Rolling Oak Forest & The Ridge (ECT Day 71)

• Hiked today: 19 miles

  • Pinhoti Trail (23.4 – 42.4)

• Total hiking: 1,553.9 miles
• Totally paddled: 99.5 miles

Weather: 40-77 ° F, sunny

Height: 740 – 1.522 foot

Pinhoti Outdoor Center to Bulls Gap

Yesterday, all people who lived in the Pinhoti Outdoor Center determined their shuttle driving times and their tax offices. Two different vehicles would leave this morning to get hikers on the way, and both started at 7:00 a.m. I might have hoped to hang on the hostel and relax a little longer, but I also enjoy starting early. In this way, my hike didn't feel as if I had to hurry to get the miles into it. So I was bright and early with Crow and Steve.

Crow made coffee and you know how much my mood ends. I gave myself my hot mug in this cozy deck chair for five minutes and chatted with the boys. Although this stay was short, I was fulfilled by the other hikers and the friendliness of Nathan and Kim. Big fan of the Pinhoti Outdoor Center!

I was tagged with Kim and Crow Gesttimg with an elevator because I was down the highway. In a few minutes I was back on the way where I stopped.

Back

Today there would be a lot more msicheres than yesterday. I loved it. To start it, I had about 2 mile country road before I entered the forest.

First the words “Chert” and “Chalcedony” appeared in my brain. These are far from people. I include that you understand the level of my amateurism. During the day I campaigned for it to be a kind of quartz, but after a little googling my best guess is actually Sylacauga Marble. Apparently this area is known for a huge marble deposit (even if I am wrong). The city that I had visited yesterday, Sylacauga, is even known as “The Marble City”. One of her resting sayings is that the marble that is used in the Lincoln Memorial comes from here (“Why Sylacauga Marble is known all over the world”)!

A few random interpretation signs along the way told me about White Oak (Quercus Alba) and Water Oak (Quercus Nigra). So that must be at least two of the species here. It seems more of a fairly diverse series of trees than the palm and pine monoculture.

At some point I stood on a comb with a view to the right and left at the bottom. It is actually nice that the leaves are not on the trees because I can still see. As soon as these leaves start, there are only small windows that I imagine. The ridge was great with a general rise and descent. My favorite. There were beautiful lichen -covered boulders and some information. In such a place I set up for lunch.

I got on a tree for lunch. Not even joking. I just sat there and sat on my cell phone and enjoyed the landscape with Ridge-Top, and I happened to be aware that the branches were high for climbing … low and many and evenly spread to grab and grasp access. Fear not, I was careful. And I hope I am not sitting as if I was too bragging about here, but I'm a damn good tree climber. As a child, I can remember to have put it in the branches and look down and like this strange change in perspective.

“I was a climber of trees before I became a climber of the mountains. Every time I looked up into high -towering branches, I thought about my roots. This moment was no different. Beginnings, oaths and cycles were continuously in my head during this hike. I was not sure how it would end, but I could estimate all the trips I had ever done that had delivered an anchor in me like the brown -red red of a venerable oak. An anchor who assured me that I would find my way back to myself – and to everything I was looking for in the rocks and the mud. ”

– Heather “Anish” Anderson in mud, rocks, blisters: let go of the Appalachian Trail

Today there were butterflies everywhere. Large bright yellow and black, large black and royal blue … whitish and black, small white with orange stains, smaller blacks that are most fluttering … and they don't just hang, it is as if they were on a mission. Maybe you migrate?

When I approached Bull Gap, the place I had picked up from the support team, I got a surprise …

MA and PA have immigrated to meet me! You did this on all my long hikes. Papa hiked with me on the PCT a few hundred miles. After I made it to Canada, the duo transported me together and some friends back on the way to Chester, CA so that we could end our skipped section. I think they went a short distance in this forest before turning around. It was on the CDT in the Glacier National Park, where they hiked with Snickers, cheers and me a few miles. I thankful for your support!

Back at the motorhome I felt sore. It was also the point at which I wondered whether it was a disease error. After some medication had taken, things seemed to make things easier. I think it's just my body that adapts to this change, in which the height is now a factor!

That night I pulled out my own surprise to show the team. I had received a jewel at the DG … The 4-part DVD combination of the Saga “The Karate Kid”. That's right, in the motorhome you have a DVD player, which is strange to me that the technology already feels old. We chose the original classic tonight and saw the young Daniel Larusso from a wine -y teenager to a Winey teenager who knew a serious karate 😉

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