Sat May 3, 2014 @ 17:00

Day 34 - Whistling Gap campsite to Erwin, TN

12.9 miles

I got up at 5:30 this morning. It's my attempt to find more time in my day for writing and photography work, as per @toesalad suggestion. I'd like to aim for 5am but started here.

We were out of camp by 7:45 and into Erwin by 3:45.

We were by ourselves the whole day didn't see any other thru-hikers. It was a lovely day for hiking with great views of the Nolichucky river as we hiked down into Erwin.

Earlier in the day @toesalad got ahold of Miss Janet, who picked us up at the trailhead on River Road in Erwin.

She kindly offered us a place to stay tonight at her daughter's house, a former hiker hostel. I feel kinda funky and out of place, like I'm a homeless college kid.

We did some online work today, ordered a new compact computer for the trail. We thought we could get by with iPads but the work we have to do in each town stop and the writing I want to do on the trail is proving too onerous and slow-going without a better tool.

We planned our hiking and resupply days until Damascus, VA. Hard to believe in less than two weeks we'll be in Virginia.