I’m at Standing Bear Farm, the hiker hostel just off the A.T. (same place where Cindy and I stayed for a night last year) and will get on the trail early tomorrow morning. The Steve Miller Band and I enjoyed a great drive down to Tennessee; James Taylor and Norah Jones joined in for about a hundred miles too. Thank goodness for the iPod or else I’d most certainly go catatonic being cooped up in the car by myself for so long.
Unfortunately, I found out from a few other hikers here at the hostel that in the last couple days there’s been a lot of aggressive bear activity at Walnut Mountain Shelter, which is (rather, was) my destination two nights from now. Apparently the other night a bear absconded with eleven hikers’ food bags. He also played piñata with what he thought was one giant food bag – but which was actually a hiker sleeping in a hammock just outside the shelter. Oy. I’m told the bears are very hungry right now because, due to a late cold snap and a recent drought, a lot of the berries they rely on for food did not produce very well this spring.
Anyway, hikers are being advised to stay away from that shelter for now, especially when hiking alone. This presents a problem for me, because skipping that shelter means more than doubling my planned mileage tomorrow. I had kind of looked forward to easing into my hike with a nice easy 7.5- mile day. Now it looks like it will be 15.5 miles. Crud.
Unfortunately, I found out from a few other hikers here at the hostel that in the last couple days there’s been a lot of aggressive bear activity at Walnut Mountain Shelter, which is (rather, was) my destination two nights from now. Apparently the other night a bear absconded with eleven hikers’ food bags. He also played piñata with what he thought was one giant food bag – but which was actually a hiker sleeping in a hammock just outside the shelter. Oy. I’m told the bears are very hungry right now because, due to a late cold snap and a recent drought, a lot of the berries they rely on for food did not produce very well this spring.
Anyway, hikers are being advised to stay away from that shelter for now, especially when hiking alone. This presents a problem for me, because skipping that shelter means more than doubling my planned mileage tomorrow. I had kind of looked forward to easing into my hike with a nice easy 7.5- mile day. Now it looks like it will be 15.5 miles. Crud.
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