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| May
30, 1981 Saturday From Gonzo!s Appalachian
Trail journal Excellent sleep last night! No waking up with sore joints, rear end, or heals from resting on hard surfaces. My 3/8 inch thick Ensolite pad just does not give me the padding that I need in the shelters. Didn’t wake up at all until morning when Bruce’s watch alarm went off – must have been around 6 or 7, but I ignored the ring and then slept some more until about eight o’clock. Got up and ate Raisin Bran I bought many miles back at Suches (Most Raisin Bran comes in 20 oz boxes. Did I carry that weight all this time? No wonder I was having problems!). Started cleaning everything up and packing my pack. Chuck and I took the keys back to the office and checked out; then we went to the laundromat and washed a few clothes. Went into the grocery store and bought $30 worth of goods. A lot of the cost was tied up in materials for gorp: 1 lb M&M’s plain & 1 lb peanut, ½ lb Reese bits, big box of raisins, large can of cocktail peanuts. Other items included a few dinners, lunches, pudding desserts, and 12 snickers candy bars. Pack is definitely heavy now! (I guess so with at least 4 pounds tied up in gorp!) Back of my right ankle is very tender and sore today. I hope this day of not hiking will do it good. Chuck and I would like to take about 8 days thru the Smokies, but it appears that the maximum limit is seven. Maybe we can talk the ranger into giving us an extra day. We would like to take our time and enjoy this much celebrated wonderful park because we are under the impression that this is one of the most beautiful parts of the Appalachians and afterwards in later days we will be running into towns quite often, and will not feel as if we are in the wild. Therefore we want to enjoy the wilderness while we can. Taking
a lazy afternoon. Chuck is writing an article for a newspaper about
his experience on the AT. Bruce & Mike went to the shelter and
are going to go swimming. Wanted to mail a few things home to Mom
– especially two rolls of film, but we waited too long and
the PO closed at 12:00. Now I’ll have to carry them –
more weight! Since the PO was closed, I bought some stamps from
Chuck to send my five post cards. I had to get them sent so people
would know where to send things to me at the next post office. I
never asked for anything but letters, but hope for cookies or anything
else. A pint of butter pecan ice cream beckoned me to purchase it,
and I also bought a lighter to light my stove, then loaded up into
the Fontanabus and got taken close enough to walk to the TVA shelter
near the lake. Didn’t get our permits today. We might be out
of luck as far as getting spaces in the same shelters. Bruce, Chuck,
and I took a little skinny dip in Fontana lake behind the shelter.
We were standing around when a boat started coming close. We all
dove in real quick and had a good laugh. We joked about watching
out for the pecker fish! Nice swim. (I do not know where Pat was
while all this was happening, I am sure I would have remembered
her skinny dipping, and probably would not have done it if there
was a woman around at the time. I also notice that there have not
been any direct references in previous journal entries, other than
to say she was there, even though I know she was present and she
shows up in some of my photos. I remember her telling me that she
had been a Bunny at one of the Playboy clubs at one time. Perhaps
that, along with the fact that I had a girlfriend back home, and
that Bruce seemed to be hovering around her a good portion of the
time, kept my hormones in check. She was a very nice looking, well
endowed woman.)
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