Day 3

Day 3 (BMT): 21 miles + 4 bonus miles

It was a pretty rough first half the day logistically. I got to the road to go into Cherokee at 7 am and it took nearly an hour to get a hitch into town. I got a ride to a grocery store to buy some food. I then tried to hitchhike to the post office (my main destination) for 45 minutes before finally giving up and walking 3 miles to get there.

When I got there, they didn’t have my package. It was guaranteed to be there by this morning. My plan was to get in and out of town quickly. But jokes on me for putting my faith in the postal service. I then gave up and tried to hitchhike back to the trail. I stood there for about 4 hours without any luck. My arm was soar from holding my thumb out so much. I could’ve walked back to trail in that amount of time, but never thought that so many cars could pass without stopping. I don’t know why it’s so hard to get a ride while wearing a SpongeBob shirt.

After wasting so much time unable to leave town, my package had finally arrived. So I picked it up at the post office and found a local shuttle driver to get out of town because clearly hitchhiking was not the move. I finally got back on trail around 3pm with 19 miles to go after wasting 7 hours in town.

Even though I’m not in a rush, that inefficiency bothers me to my core.

When I got back to trail, I was greeted with a 3,000 foot climb and later a 2,000 foot climb. This northern section of the BMT has been pretty brutal. It’s not New Hampshire, but it’s 500-600 feet of elevation gain/loss per mile with long ass climbs. It looks like the terrain should chill out soon for a bit before getting wild again with a 4,000 foot climb after exiting the Smokey’s.

One thing I didn’t expect was enjoying night hiking. I did it my first night for a bit and again tonight and really enjoyed it. Maybe it’s cause it feels like a more rare activity now compared to last year when I knew I had to do it 4-5 hours every day to start out the year. I’m sure a growing comfortability of being alone in the dark scary forest after a year might help too.

Song of the day: experience: ludovico einaudi