Apparently in normal “civilian” life I’ve taken for granted a hot breakfast. It is absolutely magical to wake up, walk down to a diner, and eat delicious hot food to start your day. We’ve gotten to eat at this diner 2 mornings in a row now. Yesterday, I ordered an egg and cheese biscuit, a sweet potato pancake, grits, and orange juice. Today I wanted to eat light, so I chose oatmeal and toast plus another sweet potato pancake. After the waitress left a friend (GQ) asked, “Aren’t you eating oatmeal on the trail?” Even the waitress who served it to me came up and said in disbelief, “Oatmeal??!!” Both times I explained that instead of oatmeal we eat a protein bar and maybe another breakfast bar. We don’t want to deal with the time and mess that a hot breakfast requires. We’ve done it before and have long ago removed it from our morning backpacking routine.
Each person at our table had 2-3 plates worth of food. It was ridiculous. We asked the waitress to take a photo of us all and she happily obliged. After stuffing our faces, we had to go back to the cabin and pack up. It was almost 11a, time for checkout.
Then we retraced the .7 miles back into town to resupply. After that, we went to a local coffee shop and organized our food bags. I assume most establishments would be appalled. But you can tell they are used to thru-hikers here. The woman running the shop was extremely kind to us. We hung out there for a while ordering coffee, brownies, and homemade ice cream. Then we moved to the library for a bit. I frantically edited photos, hoping to be able to update the online journal.
Eventually hunger won out again – it was almost 5p. So we headed out for dinner. The entries didn’t make it online. I’ll have to try to do it from the mountains or wait another 5 days to the next town.
After dinner and after calling all family to catch up, we all headed out of town for good. We walked across the bridge over the French Broad River and turned right to follow the AT. Along the river were an incredible amount of camping sites. We went to the end and set up, all 8 of us (6 tents in total). The guys started a fire and we stayed up too late, like 10p.
It was fantastic sleeping next to the river. There are slight rapids so you can hear them roar, plus it smells like water. Being from Michigan, I love the smell that a large body of water has. It smells like home and summer fun.
We slept with the rainfly on since rain is in the forecast for the next 4 days. Poor Ben woke up in the middle of the night feeling sick. Finally he left the tent and vomited. He wonders if it was too much food. We stuff ourselves like it’s Thanksgiving every time we are in town. I often leave our meals feeling like I should just be rolled down the street or like there’s a heavy rock in my belly. I’m grateful for the food and know I need the calories, I just tend to make myself feel incredibly sick. Ben didn’t have a fever or anything, so I didn’t worry too much. After he was done, he quickly fell back asleep. No one heard his midnight escapade even though we were camped fairly tightly. Luckily, he was veiled by the noise of the river.
– ansel