(Written April 4th, 10:45 pm)

Yesterday was lightly rainy in a pleasant sort of way. Today was gorgeous weather all day long. Our little group (10ish people) has continued to hang out together, which has been a lot of fun. Sometimes we end up hiking in various sets of 2-4, sometimes solo. But we’ve continued to encounter each other on breaks, on the trail, and in camp at night. Today was a particularly good example of the current group dynamic. We all stayed at or near Hawk Mountain Shelter last night, and planned to make it to Gooch Mountain Shelter today (a fairly short hike, because we’re all still trying to sort of ease into this). I left camp with a couple friends, and we had a lovely morning hiking to Cooper Gap. We ate lunch there together, because it was a pretty spot for a break, and the local army base actually leaves a water tank truck there to help hikers. Then, in ones and twos, more folks from the “group” start showing up and we get to talking. We even made a new friend during this, a really nice hiker from France who just got to the US for the first time a few days ago. Eventually there are 7-8 of us there hanging out, having a lovely time. Eventually, people break off to start hiking again, once more in ones and twos. I left on my own that time, but not an hour later, came to a gorgeous stream where Nick, my friend from earlier, has already taken a dip in the water. I join, and pretty soon our friends trickle back in as they arrive from the previous spot, and most of us get in the cold water, which feels fantastic. Eventually we dry off and split up to hike the final couple miles to camp in the same fashion.

When we get back to camp we each made dinner and we hung out some more; our new French friend was given a small bottle of Jack Daniel’s by a random person yesterday, so we did a shot with him. Then two people start stretching in the shelter loft, and this turns into an impromptu, and very silly, yoga class up there, which I of course joined. Then our friend who recently earned himself the trail name Pyro made a campfire, and we all finished the night just talking about anything and everything (although mostly telling stories) around the fire.

Some photos from the Springer to Hawk Mountain section (April 3):

April 4: