The food was still hanging right where we left it, so the bear hadn't paid us a visit in the night. We were feeling pretty cocky when we left Tray Mountain this morning at 7:45. We were a bit overconfident after doing so well yesterday. Had just over 10 miles to go to Dick's Creek Gap, so figured we'd blitz it by noon. Wrong! The day was clear and sunny, but was also much hotter and more humid than we've experienced so far. And so, as "Pride goeth before a fall", the trail and the weather saw fit to sufficiently humble us by the end of the day. The trail started off fine, and we cruised quickly down Tray to Sassafras Gap, passing the "Swag of the Blue Ridge."

I haven't the faintest idea what that means, but I remember the name from the last time we passed through here. I had to look it up 20 years ago, and I'll probably have to look it up again when we get home. If it's supposed to be something special, we didn't see it. Maybe you have to be a native to appreciate it.

The misery started as we started the climb up Kelly Knob. It caught us all by surprise, and was the knob that wouldn't end. We dragged our parched bodies down the Deep Gap and collapsed at the pipe spring near the shelter and called "LUNCH!" Probably consumed 3 quarts of water each to get the strength to go on.

The rest of the way we felt much better, but still stopped frequently for water breaks. It was only 3 miles to Dick's Creek Gap, and the knowledge that we would soon be at the Blueberry Patch spurred us on. At the gap, we quickly got a ride the 3.5 miles to Blueberry Patch, where we were warmly greeted by Gary Poteat, the owner, and given a tour of the place.

Gary and his wife Lennie have made their organic blueberry farm into a hiker's haven. They are a wonderful, gracious couple. Gary and their son Shane thru-hiked in 1991, so they know what the AT is about. Soon after that, moved here to Hiawassee, and started taking in hikers. They converted the garage into a bunkhouse, which is often filled to capacity. Today we are the only hikers here, so we have plenty of room to spread out. Gary built a bathhouse out back, with a view of their huge garden and the river beyond. I can picture the area dotted with tents during the spring thru-hiker rush. We settled in and got clean, then set out our laundry. Lennie is going to wash it for us while we go into town for dinner and supplies. Right now, I'm showered and rested, and relaxing in the warm sunshine down on the dock by their creek. All the misery earlier today is already becoming a distant memory.

Later, we hitched the 7 miles into Hiawassee and had dinner at the Georgia Mountain Restaurant. It's a good ol' boy, down home cookin' type of place. From there, we walked down to the IGA and picked up a few needed breakfast and lunch items, then on to the Post Office to mail envelopes of extras to Virginia and home. Quickly got a ride back from a local family in a pick-up. We're spending the rest of the evening relaxing in the peacefulness of their back yard. We're chatting with Gary and Lennie, writing in the journals, and generally enjoying the cool Southern evening.

With two days of cool sunny weather in a row, I was wandering when hot muggy southern heat would appear. Descending down on us like a smothering blanket, sapping whatever strength we possessed. Today's weather, while not beastly hot, still did a number on us, particularly on the climb up Kelly's Knob. I think a combination of heat, bad breakfast (dried cereal - more later) and not being psyched for the climb killed us. Kelly's Knob is not a steep or long climb and with a view it might even be considered decent. By the time I reached the top, after a couple of breaks, I was soaking wet from the top of my head to the bottom of my socks with sweat. I pumped out at least a quart of vital fluids on that climb. When we reached Deep Gap Shelter for lunch and water, I drank a quart before sitting down. At least another was consumed during my meal. With bodies rested and restored, we were able to make the three remaining miles to Dick's Creek Gap in short order.

Needless to say, one of the main stays of hikers is food. It fuels us, gets us motivated to hike beyond our means, especially if there is a good restaurant nearby. On this trip our plan was to make our suppers at home for the whole hike. Breakfast and lunches for the southern section were purchased and sent before leaving. The only food we needed to buy in the south was meat, cheese, bread and treats. In the northern section we'd buy most of our breakfasts and lunches along the trail.

You can pretty much expect that there will always be one food that you liked at home but sucks on the trail. Invariably you've bought a lot of it. Then every time you open your mail drop it will stare you in the face, a grim reminder of how much you hate it. With a little luck there's someone else that loves it and you can dump it on them. Most of the time it's left in hiker's boxes in hostels along the trail. In '77 our bane was instant mashed potatoes. This trip we started gagging on dry cereal after the second morning. Fortunately we planned for half the mornings for cold breakfast and the cook the other half. Oatmeal or Instant Grits is our favorite hot breakfast.

At home we'd grab a bowl of dry cereal for a snack. So we figured to jazz it up a bit and eat it as a good quick meal. Wrong! It goes down heavy, hard and takes a long time to kick in. As Brandon says, "It sucks the moisture right out of you." I don't know how many pounds of the stuff we've stashed in upcoming food boxes, but I'm sure it's way too much. We got another three pounds in our box today. We're leaving it for the next hapless hiker. We'll stick with hot breakfast and augment them with Pop Tarts.

Tonight we're staying at the Blue Berry Patch. It's run by a former thru-hiker and his wife, Gary and Lennie Poteat. Gary hiked the trail in '91 when his son graduated from high school. He opened this place a year later. They can be used a mail drop and have bunks, showers and a laundry service. Also notable is the pancake breakfast we're looking forward to tomorrow morning.

Since we got in early today, we had a leisurely afternoon preparing for our continued hike. With the usual cores done, Brandon went for a swim in the river that flows behind their enormous organic garden. Linda and I did some advance planning and worked on our journals. We are thinking of picking up the pace a bit. The trails been good so far and we'd like to take a day off at the NOC to do some river rafting. To do that and keep on schedule we need to make Rainbow Springs in three days instead of four.

This evening we hitched into Hiawassee this evening to get dinner and purchase our extra food. We ate dinner at Georgia Mountain Restaurant. It has a good selection of southern foods with lots of quantity at reasonable prices. Since our appetites haven't kicked in, we still couldn't eat it all.

Today we left about 7:30 and started hiking to Dick's Creek Gap. We climbed Kelly's Knob and just about died. We went down the other side to Deep Gap where we had lunch. We climbed and went down and up and down until we got to Dick's Creek Gap. We setup our packs (so people would know we're hiking) and held out our thumbs. (People are more likely to pick you up if your are hikers.) We were picked up in about five minutes by a couple out for a Friday drive. They took us to the Blueberry Patch where we got settled in to stay for the night. Later we decided we would want dinner so we hitchhiked into Hiawassee to get dinner and some extra supplies. We ate at a great place called Georgia Mountain Restaurant. I had the club sandwich. We hitchhiked back to the Blueberry Patch with a person who had carried some people there before. Overall we had a great day.