There’s a half moon rising in southeastern skies tonight…
-YMSB
Not so random thought of the day: If you find yourself in backcountry with very high bear activity, it’s probably a bad idea to keep something scented in your sleeping area like, oh, say, toasted coconut sunscreen.
Following a night’s rest and a great breakfast at the NOC it was on to Fontana Dam and the Smokies! If I haven’t mentioned this already, I was slightly excited to get into the Smokies. I have fond memories of visiting GSMNP and Maggie Valley when I was younger, and now I had the chance to hike through.
Fontana Dam stands as the southern entrance to the park and the trail follows the road over the dam. Great views of the lake and surrounding areas.
A short walk around the lake and I was officially in the Smoky Mountains! They were everything I thought they’d be…challenging (Mollie’s Ridge kicked this hiker’s butt), incredibly rewarding, and, well, smoky. Being the ridge that divides two climates, the weather there can be a extremely varied, hence the famous cloudiness. One thing I had been missing out on was a really clear night. A sky full of stars was something I’d have to keep waiting on.
The weather was tempermental as expected. And the cold stuck around, dropping down to the mid 30s at night. The morning of the third day I could see no more than maybe 50′ down the trail it was so cloudy. Kind of cool actually, but not great for views.
As the day wore on, the sun started to break through, and by the early afternoon it was a gorgeous, clear day. I lucked out. Big time. That afternoon I reached Clingmans Dome, the highest peak I’d climb on the entire AT. Amazing would be an understatement to describe the 360 view from that spot. I’ll leave a picture.
So, I mentioned bears earlier. The Smokies are home to one of the highest populations of black bear in the US. Thus, there is an increased chance to see a bear in the park. Unfortunately, when visitors don’t practice good LNT principles, bears can become a nuisance or even a threat to safety. And that’s what happened to a hiker just two days ahead of me.
I won’t get too in depth here, but when visitors (us) leave food around campsites, it makes it easy for bears. The bears associate people with an easy snack, and you can figure out the rest.
A hiker, who did everything right with his food bag, made an error by leaving scented sunscreen in his tent. A bear smelled it, paid a visit, and the hiker ended up with a nasty bite on his leg. Fortunately, he was ok, considering what could have happened, and he was safely evacuated and patched up. Unfortunately, the bear was tracked down by rangers and put down. Sections of the park were rendered unavailable for sleeping as a result.
Back to the trail. Above 5500′ the foliage of the Smokies starts to change from deciduous to evergreen. You get to hike through forests of spruce and fir that typically don’t exist this far south.
I wish you could smell this picture. Think christmas tree winter wonderland…in May. There’s the Smokies for you.
The 5th day through the park was the last full day of hiking before leaving. The next morning I’d cross the Pigeon River and be on my way. It was another cold day, and I was hiking by myself on a gorgeous, winding ridgline when I heard people yelling. Then I heard a distress whistle. I knew there were a couple of hikers about a half mile ahead, and it was obvious someone was is trouble, possibly seriously injured.
I picked up my pace considerably, taking care not to hurt myself as well. A few blows on my own whistle in response let them know someone was near and on the way.
Then the thought hit me. I stopped.
Wait.
What if it’s a bear?
Wait.
What if it’s a bear and they’re chasing it off towards me?
Shit.
I had no other choice but to keep going. Blowing on my whistle, I braced myself for an inevitable head on collision with a scared, sprinting black bear.
After a few slightly tense minutes of hiking/whistling/praying I came up on three shaken hikers. Turns out it was a bear. He walking south on the trail, and it took them a bit longer than they would have liked to get him off the trail. He wasn’t threatening, but wouldn’t leave his path easily. I just missed him by a couple minutes.
We gave the bear a few minutes before we moved on (a couple other hikers had caught up by then), making as much noise as we could when we did. Imagine six grown adults singing Row Row Row Your Boat through the mountains…
That night in the shelter, I woke up in the middle of the night. I couldn’t get back to sleep, so I decided to have a look around the campsite.
Careful not to wake anyone else, I left the shelter and looked up. Finally, there was the clear night sky I’d been waiting for. A sea of stars punctuated by a perfect half moon.
The Smokies felt like a turning point, maybe in a way a rite of passage. I felt much more comfortable in the backcountry, I got a real sense of how far I had travelled (and how far I had to go), I got a trail name, and I felt more like an actual AT thru-hiker than an insane person with a backpack still figuring this trail thing out.
But I still hadn’t seen any bears!
SFSSF:
Total Miles: 253.8
Mi/Day: 12.1
Highest Elevation: 6643′ (Clingmans Dome)
Mountains: All of them
Pop Tart Count: 18
The B-Log 