Day 2

Hawk Mountain Shelter to Gooch Mountain Shelter. 7.6 miles today, 15.5 total.

Was a pretty cool day with lots of climbs and descents. Started off the day with oatmeal & instant carnation breakfast, and then had my typical lunch of peanut butter, a Bobo bar & a large snickers all periodically while walking. A decent day weather wise, though it started to rain once we got to camp @ 5:00 and rained most of the night.
Met a Ridgerunner trail name moxie that had thru hiked back in 2014. We chatted for 10 minutes on the way up Mt. Sassafras. These volunteer Ridgerunners do tremendous work on the trail and are great sources of info and generosity.
A mouse chewed a hole in the side of my tent at 2am trying to get (and succeeding) a Bobo bar, the only food item I didn’t put in the bear box with the rest of our items. Mice are damned good. Thank God it wasn’t a bear. A rookie mistake that has been rectified. 😳Read more