Pinhoti Trail Section 6: 1/24/2014 - 1/26/2014

It has been quite a while since I've posted anything about backpacking. However, I'm back in backpacking mode again and just completed an 11.3 mile section of the Pinhoti trail here in AL. I know some of you guys do that in half a day, but for my nephew and I - it was quite the adventure. Here's a link to the route guide that we followed for the trip:

http://www.pinhotitrailalliance.org/006-tg.html

Friday night, due to Kevin's schedule, we weren't able to arrive at the trail head until around 8:15pm.

The low (according to the news) was supposed to be 19F, however I suspect it was a smidgen lower than that up on the mountain. I also suspect I may get shamed for night time hiking, but I must say there's a certain rush to it. The stars and our headlamps lit the way.

We hiked about 3 miles to the first fire ring of the section. First things first, we started a fire.

...and of course - checked the cell phones to see if we had enough signal to let my wife and Kevin's girlfriend know we were okay. We actually had signal most of the trip.

I have no idea exactly how cold it was. I can tell you I slept in a Kelty Cosmic Down 20 deg bag with smartwool socks, icebreaker underwear, icebreaker long johns, icebreaker t-shirt, and icebreaker long sleeve 200 weight - on top of a exped downmat 7 short pad...and I was COLD. Not so cold that I was worried or anything, but just cold enough that I had a hard time sleeping. Mostly my feet. The second night I had an epiphany just before bed and pulled my outdoor research gloves on over the top of my toes over my socks. Worked like a charm for that little bit of toasty my toes were lacking. lol. Nonetheless, we made it through the night! We woke about 6am.

I love pics of the view looking out of the door of my tent in the morning. No clue why, but they're my fav pics of all the trips I go on.

This was the first trip with my new cook-set. It's the GSI Soloist with a Snow Peak LiteMax Titanium stove. I absolutely LOVE this cook set. I upgraded from a JetBoil kit. I wanted something that had #1 more control over heat (JetBoil has 2 settings: off and "THIS THING IS ABOUT TO TAKE OFF LIKE A ROCKET!") & #2 a NON-STICK pot...which apparently doesn't seem to be a go-to feature for backpacking pots, but the soloist is nonstick! I learned the hard way that ramen noodles and JetBoil do not make friends.

We hiked around 6.5 miles Saturday. The first part of it took the longest as it involves a lot of elevation climb. As you go up the south side of the mountain, the trail does a bunch of switch-backs up a ginormous rock garden. Rock gardens are the BEST way to climb elevation. Why you may ask? Because there's plenty of objects that are the perfect height for sitting on. I turned around and caught Kevin standing there with his hands in his pants and made a slightly crude, but share-able joke: I said, "Dude, it's so cold; are you warming up your hands - or cooling off your balls?" lol. He replied. "Both".

My "awesome" face:

There were lots of places where water had frozen in layers over the rocks. Really pretty.

There was a nice little cliff at the top of the rock garden part, a short distance from the ridge.

Reaching the top was amazing. I love the views, but most of all the feeling of absolute bliss that comes with a complete disconnect from "normal" life. This is home away from home. It appears that I didn't hide the huge chunk of Hershey chocolate bar I had in my mouth very well.

We hiked along the ridge the rest of the day. We saw amazing views, many of which had fire rings. But with the weather the way it was, the wind up there was INTENSE. We both vowed to return this summer when the wind would be welcomed. I'm actually wanting to try some hammock camping, and there are some places with amazing views where one could safely set-up a hammock and wake up to mountain views. Don't know why that's important, but it's the little things I do this for. We continued on until we came down off the main ridge. We refilled on water at a spring crossing and picked a nice little campsite with a fire ring waiting for us. We were both really sore and tired. We probably carried too much in our packs. I really need to make a spreadsheet of all my gear and see what some of the experts on this board might suggest to help me shave it down. Here's a shot of Kevin next to my Nemo Losi 2p:

We probably set up camp around 5:30 or so. It wasn't as cold Saturday night so we spent a couple of hours just hanging out by the fire, made dinner, etc. We went to bed early at around 8:00 pm. We were beat! We slept good and warm. The temp was not as low. I had gone to bed with my fleece on fearing a repeat of the temps from the night before, but I ended up having to remove it around 1:00 am. My feet stayed nice and warm with my gloves over the end of them. Sunday came and we knew we had somewhere around 3 miles to go. We climbed up out of the valley back onto the next ridge. The best views we found here.

The spot the 2 previous shots were taken from had a fire ring. I immediately called my wife and asked did she think my stepson could do a little less than 3 miles down the trail. He's 10. I guess we'll have to see! Plenty of places to camp between the trail head and there if we get tired. I will be back when it's warmer for sure!

And then, the victory shot from the parking lot with the trail head entrance arches just behind us. We brought two cars so from here it was a quick ride back down hwy 281 in Kevin's car to bring me back to my car to start the trip home. This trip was an absolute blast! It was our first section hike. In the past I've only done loops or in and out trips on the same trail. Taking two cars is a tad burdensome, but totally worth it. I'm craving more trails now! I hope you guys enjoyed this report. Any comments, questions, or suggestions are welcome! - Wes