Day 17 . Yesterday was a pretty smooth day terrian wise. We only had a 12.7 to do. We had good company at shelter night before and we hiked most of day with "pudding" for the morning and then in the afternoon bandit caught up to us when we were on break. Hear is a little funny story . Kayla and I were hiking along and we heard a wolf howl right behind us. I mean right on us . I told Kayla to get behind me and I was getting ready to see a wolf pop out. I was looking down the trail where the howl came from and saw a hand waving to me haha it was bandit haha I couldn't get over how good his howl call was haha there is red wolfs in the smoky mountains.
We hiked with bandit rest of day and at some point we were on a high mountain ridge and we were actually in a cloud. Then I looked up and I saw a huge flash and then BOOMMMMM !!!! We all jumped and ducked real low. We had no idea what just happend. As were fast hiking away we put it together that it was lightning . A lightning bolt just hit right by us! It was prob 25 yards away ! We were pretty amped up after that so hiked it quick and got off ridge. Later that night after we got to camp we all took a lil cat nap. When we woke up pudding just got there and also a new guy named stephenwolf . He is a section hiker hiking the first 1000 miles and guess what ?! He is 70 years old ! Big props to him. He been on the trail for awhile and does a lil bit each day . I don't know if we will ever see him again but he was an interesting guy.
Today we had a 14.8 miles to do and a couple good up and downs. Kayla has been pretty tired lately so we have been going at a lil slower pace. We left the shelter at 8 and we said bye to pudding and stephenwolf in case we don't see them again. Bandit hiked with us again today and we talked all day about all kinds of things. We came across a crazy slamander today. It's our 3rd orange one but All have different features and spots. This one was about 7 inches long .
O another lil funny thing. Anyone ever have a puppy ? And you are potty training it and once it finally starts to get going potty outside it comes back to the house all happy and wagging it's tail ? And you say good girl and it's the happiest dog ever??? Wellllll that's what exactly Kayla does when she goes potty haha once she is all done she comes out of the woods with this big ol smile from ear to ear haha and she is walking with a pep in her step haha it's so funny haha
We are at last shelter in the smoky mountains . We are pretty much out of the smokies we have less then a mile . This shelter we are staying in has a real bad bear prob and has reports of bears coming in and stealing peoples packs and food bags. The front of the shelter has a chain linked fence to help this prob and tonight 2 park workers are camping here with us and going to see if bear shows up tonight . If it does show up they are going to shoot it with paintball gun and also shut the shelter down tomorrow if it shows tonight. They said there is prob 1500 black bears in smokie mountains. So yeah we are here tonight picking these guys brain about all kinds of animals and plants in parks . Cool stuff . Raining here now hoping this post . Talk to you guys later !!!
Great photos! Sounds like that lightning scared the hell out of everyone. Glad you're safe. Keep up the good work you two.
ReplyDeleteKeep the posts coming, you guys are doing a great job. I think pudding is an escaped criminal that is on the FBI's most wanted, I'll do more research on it.
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