April 5 – 14.3 miles
We spent last night running around Atlanta trying to find an REI store to pick up a one man tent for Leap. Finally found a store 5 minutes before closing that had the tent he wanted. Leap was now ready to take his leap!
Our hotel was about an hour and half from the trail so we got up early and headed out. Leap had planned 14.3 miles slack packing and we had scheduled Doug (Alpine Taxi) to pick him up about 5:00 pm from Unicoi Gap since I had to turn in our rental. He needed to get going if he was going to have enough time to do the full mileage or he could be stuck in the woods without a tent for the night.
Made it to Hog Pen Gap to drop him off about 9:30am. Despite forecasts of mid 60′s sunny weather, we found ourselves at the trail head in a misty cloud with temperatures in the upper 30′s! At this point Leap turned to me and said “maybe we are beach people”. I gave him a kiss, assured him it would warm up, pointed him up the trail
and then heading back down the mountain to where the sun was shining!
I spent the day returning our rental, checking into the hotel, reacquainting myself with Helen, GA and finally taking a nap. I felt a little guilty knowing Leap was out there putting in the miles but not too guilty!
Leap finished the hike in record time. He was dropped off by Doug at the hotel earlier than expected with a big grin on his face. He had completed 14.3 miles in 7 hours! He seemed to have really enjoyed himself and met several hikers along the way. He said it did warm up by lunch and was a beautiful day for hiking. He had several views and a challenging section down into the gap.
Our son arrived about 9:00 pm to spend the weekend with me while Leap slack packs another day. We took him to dinner and enjoyed catching up on his life since we went awol.
During dinner we received a call that Leap’a mom was back in the hospital for the second time in two weeks. We decided we need to be there for her and help with her care since Leap’s sister has been having to pull double duty since we have been gone. We will be off the trail again for an indefinite time period but the trail will always be there. For now we will take another blue blaze and head home. Happy Trails!
