Miles today 0. AT miles 164.7
We're taking our first 'zero' day today - a non hiking/rest day. We had a nice lie in watching TV, free tea and coffee and Trail Magic! Yes we got trail magic at Fontana Lodge. We were chatting yesterday in The Pitstop to a couple from Atlanta who where here for a couple of days hiking, I saw them again this morning in the reception area and they offered us their granola assortment and fresh milk they had left. Thank you so much guys, really appreciated, it was delicious and enough for breakfast tomorrow too.
It was back to a gorgeous sunny day again after the frost yesterday, we had clear mountain views from our hotel room. We got our laundry done at a launderette on site and stocked up on the few extra bits we needed to get us through The Smokies. Hot dogs for lunch at The Pitstop again and a warmed Iced Honeybun with butter, recommended by Laurie, the lady serving at The Pitstop, it was delicious.
We had a sort out of our gear in the afternoon and managed to throw away a few small unessential items to reduce our pack weight a tiny bit - every little helps! Overall though we are very happy with the gear selection we have with us and so far we seem to have packed just right. We are also very happy with our progress along the trail so far. In thirteen days we have walked 164.7 miles of the AT plus the 8.8 mile Approach Trail, a total of 173.5 miles. That works out at an average of 13.35 miles a day, slightly higher than we anticipated, we predicted that we'd probably average around 12 miles a day for the first couple of weeks. Our overall aim is to average 15 miles a day over the whole trail.
Our pace ranges between 2 mph and 2.5 mph depending on the terrain and so far we have clocked up over 50,000ft of accumulated ascent/descent. We like to try and get into camp fairly early in the afternoon, if possible, so our bodies/muscles have time to recover as we believe this recovery time is important.
We had one last visit to the Pitstop (it's the only place open) around 4pm this time for a 'sausage dog', a bigger version of a hot dog (limited menu!) and Nigel had another warm buttered iced Honey bun, his new favourite sweet treat. Laurie was a lovely lady, very friendly and wished us well on our travels. We saw some pretty purple crocuses on the way that had blossomed in the warm sun this afternoon.
We'll be going to bed early tonight ready to get up early morning and back on the trail to hit the Smokies tomorrow.
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