Day 27 No Business Knob Shelter to Uncle Johnny's Erwin

Today's miles 5.8.  AT miles 341.5

A slow start again this morning, we were in no rush.  After an early mist our old friend 'sunshine' was out again, very welcome after two wet days. We left camp at 9:45 and reached Uncle Johnny's Nolichucky Hostel for midday.  We got glimpses of Erwin and good views of the Nolichucky River from the trail on the way down. 

We got greeted by the hostel cat, checked into a private room then got the most important job done first - shower! Most hostels have some sort of soap and shampoo available, this one had a selection of left over products including hair conditioner.  The first time since on the trail I've been able to use conditioner on my hair- no knots - bliss!

We called a local guy 'Tom' for a shuttle into Erwin town, about 4/5 miles from the hostel. A great guy, a previous AT thru hiker, he's off to thru hike the PCT next month.  He dropped us off at a great little family run Mexican restaurant he recommended, El Corita. Authentic Mexican owned and the food cooked fresh, we ordered a small minced beef Burrito each and coke.  The lady only had small Tortilla's rather than her normal large size but we said that was fine.  Tom had already warned us one normal burrito would be enough for two, so a smaller one each was just the right amount to keep us going and they were delicious. The bill came to less than $10 - great value.

From there we did our food resupply shopping for the next four days at Food Lion and got a few bits from CVS pharmacy.  We then had a wander along the road and ended up at McDonald's - Nigel was happy!  The WiFi at the hostel is very tempermental so we made the most of Mcdonalds WiFi whilst there to update our blog.   Erwin is the largest town we've been too so far but is extremely spread out, about 5 miles long - we saw about half a mile of it.

Tom's wife kindly shuttled us back to the hostel around 6pm.  Final jobs for the evening, laundry and trail food sorting/packing needed to be done.  We're back on the trail tomorrow, so today was what is classed as a 'Nero' day = not quite a 'zero' day, a short mileage day into a town to get jobs done, stay one night then back hiking in the morning.  A 'zero' requires a two night stay so you benefit from a full non hiking day.