5/12/00
Day 51
Pond Flats Campsite
592. 8 miles

For a place called "Pond Flats," this is at a respectable altitude of about 3800 feet.  The elevation profile makes Pond Mountain look like a Mayan Pyramid or a Southwest Mesa, and I'm on the flat part on top.

This is the 3rd night in a row since I left Damascus that I've camped out rather than staying at a shelter.  Among the reasons:

• I'm still afraid I'm headed into some kind of mob scene and tenting is one way to avoid them.

• On the way into Damascus I was planning to visit the outfitter there and buy a 1 pound tarp to replace my 3 pound tent, but by the time you add in a ground cloth and mosquito netting, you're basically back to a tent.

• The last few shelters I've passed in Tenessee have been designed with very short floor lengths and I'm not sure I'd fit.

• It's finally warm enough that the inside of the tentfly doesn't get soaked with condensation from my breathing.

• And the heat has brought out the bugs big-time, and a tent provides refuge that a shelter can't.

I've intended to write you each of the last two nights, but I've retreated into my tent from the biting flies well before dark, and, once prone, the temptation to just rest my head for a little while has been too great.  Eleven hours later it's morning and time to get up.  Amazing, since 6 ½ hours of sleep was about my average when I was home.

The first 2 days out of Damascus were mostly ridge-walking.  Smooth trail, well maintained, with rolling ups and downs.  Today the Trail dropped down to Watauga Lake, crossed a dam, and passed by a public beach before climbing up Pond Mtn.  Tomorrow I'm only going about six miles and I'll stop at a hostel called "Kincora", which numerous northbounders have recommended as a must-visit.  I don't think that the facilities are remarkable in themselves, but the folks who run it are supposed to be exceptionally nice, and have made loyal friends of many thru-hikers.  I understand they do a shuttle every day into the nearby town of Hampton, so that people can buy groceries.

I must admit I was a little concerned by the letter you sent with the maildrop.  It sounded like you were transcribing the entirety of these letters out to the Rockdogs email list.  I think of these entries as partly a long disjointed letter to you (a form of payment for your services as "mail-drop guy"), and partially a journal of notes to myself, because I know that I have no memory and will completely forget all these niggling details that make up each day.

As an example of the kind of thing I hope you would have the discretion NOT to spread around, I think its time for an update on "Greg's Disgusting Body and Its Many Problems":

1. Left foot still has tendonitis in arch, weakness and pain in the ankle, and a new tenderness beneath the heel.

2. Blisters on both heels have ceased occurring and the skin is forming callouses.

3. Recently I've noticed a marked puffiness above the sock line, but only on my right shin.  Odd that it's not happening on both legs, or neither.

4. The exposed legs from sock line to hem of shorts have numerous healing scratches from green briars and other thorns.

5. The horrors of SBCR (Sweaty Butt Crack Rash) have come with the recent hot weather.  On this trip I've been using Gold Bond Cream (the powder, under these conditions, would just turn the two cheeks into sandpaper).  Once applied, the icy-burning sensation makes it hard to keep a normal expression on one's face as one is walking back from the privy.  The ultimate cure for this condition is simple soap and water and dry skin for a couple days.

6. On a related front I also have something of a sweat rash on the sides of both hips and across the shoulders where the pack straps run.  I don't think this is so much abrasion as simply areas that aren't allowed to dry out.

7. I have accidentally triggered the sciatica-like pain in my left hip/leg a few more times.  I must remember I have to sit hunched forward, otherwise if I lean back on my left buttock I seem to pinch a nerve.  I'm sure that if I went to a doctor and said "I get a stabbing pain when I sit like this", he'd say, "Don't sit like that.  That'll be $79."

8. For a while I was getting a "fluttering" pain in my left-middle back, in about the same spot as that paralyzing spasm I got my second morning on the trail.  It would come on a while after I started hiking.  I would try adjusting the straps, switching the hiking staff to the opposite hand, and eventually the pain would go away.  Though I never knew if anything I'd done had made the difference.  It happened every day for a couple of weeks and then subsided.

9. I haven't had a chance to weigh myself, but the last time I looked in a mirror I thought I looked thinner.  I can still pinch flab all around my midsection, but I think there is less of it.  As a result, the hip-belt on my pack doesn't fit as well as it once did.  I think it used to cup nicely around my spare tire, and now I have to cinch it against my hip bones.

10. My neck is stiff and sore all the time, but it has been for years, so what's new?

11. I may have discovered a miracle cure for zits!  I am a bit reluctant to draw conclusions yet because my face has spontaneously cleared up for short periods before.  However, since I started this adventure there has been a steady healing of old zits and no new ones forming.  This makes no sense to me since I am only able to wash about once a week, so it would seem like bacteria would be having a field day.  The only thing I can figure is that I spend much of each day sweating.  Maybe this is keeping my pores open or reducing the thickness of my skin oils so that they don't clog.  So all I have to do once I return to my normal life is figure out a way to spend about 8 hours of every day in major physical exertion under a heavy load, and I can remain zit free!  Sounds easy enough.

12. Well, what's left?  Boogers?  Poo-poos?  I hope that this has taught you a lesson about the role of the Editor, and the need to select only those portions for distribution that are worthy of public interest.