We have some sunshine finally!! I love that my blog is just on run on sentence with occasional explanation points :) we are in the NOC right now leaving in a bit after resupllying. While in Franklin , NC we all learned a lot the main thing to slow down all of us were starting to feel the amount of miles we have been doing 16 mile days take a tole going up and down. Down is pretty harsh on the knees. I also learned that my pair or hiking boots I had purchased we cause acheleis tendentious on my left. I thought it was I bruise at first but it just kept swelling and not really noticing it, not good. When in Franklin we went to and outdoor store named outdoor 76 and the guys working there gave us the feet 101 they helped us all extremely and we all thank them more than we can explain. They fit me to a new pair of trail runners which were a size and a half bigger than shoes I had gotten for the past few years!! Crazy!! We took two zeros in franklin cause my acheleis needed to not be swollen ha. K2's foot and knee were also having issues as well as LT cookoo bird with some nasty blisters, he got new shoes too. Franklin was awesome too Rom Haven the owner of the budget and saphirre inn was awesome he took us where ever we needed to go, one of which was a Chinese buffet were I learned that my eating truely has grown seriously!! All of us had at least 5 plates :) just yesterday in NOC I ate a pound burger salad and dessert in like 5 minutes pretty funny some older thru hikers by us were just amazed at the amount I ate! Before we got here after taking two zeros in Franklin feeling healed up we decided to keep it slow and only hike 5 miles got to a beautiful shelter on a grassy hill and relaxed yet again had some great company with two older fellows named gman and noodles, love the daylights out of those two just positive beaming guys. Also this kid nibble we keep running into who also shares are silly sense of humor :) so we ha heard that thunderstorms were coming in that night and it would be yet again chilly. It got very chilly rain just turned to ice on everything getting to almost an inch thick all day the next day it rained LT cookoo said it'd be a goo idea to take another zero on account I hold cold it was, not to excited to sit again all day. It was in our bet interest, we realized it when a group of Boy Scouts came in and 3 were hypothermic! Two other thru hikers followed and stayed in with us ET (English tony) and frenchie there packs and hats were covered in ice and they were freezing! In the shelter we created stories from the names of previous hikers and it kept us quite entertained, all about Gerald renalodo the professor that studied river otters and went on a mission to the amazon with his companion gnat. They ran into a intense battle between the river otters and sea otters...see what happens when you have little to entertain yourself we rotated the story person to person and boy it got weird :) It was most defenitly the longest day I have had really missing a warm house and my smelly Ellie. It was good though to have a crappy day cause the next day when that sunshine came out it was truely heaven. We all thought we were going to get smushed, branches breaking and falling everywhere including the shelter, very scarey!!
The next day we hiked in the best weather we have had yet! And had the most amazing views continuously though the day! Also met a new part of our crew a kid named long gone who is one hell of a speedy walker! We all spent the night in a shelter right on the trail woke up and began the walk to NOC. The night there was sweet I got to play guitar and hula hoop which I missed strings so bad. I played and was joined by these lovely girl names hammy and flow who played cups :) that night was refreshing everyone was there taking a load off! Blue was there with his family and they bought us trail magic brews and boy we were grateful thank you blues mom!!! I met a young girl the age of 9 named pink panther hikin with her mom and dad, that is one lucky lady :) slept on grass that night for the first time in a while I slept great, minus this guy named noodles drunk ranting an raving(soo funny) he is a riot!
Now in robinsville really resupllying for the smokeys a week adventure! Well be goin through Fontana first and stay the night in the "Fontana Hilton" a really nice shelter with showers (I havnt showered in a week, I smell great) mile mark 151!!! Life is good!
