Finley Cane Trail with Jodie, Bailey, Myers, and Jessica

 

AT Prep and Plan

As if this summer isn’t going to be packed enough with the trek to Alaska, Sam and I are trying to pack in a week on the AT as soon as school gets out so I can get my hike on for the summer. As neither one of us has more than a handful of miscellaneous AT miles under our belts, we’re going to start at the beginning and walk north. We’re going to be leaving a little after the traditional northbound start time, but, then again, we’re not going nearly as far.

The plan so far:

Time Frame: May 22-31, depending on Maryville City Snow Days

Trip Length: 5 nights, 6 days; approximately 118 miles

Day One: Start at Springer Mountain whenever someone wants to drop us off; hike the 3 mile approach trail to Springer Mountain (pre-AT), then 15 miles on the AT to Gooch Mtn Shelter (total 18 miles)
Day Two: Gooch Mtn Shelter to Baggs Creek Gap Campsite (20 miles)
Day Three: Bagges Creek Gap to Tray Gap Shelter (22 miles)
Day Four: Tray Gap Shelter to Muskrat Creek Shelter (24 miles) -- this crosses from Georgia to North Carolina around mile 20
Day Five: Muskrat Creek Shelter to Rock Gap Shelter (24 miles)
Day Six: Rock Gap Shelter to Wayah Gap (9 miles); Pick up on the road around 1/2 pm

Even if we don’t make the whole haul, the plan is to at least tick off all of Georgia.

Anyone else interested in joining us for some or all of the trip?

Porter’s Creek Trail, Hiking Cabin, and Barn

Bailey’s Social Studies Fair Project

Royal Blue

Fall Break—Panama City Beach and St. Andrews Bay State Park

Great time on the Gulf of Mexico. We went here instead of some of our old standbys of Myrtle Beach, Charleston, etc., because we wanted to get some good snorkeling in. Unfortunately, the warning flags were out and the beaches were closed most of the time. The perks, though, were that we found St. Andrews Bay State Part—a true gem. Right off the edge of town, it was great. It was like a mini-Cades Cove with alligators and deer. We got to drive around, hike, walk on the beach, and just wander around. We saw our first alligator in the wild and a big ol’ jelly fish beached on the sand.

Later, we took the ferry from St. Andrews to Shell Island for the day. Beautiful. We rented a kayak, paddled around the bay, played in the water, fiddled with the snorkels (rough water so not much luck). 

Near the end of the week the water calmed enough for all of us but Myers to snorkel. Bailey’s mad snorkeling skills kicked back in. I was afraid that since she’d only ever done it in Little River that the ocean would freak her out, but she did awesome!

I thinking maybe somewhere in el Caribe next time? :)

Indian Boundary and Hooper’s Bald

It’s always a good birthday when you get to head to the mountains. Jean and Dexter took the camper for a weekend at Indian Boundary so we headed up after school Friday and spent the evening. We had so much fun we went back to spend the night Saturday.

Highlights of the trip were--

letting Bailey chauffeur me around the lake in the canoe… she paddled from the campsite to the beach and back, all by her lonesome, steering and all. After five years of canoeing, it finally clicked!

heading to Hooper’s Bald and taking the back way to do some huckleberry pickin’. [as of Dec. 29 I’ll be finishing off the last of the batch the next time I make pancakes. yum!]

canoeing with Myers when he’s settled down enough not to act like a nut—once again, it finally clicked.

getting to spend some good times outside!

Kayaking with Bailey and Jessica

Chilhowee Lake goodness.

Little River

FINALLY! After working just about every day this summer, now that I'm three weeks into school we finally got a chance to break out the kayaks. Bailey and I took the yaks to the car wash yesterday and gave 'em the good once over and de-sluggification for mine and gave the Rover its first proper exterior cleanin'. We surprised Bailey today with a new boat of her very own, so of course we had to go test it out. Bailey, her uncle David, and I threw the boats in the trailer and made for Little River. We paddled down just below Coulter's Bridge (about 5 minutes... past the bridge jumpers but not so far we couldn't paddle back up river) and tethered the boats to a patch of cane and hopped out to practice Bailey's snorkeling skills. Although she's been wanting to get into snorkeling since forever, I'd been really worried she'd freak out, hate it, and never give it a chance again. So, I put a life jacket on her, her mask, snorkel, and flippers. She laid down in the water, I held the jacket for about 30 seconds, and off she went, never looking back. She's a natural! Great time, no pictures, back to school tomorrow--

Splash Country

We are burned to a crisp. What else is there to say?
Aside from: Splash Country opens an hour early for season passholders on Saturday morning. IT IS AWESOME. We got to go in, set up, no crowd, no rush, staked claim to great seats, and got in the wave pool with the massive crowd of, o, five people. Good stuff. Next time I'll remember to bring the sun screen in from the car. (Ironically, neither Bailey nor Myers got burned, although Bailey is on a medicine that calls for limited sun exposure. Go figure. If Jodie were a super hero, though, her name would be Lobster Girl.)

Fourth of July

Fourth of July... woo! Since Alcoa didn't do the duck pond this year, everyone on our side of the county stocked up on fireworks. Usually all the houses down our stretch of the Pike are shooting off fireworks, but there was double previous years this time. David came down and shot off his leftovers, including some of the big artillery shells, and it was great. We set up hammocks and chairs in the yard and took turns watching fireworks at our house and several of the neighbors.