Tuesday, June 7th

Laughing Heart Lodge (274.6 mi) to Little Laurel Shelter (294.5 mi)

Hiking Miles: 19.9

Total Ascent: 6,195.9 ft

Total Descent: 3,948.5 ft

Total Grade: 509.0 ft/mi

Steps: 49,965

We slept in a bit and we finally poured ourselves some coffee at 7:30 am in the kitchenette. We also ate breakfast there at 8 am before heading back on trail by 8:30 am. On our way out off the grounds, we said our good-byes to Restless – I asked her what her first name was and she replied “Susan Parker.” We settled our drink bill, and headed down the hill and through town.

Right from the start the grade was aggressive, however the views looking back on Hot Springs were beautiful and calming. We were fortunate to also enjoy various flowers along the way that were preserved on trail. And not unusual, we continued to see bear sighting warnings. 

The sights – looking back towards the town, as well as the on-trail vegetation, were eye-catching.

We stopped for lunch (at noontime) at the Rich Mountain Fire Tower (pretty cool name). There were a few other gentlemen there in the tower eating lunch and conversing. 

It was essentially an uneventful day other than the fact it was a very steep climb. We decided that we would hike to the Little Laurel Shelter which would put us at 19.9 miles for the day. Kyle (Vintage) and Kenny (Honey Badger) passed us and were racing to the shelter. It was a hefty climb at the end (the entire day totaled over 6,000 feet of elevation). It’s funny, we still call them South Park regardless of their trail names.

Their aggressiveness paid off as they claimed the last two spots in the 5-person shelter, and because of that, we contemplated hiking another 7 miles to the next one. But fortunately, one person who had actually taken up two spots in the shelter decided to leave so we took that as a sign to stay, and we set up within the two open spots.

We cooked dinner, I called Teresa, and we hung our food. I actually remained seated at the picnic table while Stevie settled into the shelter for the night, and I journaled. I sat across from two women (who ate dinner with us) who had just hiked 20 miles southbound from the Nature’s Inn Hostel where Stevie and I planned to go tomorrow. It was a pleasure conversing with them because it was an actual two-way conversation, unlike when some hikers dominate the conversation by being in transmit mode only. One of the women actually grew up in Wilton, NH until she was 11 years old. The other woman (Scunch) was finishing up her thru-hike to Springer Mountain which she had started last year from Katahdin in July. She unfortunately had to stop last year when she broke her foot in Waynesboro, Va.

I eventually got to bed late (~9:30 pm) and planned to get up at 4 AM to get a solid jump on our anticipated 25 mile day.