Oceanic Wilderness

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed by email! Thanks for visiting! Did you think we’d get very far on the trail without finding something interesting in the plant world? This is some type of Lycopodium. We’ve seen several patches of it in some of the wetter areas. Very cool plants.

The Approach Trail to Springer Mtn is worth skipping and leaving for a nice day hike later on. Just my opinion. Or if you want to do it, get dropped off at the top of the falls at Amicalola. Skip the stairs. They suck.

Before I start a post, I need everyone to think/pray for my friend Connie. We went to college together and were roomates for a year before she graduated. She was pregnant with triplets. Just about the time that Ashleigh was born I found out she was having triplets and that it had been touch and go and she could deliver early like Asheligh was. I just read her blog post and she has lost all three of the babies, two born alive to later pass and another stillborn. All with names and teeny tiny weights. She has a nearly six year old son who was desperately wanting a brother (all…

Well, we have made the first 30 miles. I’ll be semi-brief. The Approach Trail kinda sucked. The last mile it started sleeting hard up to Springer. We stayed for about 15 minutes on the top where a ridge runner was taking a poll of hikers and he told us we could make it to Stover Creek about 2.5 miles downhill..WOO! The downhill was nice. We stayed there that night with a bunch of other hikers and a group of Scouts who were too prepared and carried too much weight. It snowed a little bit while making dinner. We headed out of Stover Creek the next morning and walked a nice…

So, here we are in Georgia. I didn’t think I’d post again but Chris grabbed the laptop at the last minute this morning so he could download more maps tonight. We’ll send it back with my dad tomorrow. We left Texas at 5am and I slept through East Texas and Louisiana. It was smooth sailing the majority of the way until my dad decided he needed a Starbucks fix in Tuscaloosa, Alabama and when we turned off onto the road we realized the entire Crimson Tide was leaving for Spring Break to Panama City. Then, that same Crimson Tide decided to have about five wrecks on I-20 backing us up…

Today is the last day at home. We’re both feeling better and have decided to keep our start date for Saturday, though it appears it’ll be dreary with some rain. We’re heading out tomorrow to drive to Georgia; my dad and uncle are driving us out. They will drop us off sometime on Saturday morning and we’ll make our way up the 8 mile Approach Trail to the start of the Appalachian Trail on top of Springer Mountain. I started dreaming about the trail the other night. Somehow it involved a sister species to the roseate spoonbill, a darker red bird that only lived in Maine and along a few…