16.7 miles hiked
They have cabins and a lodge for hikers, but she didn’t really offer a cabin to me. I guess she assumed I wanted cheap. As that kind of accomodations go, the place is really nice. The setting is pretty too. There’s one other hiker (female) in the lodge with me, but she’s so unfriendly that she’s almost hostile. I’ve never encountered such an anti-social backpacker before. I could use some girly chit-chat time, but she’s clearly not interested.
She’s trying to get a ride somewhere, and when she said maybe she’d just hitch, the proprietress said not to. She repeated herself — don’t hitchhike around here. Yikes.
So, last night (at the shelter), I was awoken by a chewing/gnawing sound. I’m not sure if it was a mouse or something larger, but it sounded like it was eating hiker gear. It wasn’t, thank god. It must have been eating the shelter!
The trail today was a good deal harder than it looked on the profile. They had relocated a couple of miles to go down a rocky and very narrow ridgeline. There were a lot of views, but it was all rock scrambles, one hand over hand climb.
The 2007 AT Companion also lists two water sources that are no longer ON the trail since the relo to that ridge. One looks like it’s dry (and it was supposed to be a reliable source), and the other is just not on the AT any more. I think one or both must be on the old A.T. which is marked blue and is the bad weather by-pass.
I’d like to make Hot Springs tomorrow though there is really no advantage to that. There’s a music festival this weekend and the whole place will be jammed full of people. I might hike *almost* to Hot Springs and come in on Sunday morning.
I think the other lady here managed to arrange whatever she’s trying to do. In fact, I think she’s leaving the trail, so maybe she’s depressed about that. Either that or she hated me on sight. 
Anyway, I’m going back to reading Backwoodsman magazine which is pretty interesting if badly edited. It’s very informationally dense. I might subscribe to it — I’ve certainly seen nothing else like it.
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