[Section 8] Feb 26th   6:20PM at the Cheaha State Park, the highest point in AL.  I'm writing at a picnic table.     I hiked my first steps on the Pinhoti Trail this after noon 3 1/2 miles. We awoke this morning in Tallahassee. About 300 miles and six hours and a time zone change later we were at the Porter Gap trail head. After digging out my day pack and taking a picture I was on the trail at about 1:40. The woods were open and a mix of pine and hardwoods. The treadway was deep with dry brown leaves that rustled as I climbed the easy grades to the rock outcrop at the height of the land.

My thoughts ranged from Nimblewill Nomad, to the Long Trail, and to Wingfoot [Wingfoot runs the Appalcian Trail Web page and is opposed to technology on the trail]. I got my inspiration from listening to Nomad at the gathering last October and I plan to hike the Pinhoti now and the IAT this summer. (What did you do to me Eb?) The Long Trail is now sleeping beneath a deep blanket of snow and these hiking conditions are still 3 months away in northern Vermont. What would Wingfoot say as I sat on the rocks getting a GPS reading and talking to Jan on our ham radios. At least the computer was in the car with my hiking pole.

For those that are interested in learning more about this trail, read Nomad's journals on his web site  www.nimblewillnomad.com.

Sunday Feb 27  4:30 at Cheaha Park Last night was our first night in our tent, an Armandilo by Walrus. It is big and needs to be set up no more than 50 ft from the truck. Since it was our first night the winds blew real hard and about 3:00am it rained hard. It was still raining when we got up so I went to Town with Jan before she dropped me at the trail head just as the last shower cleared. Yesterday's 3 1/2 miles had been smooth treadway so the very rocky trail today was a little bit of a surprise. Several places looked like the glacial side moraines along the AT in PA and New England. It took me from 9:50 am to 3:50 pm to hike the 11.7 miles from Chandler Springs to Adams Gap. In general the trail is in pretty good shape but the Greenbriar is beginning to infringe in places and in other areas the lack of use leaves the trace a little faint. Today I met no one on the trail. Yesterday as I left Porter Gap a young couple with two children were coming down the trail and just as I was reaching the Chandler Gap parking area I met a maintainer.

[Section 7] Monday Feb 28  6:30 pm 12 miles from Adams Gap to the park. We just returned from supper at the restaurant. This park has a very nice stone restaurant with high glass windows that let you see half of Alabama.  It faces west, so you get a spectacular sunset almost every night.  There is also a motel across the road from the restaurant.  Today was a late start as we stayed in the tent until and hour and a half after daylight.  It was a cold morning. The trail today was more rocky treadway but beautiful views from the ridges.  Reading Nomad's account of traveling this area, I can see how he had trouble finding the trail with snow on the trees.  Dave and Tim (GMC and ADK head field honchos or some such title) I thought of the work you guys do and compared to what the forest service has done for maintenance here, you guys are way ahead of them.  Several blow downs had walk arounds that had to be two - three years old.  I don't think they have had a walk through in longer than that.  But there were many, many fine views today with good weather so I shouldn't complain about the trail.  Just hike it as I find it.  Let Bryson rag on the forest service. 

[Section 6] Feb 29th 6:00pm our last day at Cheaha State Park Today I got an early (6:30) start and hiked 17 miles to rte #431. The trail was easier today so I was done hiking at 3:15pm. The trail still needs some attention (walk through & brushing in spots) and the side hilling would not stand up very long to heavy traffic. The hike itself was very pleasant in mostly open hardwoods with a some pine mixed in. The trail started up Blue Mountain and I soon jumped three deer before coming to Blue Mountain Shelter. After coming off the Blue Mountain Ridge the trail followed first low ridges and then brooks, alternating from one to the other. I saw a turkey right after lunch and Jan and I saw another on the ride back to the campsite. I met my first backpackers today, Scott, Chris and their Lab, Annabelle. They are collage students from Michigan. Their car was at the north end of the Forest Service land (60 miles from rte #431) and they wanted to be there Friday night or Saturday morning so they could make Monday classes. The first 25 miles of this trail would have torn your feet to pieces but today's treadway was OK. I saw my first spring flowers today by the brooks: Trout lily, purple violets, and a couple of other little ones. Nomads tree. In his Journal Nomad told of a tree that was sawed off 10 feet above the ground. He said he could not figure out how it was done so he left it a mystery. I am pretty sure I know what happened. The root area looked disturbed 3 to 5 feet around one half of the tree. I think the tree was partially uprooted and blown part way over. The tree was then cut and the root mass was heavy enough to stand the tall stump up. It may have had a little help from the trail clearers. Bob and I have been known to do this on trail clearing work trips.

