April 16 Sunday
Miles today 4.5
Total miles 202.5
Mt Collins shelter to newfound gap
Today was easter sunday! We got some amazing on trail magic from a woman and her daughter at our shelter when they showed up with a basket full of candy and trail snacks for Easter Sunday. I got some chocolates, crackers and cookies :-). People's generosity and thoughtfulness for the hiker on this trail is really remarkable. Our group really wants to come back and do some magic in the future for hikers as well.
After the easter trail magic we had packed up and started our day with the 1/2 mile hike out of the shelter site. We were jubilant since we knew we were headed into town and had only about 4.5 miles that day. The weather was lovely and we were finding Easter egg jelly beans someone had left every so often on our hike. The terrain wasn't bad and we tried telling bible stories as best we could recall to acknowledge the day hah. We came upon some wild hog barriers today at beech forest. Apparently there are some rare or protected plants that they put a fence around with platforms so the wild hogs can't get in and ruin them; I took some photos.
We came to a first road crossing at Indian grave gap and thought of trying to make reservations at hot springs for the next weekend but didn't have service so we pressed on to newfound gap where Hannah, Dalen, their exchange student from Denmark Anders and their chuiauia dougie had planned to meet us and take us to town. It was so great to see a familiar face and catch up! Her dog made me miss ours lots but i was glad to get to see a familiar puppy. They asked us about the trail and we told them stories and were very grateful for the ride. We had lunch at the five guys in gatlinburg and it was absolutely delicious. Us hikers waited to eat the five guys until later that evening because we had gotten trail magic BBQ sandwiches, black bean/corn salad, grapes, snickers, candy and more from a gentleman providing trail magic at newfound gap! We were so happy and it was so delicious! There was another gentleman giving rides into town and back to the trail as his version of trail magic. Another excitement we had was seeing a CICI'S when we entered gatlinburg!! We had been talking about cici's and all you can eat pizza for days and days and days; then to have one as a surprise when we got into town was incredible! We are there after we checked into our hotel did some town chores. It was so awesome. Can't wait for more delicious food items, until then, happy trails!
Notes
Easter basket
First road crossing Indian grave gap
Wire fence at beech forest
Trail magic BBQ sandwiches at newfound
Hannah Dalen anders dougie pick up
Ride to town
Trail magic rides
No comments:
Post a Comment