It was real quiet when I woke up this morning. Since it was light I was able to explore my surroundings a little bit more and found we were camped on the bank of the Ocoee River. I found it difficult to believe that the Olympic Whitewater events were held here in 1996. There was no river. The bed was a jumble of wet boulders with a small trickle of water flowing among the rocks. Tom and Charles joined me and we looked at this strange sad sight. After a few minutes we noticed that the trickle turned into a stream and then a small river and then finally a raging river filled with rapids, eddies, and waterfalls as the water rushed around and over the now partially submerged boulders. I figured that the water rose at a rate of 6 to 8 inches per minute in the formerly dry river bed.
I then learned that the TVA had dammed the Ocoee River in 1942 and diverted nearly 100% of the flow through a pipeline where it was used to generate electricity as it was fed through a series of hydro-electric power generating plants. The river remained in that state till the Atlanta Olympics when the gates were opened and the river was allowed to run its normal course for the games. When the games were over the river gates were closed and electric production resumed.
Whitewater enthusiasts would have none of that and lobbied for the return of the river and an accord was soon reached. During the spring, summer, and fall the TVA would turn on the river during daylight hours. The rest of the time the river would be turned off so that electricity could be generated. Imagine that, a river with an on off switch.
Todays planned hike was only 8 miles but they promised to be tough miles. The main event was to be a 3,200 foot ascent of Big Frog Mountain. This would be the longest continuous ascent I have done. I guess the fact that it was "only" 8 miles lulled us into a sense of complacency but we didn't manage to get started till after 9. Water was a primary concern not because there wasn't any but we weren't sure whether or not there was any. Tom and Charles started out with 2 liters each and I took 3. Fortunately the temperature was not too hot and it was noted that while we might get a little uncomfortable we were not likely to die from dehydration.
We finally set out and started climbing. Basically we went up. up. up the entire day. For the most part the grade was moderate to steep and we were right to be concerned about water as the few creeks we crossed were dry. The leaves seemed to be at their peak or a little past for color but there were few vistas where we could see an expanse of color. I finally understand the expression of not being able to see the forest for the trees.
We finally achieved ridgeline in the late afternoon. Tom and Charles got there quite a few minutes before I did. I arrived and collapsed on the ground completely spent. We found a small clearing a couple of a hundred feet further up the ridge and prepared a dry camp. I still had a liter and a half of water left which was more than Charles and Tom had combined. I was mildly concerned about the situation but decided that we couldn't do anything about it. The temperature started dropping quickly and the wind started picking up. We estimated it to be 20 miles per hour with gusts up to 40. It just roared through the trees. We quickly set up tents and tarps to serve as windblocks and prepared a quick dinner. After dinner it was sleeping bag time.
For the past few weeks I had been entertaining notions about getting out and hiking again but things just seemed to keep cropping up and getting in the way. Then October 28 arrived. On that date I received an e-mail from Tom Dupree, a person I met while on the trail in North Carolina. He told me that he was going down to the Tennessee/Georgia area to do some hiking on the Benton McKay Trail. While technically not the Appalachian Trail it si close enough that I decided to include it here.
The southern portions of the Appalachian Trail are heavily used. To take some pressure off it the Benton McKay was created as an alternate route from Springer Mountain in Georgia to Davenport Gap in the Smokies. The Appalachian trail leaves springer and heads east north east befor curving back to the west while the Benton McKay leaves Springer and goes Northwest before making a curve and heading in a Northerly direction.
It promised to be an interesting hike and I took him up on his offer. There were to be some challenges. The Benton McKay, being relatively new, is not as well documented as other trails I hiked, our main maps were geological survey topographical maps, and a good portion of our planned route went through the Big Frog Wilderness where there were no trail blazings with numerous intersections with other unblazed trails. We hoped to be able to hike about 40 miles of this trail.
I was to drive to Lexington, where Tom lives and works, leave my care there, and take Toms car down to the Ocoee River, near Ducktown, TN and meet a third member of the party, CharlesDeWitt from Nashville, TN.
Well, flexibility is a good thing. I left for Lexington at 10:30 this morning and upon arriving discovered that Lexington only built garages for midget cars. My van would not fit in the parking garages in the area. We decided to leave his car and head for Tennessee in my van. The drive was great. The weather perfect. We stopped for a late lunch at Cracker Barrel down around Corbin. It was the first time I was dissapointed about what I had at Cracker Barrel. Since I was getting out of my rut I decided to get completely out and ordered their fish. It wasn't bad but Cracker Barrel has many better things on their menu. After eating we were hung up in a massive traffic snarl in Knoxville. After all was said and done we didn't actually meet up with Charles till well after dark. No hiking today.
We set up camp in a forest service campground and figured out how far we could go. We shortened the distance. Each of the 3 of us, it turned out, had to be back at our respective homes on Monday night and we had lost the opportunity to hike any on today. We decided on Dyer Gap a distance of about 24 miles. The next chore was to find a place to stash a car at Dyer Gap. We knew that the trail crossed a forest service road there. The questions was finding the particular forest service road and staying on it till we found what we thought was Dyer Gap. There were no road signs or destinations signs saying you are here.
We finally found the place, we hoped, and left Charles car there and drove back to the Campground. On the way back we stopped for a snack at a Mexican Restaraunt in Copper Bottom, GA. We got there at 9:57pm and the place closed at 10:00. The waitress did not appear to be happy to see us. A half hour and 10 of the hottest chicken wings I ever had later we were back on the road to our campsite . Ready for an early start in the morning.