Day 6: April 9, 2021
Low Gap to Unicoi Gap - 9 miles
My eyes opened and revealed a cold looking grey day through my rain fly. I stuck my hands in my sleeping bag and fumbled for my phone. On chilly nights, it’s a good idea to sleep with electronics so the cold doesn’t zap the battery life. I found my phone and saw it was 6:30. I groaned as I rolled over, my body protesting the movement.
I reached for my cold clothes and brought them into my sleeping bag to warm them up before putting them on. My knees objected to being bent and I felt every muscle and tendon stretch past a comfortable point as I rearranged my body to slip on my clothes. I layered up and stepped outside; it was beautiful. Dense mist stretched as far as I could see, making the trees in the distance look fuzzy.
The sounds of the morning seemed dampened by the fog, like how the world feels silent after a big snow. The heavy, quiet forest brought me a lot of peace. I decided to pack up my things and hit the trail as early as I could so I could enjoy it all to myself. I didn’t feel like talking to anyone in the morning; I just wanted to be. I took my time, slowly warming up my legs but stopping frequently to gawk at the beauty the mist created. Little patches of green looked even more vibrant in the haze. My eyes caught on a cluster of moss on a tree and small plants pushing out new growth, outlining the boundary of a well-worn trail.
The plan for the day was to meet at Unicoi Gap to catch a ride into Helen, GA. The weather forecast was looking like rain for the next day which made the decision to take a zero easy. A “zero” is a day where no miles are hiked on the trail, a rest day. The topo map showed about 8.5 miles of hiking steadily uphill, but the last mile would be a straight plummet into the Gap. It seemed like it would be an easy day since the downhills were what hurt my knees so bad. I hoped they would get a break; unfortunately, I was sorely mistaken.
My left knee hurt the worst; it was the one that always gave me the most trouble ever since a high school soccer injury. I had begun limping to alleviate my knee, but that meant my right side was taking the brunt of my weight which developed a new injury in my right foot. I clung desperately onto my trekking poles to keep me upright. Between the pain in my knees and the excruciating pounding in my right foot, I had a hard time walking. I felt like the bones in my foot were broken and with each step, the cracks got deeper and deeper. Since I hadn’t fallen, or done anything to cause this sudden crippling pain, I was certain I had caused a stress fracture from all the walking. I staggered like this for most of the day, fighting back tears.
A man named Dark Cloud saw me struggling. “You look like you’re having a hard time,” he told me.
“Yeah,” I said through my teeth, “I feel like my foot is broken; it hurts so much.”
“I’ve got a little bit of medical experience; do you want me to take a look at it?” he offered.
“You do? Yeah, that would be great.” I hobbled over to a log and sat down. I untied my shoe and slowly took it off for him.
“Well, it looks pretty swollen, but it’s not discolored.” He pushed on my foot lightly to assess where the pain was coming from. I braced myself for his touch on the bottom of my foot…but there was nothing. Then he moved his fingers around to the inside arch and pressed. Searing pain seeped into my bones at this, and I cried out in pain. “That’s where it hurts? I don’t think it’s broken; I think it’s plantar fasciitis,” he diagnosed. “You should try icing your foot in a stream for a while and see if that brings down the swelling.”
I thanked Dark Cloud and gingerly put my shoe on. I begrudgingly stood up, once again feeling the pain work its way deep into my bones. I found a stream up the trail a little bit and I stuck my foot in. It was a good thing I got an early start in the morning because as I iced my foot, my tramily passed me one by one. The frigid mountain water did help lower the swelling and I popped a handful of Advil hoping it would take care of the rest.
I caught up with Pickles, Cowboy, Stache, Freshly Baked, and Short Trek while they were filtering water. I checked the map to see how much further we had to hike but I lost my train of thought when I saw the mile marker we were at. 50…the map read mile 50! I told everyone and we all celebrated a little bit, proud of the accomplishment. I couldn’t believe I had walked that far!
I finished strong and made it all the way to Unicoi Gap with my tramily. We all hung out there for a little while planning how to get a ride to Helen. It wasn’t long before Stormy Weather and an older woman named Towanda had flagged down a car. The driver said there were two more seats left so Pickles and I hopped in.
Pickles checked us into our hotel room while I walked across the street to grab some beers. After my shower, I grabbed a beer from the minifridge and froze momentarily as I realized neither of us had a bottle opener. I looked around the room and felt a few different surfaces, but everything felt too soft, and I didn’t want to leave a mark opening it. I walked outside of our room and saw the metal railing, perfect. So, there I stood, wrapped in a towel, totally naked, popping a beer on the railing outside our room. Next door there were a few hikers I had seen around who cheered me on as I embraced my hiker trash nature!
Mike texted us later in the day and said they were at Big Daddy’s.
“Do you think he’s talking about his hotel room?” Pickles said with a laugh.
I put Big Daddy’s into my phone and saw it was a pub just down the street. We met the boys there for lunch and dined on a large burger and fries. I got full surprisingly quick though, so I let Fresh eat the rest of my burger. My stomach had started hurting a lot to my dismay, I really wanted to keep eating.
Sweet Water texted everyone and said they were going to a restaurant called Bodensee for dinner. We walked there and sat outside with everyone. The restaurant, like the entire town, was German themed so the boys were stoked about eating sausages and drinking beer. Our waitress took drink orders and while everyone got Mass beers, I stuck to iced tea since my stomach was hurting so much from lunch.
Our waitress was an older German woman with a very thick accent. Sweet Water was ordering our appetizers, and the waitress would reply to him and ask him a question, but he had no clue what she was saying, so he just said yes to everything.
“Can we have two orders of potato pancakes and two pretzels with cheese?” he asked.
“Uwan mustard?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Uwanplay?”
“…Yes,” he hesitated.
“Are ujus goitoo say yes?”
“Yes.”
She squinted at him, “uwan thesmotrou?” she asked.
“Um…yes” Sweet Water said nervously.
She made a note in her book, closed it, and walked away. She returned later with the food. First, she put down a stack of plates, then on one side of the table she put one potato pancake and one pretzel before doing the same to the other side. Then she walked up to Sweet Water, and with a big smile on her face she set a whole smoked trout in front of him. We thanked her and she walked away. Sweet Water looked at the fish in front of him and said, “who the fuck ordered this trout?”
“You did!”
“I did? When?”
“She asked if you wanted the smoke trout, and you said yes!”
“Is that what she said? I just heard uwanasmotrou,” he said mimicking her accent.
I took a few bites from the appetizers, but I didn’t eat much. The boys however, passed the food around the table like wild animals. Shoveling food into their mouths, practically snarling.
“Pass the trout here! I ordered the damn thing, and I haven’t eaten any of it!” Sweet Water yelled across the table. The trout made its way to him and tasted it hesitantly. “This is a good fucking trout,” he roared before diving in.
We were there for hours laughing, drinking, and eating. It is weird thinking back that I had known these people for six days at the time, but it felt like we had been friends for years.
Before leaving the restaurant, the waitress came out one more time and said she made a round of killepitsch shots for everyone. I was certain she said kill-a-bitch which made everyone laugh. Pickles and I took our shots with everyone else before walking back to the hotel to call it a night.
Next time on Packing It In: I share how my first zero in town went but I’ll also include day 8 when I’m back on the trail.