[Section 5] Wed March 1st Happy birthday to my mother and our daughter. 6:45 Pine Glen Campsite. Got up this morning in the fog and broke camp, loaded the truck and moved north to here. We then went to the Heflin Ranger Office to ask about a burn along the trail and to see if we could use the phone system to send out this email. They would let us if aol wasn't a toll call. Just as at the Cheaha State Park it was so we have to wait some more. This is quite frustrating to me but doesn't seem to bother Jan. I guess I need to relax. After an early hamburger I got on the Trail a little after 11:00am and hiked 8 miles to the Trailhead near rte #78. The trail today meandered along little finger ridges and small brooks. After the threat of rain my weather held and today was another warm mostly sunny day. So far every day has been great shorts and tee shirt hiking weather. Aside from a shortage of blazes and the need for brushing here and there the trail was pretty uneventful EXCEPT. For about a mile or a little more the Trail passed through an area they had burned yesterday. Several logs and stumps were still smoldering with some flame and considerable smoke. The usual brown leaf and needle treadway covering was black ash as was every thing in sight. It was at little eerie, an environment I had never been in so soon after the flames.

[Section 4] Thursday March 2nd 5:45pm Pine Glen campsite. What a beautiful, great and grand day this has been. Warm and sunny with a pleasant breeze most of the time. We saw a deer on the way to the trail head and I saw one bunch of six turkeys on a bank and a little later I saw two jakes (young toms). The trail was quite easy with a lot of side-hill traversing. I hiked the 13 miles from the trailhead by the railroad tracks to here at Pine Glen. I started at 8:00am and got here at 3:00pm. I took my time and stopped several places to remove brush and small fallen trees from the trail. (my trail maintainer self kicked in) A long section today had been burned over a few weeks back and while it was still black, it had been rained on and some brown showed through. It was like I visualize burned over land, yesterday was so different. An enforcement Ranger warned us yesterday that the Rainbows were beginning to arrive for a gathering in a few weeks. One young woman asked Jan if she had seen any other "'bows". She apparently was carrying flowers and was very skimpily dressed. Little enough that Jan figured Bob would not have been able to talk to her. Brunt Rock lives on. That is probably our only contact since we will be moving north tomorrow.

[Section 3] Fri. 8:00  pm March 3 University Inn Jacksonville, AL ..... Hiked from Pine Glen Camp Site to County Rd # 55 about 15 miles. The first 8 miles were very moderate up one drainage, past Sweetwater Lake, Coleman Lake and the old Shoal Creek Church. Easy walking with some ice storm damage. The hike down into the Choccolocco Watershed had more ice damage and some very steep ravines with narrow and poor side hilling. While yesterday was beautiful day and I hiked easy, today was more humid and I hiked the finale hour plus in light rain. It rained harder once I got to the truck and it is raining now and the weather forecast is giving tornado warnings.  I finished the good gorp Dorcas gave earlier and I am now snacking on cheese crackers. Wish I had more of the gorp with crunchy M&M's. I have about 3 days left in Alabama.

It's thundering outside right now. I'm glad Jan decided to motel it tonight.

[Section 2 and Section 1] Sat March 4th  Camped beside Dugger MT Rd 6:15pm      Another fine day rather overcast and humid to start but ended sunny and nice. A little cooler as I never did change out of my jeans. Today I actually climbed onto and hiked along some fairly high ridges, more my type of hiking. Today was the first time that the slackpacking was a small problem. I could either hike 7.7 miles or 16 miles. I left the motel early and did the sixteen. Still a few new blowdowns but several old ones that had been trimmed and left need a chainsaw. I'm just getting used to going from overblazed to no blazes and I only have one more day in the National Forest. Monday we will be in Georgia.

[Section 1 and ATA section]Sun March 5th camped at rte 278 trailhead 6:20 PM  Today was hotter and I'm into more hilly terrain but I'm getting in better condition so I kept my normal pace of about 2 mph. The trail was generally in pretty good shape except for some ice damage about 4 miles south of here and the ever inconsistent blazes everywhere except when you need one like where two trails cross. Just north of the road here, Rte 278, the forest has burned since we checked this trailhead on our way to Florida a week and a half ago. This area has several old iron mine sites. Today with Jan's help I hiked two sections southbound. It worked out that we had lunch at this trailhead. As we ate, a 20-year-old gray ford pickup in pretty good condition drove in. After a while I went over and talked to the old gent (my age)  and his wife. They were out for Sunday dinner eating Hardees hamburgers and all. He told me about the iron mines and that this part of the National Forest had been added about six years ago.  Seems the local congressman was in on a sweetheart deal but at least it's now NF. Today I looked across a brook from the trail and saw a young family who had come in on an ATV on the other side of the brook. The only people I've seen in the woods since the two Michigan college students who apparently got out Friday just ahead of the worst of the storm.

