I slept OK last night. Lefty didn't snore to bad and the local residents were fairly calm. I woke up with Cindi practically on top of me, and I was confused thinking that I had moved into her space during the night. Apparently, the roof started leaking at about 3am and Cindi was awakened by a stream of water hitting her face, so she moved over to stay dry.

The local residents left us both presents; both my shoes were filled with acorns this morning & Cindi found some acorns in her pack. Thanks for the gifts, but we don't want to carry the extra weight :)

The rain was still pounding down this morning, so we decided to take our time getting out of the shelter and onto the trail. After discussing our options we decided to try and make it to Siler Bald Shelter 12.8 miles away, and bypass the stop over in Franklin, NC. By the time we reached Rock Gap Shelter 5.3 miles from our starting point our packs were soaked, water was seeping through both our rain jackets, and some of our stuff in our packs was getting wet. We still were going to press on. Two hours after leaving Rock Gap Shelter we reached US 64 which leads to Franklin. As we started to cross the highway an AT shuttle pulled up. We were the only hikers there - cold and wet. So we decided that it was fait and we headed into town to get dry.

We are staying at the Sapphire Inn, one of the many places run by Ron Haven and he's taking good care of us. I have showered and eaten almost an entire cheese pizza. My wet stuff is hanging around the room to dry; it looks like a bomb went off in here. Tomorrow we'll be doing laundry and I may be buying a new rain jacket.