Bridges and water, but less wind
Sleep came gradually Friday night, but the bitter cold that shocked us from our sleeping bags was painfully quick. It seemed as if the cold had seeped through every possible entry point into my sleeping bag. Having a mummy bag helped a lot as I had the hood wrapped tightly about my face, but my toes were feeling painfully numb. Although I didn’t want to get out of bed just yet, I knew that my only chance to warm up was to get out of the tent and move around a bit.
Prosecutor built us a small warm fire that morning to warm our toes by as we all packed our gear in preparation for the days hike. We shuffled cars around to make sure that everyone had a way to get home, and joined up with Ewker and Jimmy San as they drove in from Nashville that morning. It was around 11 am that we finally got to the trail. Almost immediately the peacefulness of the walk settled in as people gently spread out and strolled through the woods admiring the drifting snow from the previous nights storm. We stopped at waterfalls, bridges, and trail heads where we took the opportunity to snap a few pictures, eat a bit of lunch, and rest our weary legs. It took us between 4-5 hours to walk the 8 miles to the next campsite, but the time passed rather quickly as the views were so spectacular you seemed to loose track of time.
Upon arriving at the second nights campsite, saw mill, we unpacked our sleeping bags and setup out tents before the night fell. We must have had a half a cord of wood for that nights fire, but with the air turning colder, the fire just didn’t seem all that warm. I turned in quite early that night due to the fact that I was cold, wet, and just wanted to get in my sleeping bag to get warm. The temperature got down to 18 F, but I stayed a bit warmer than the previous night because the wind wasn’t blowing as much.