[ATA Section into Georgia] About 11 miles today only 3 miles of trail left in Alabama, with a bushwhack to the state line. Georgia tomorrow. Monday March 6th 7:30 pm James H "Sloppy" Floyd State Park, GA  Depending on how you look at it, today was a rather short -or long - day distance wise. After hiking the last three miles of marked Pinhoti Trail in Alabama I bushwhacked  along the ridge to a truck road in Ga. Marty Dominy's directions were good except I was supposed to come to a gate at 0.7 mile.  Well, after walking almost 40 minutes at my one mile in 20-minute speed I came to the gate and Jan at the road 0.3 m. farther on. The next 20 or so miles are along roads so the big blue truck made short work of them. I eventually come to the Simms Mountain Rail-Trail portion of the Pinhoti Trail and hike it 4 miles to rte #100 just south of Holland, Ga. The bushwhack along the ridge is a very good route (a portion was flagged) and I hope an easement can be obtained. The walk along the old railroad was flat, very hot and much more of it would be boring. For AT-Listers, we crossed the Coosa River into the Hamlet of Coosa. A power generating plant, a pulp mill and two store/gas stations were about it. Tomorrow I hope to find some maps of where the Trail goes into the Chattahoochee National Forest and comes out on the other (east) side. This State Park is very nice and we will probably be here a few days. It is also nice to be back in the eastern time zone and have it light until 7:00 instead of 6:00 pm.

Tue March 7th 7:00pm Floyd State Park. Today I hiked the rails to trails portion and did fine until the old railroad turned west and I followed it too far - took a crossing road to the right to go back to rte #100 but had gone too far. My directions lists road names that cross the Pinhoti but none of the names are present at the crossings. Anyway a radio call to Jan (and several red herring type paved roads and 8 miles west of where I should have been) and I was back trying to find the one mile of trail between Starling Mill Road and the High Point Trailhead. After bushwacking between the two I would guess there is none at this time. Trail distance is listed as 8 miles. I did considerably more before the sun got too hot and I found a beer. We had a little scare tonight when Jan couldn't get this computer fired up. Hopefully we won't have any more problems.

Wed, March 8 - Sloppy Floyd Park - 4:20 p.m. It was decision day today. Tomorrow we are headed for the Benton MacKaye trail at Dyer Gap. Today I hiked 8 miles from Highpoint Trailhead on Rt 100 to Mac White Gap at Rt 27. I got an early start but the weather was hot and humid. The trail has suffered severe ice storm damage (a month ago) and has too many blow downs to comfortably hike, particularly in shorts. When I reached the ridge this morning I took the road .3 of a mile to the fire tower for the best view of the day. The rest of the day found some of the trail had a little work done, but most if it was covered with broken limbs and tree tops. Very similar to our storm of two years ago. Without the storm damage, this appears to be a very enjoyable trail to hike. Reached Mac White Gap at 1 PM and we went up to the ranger station in Lafayette. The rangers said they had reports of some volunteers starting to do some clearing, but the majority of the trail is not clear yet. They told us there is a lot less ice damage in the area of the MacKaye, so that made the decision for us. If I live long enough, I will come down when the rest of the trail is finished and hike it all. The last two nights I have gone to bed listening to coonhounds on the chase. Mountains, coon hounds and pickup trucks - I could probably live down here.

This is Jan. A couple of people have inquired as to my part in this adventure. Aside from the usual (laundry, food shopping, cooking, etc.) I have found that helping Smith adjust to slackpacking is a formidable chore. (laugh) I have been tracking down libraries, telephones, and road crossings on the trail and generally keeping track of ORR. He seems to think that because he has a driver/cold drink fetcher he can go anywhere he wants, whether the trail goes there or not, and he will be picked up. So far, this is true. This may surprise some of you, but my golf has been limited to (by choice) chipping pinecones into the campfire. I am having a very good time, the weather is great, I am on my third book, I am getting a tan and I am NOT homesick. Especially for Vermont weather. And ORR and I are really getting along quite well.

The Old RidgeRunner and Jan