Thanksgiving Day from Andrew’s Bald in the Smokies.
Such a sweet picture of Jesus and Young Life.
Here’s a sneak peak of my first experiment with a GoPro and video editing! Sorry if it makes you dizzy…
Sunrise view from Shuckstack Fire Tower.
I decided to make an attempt at a high-mileage backpacking trip this week. Over the past 2 years or so I’ve done a lot in the Smokies. I’ve seen pretty much everything up there that I wanted to see and been almost everywhere that I wanted to go. The only thing left on my list that I really wanted to do was the 72ish mile stretch of the Appalachian Trail that runs through the Park. I’ve done little sections of it but haven’t done the whole thing, and I wanted to do it in one trip. And, since that stretch is a really popular hike, I decided to put a little twist on it. I wanted to try and do the whole thing in 2 days.
I decided on 2 days mainly because I don’t know anyone who has ever done it that fast outside of professional ultrarunners trying to set AT thru-hike records. And since I don’t know anyone that has done it, why not try it?
Austin Morgan is about the only person I know who could and would be willing to try it with me, so we woke up at 3am Tuesday morning to get started. My mom dropped us off at the southern trailhead by Fontana Dam and we hit the trail at 5:45am with headlamps on in the dark. One very long day later we made it to Mt. Collins Shelter, our halfway point a little past Clingman’s Dome, just before 9pm that night. We woke up the next morning at 4am and hit the trail again in the dark with headlamps on. Another VERY long day later we made it to the northern boundary of the Park, Davenport Gap, right at 8:30pm. It ended up totaling about 74 miles (with side trips to water sources and shelters) in 2 days, stringing together back to back 37 mile days. Finishing this trip marks about my 250th mile in the Park.
We saw 2 black bears and one big ole’ rattlesnake. We actually came really close to the first bear, probably within 30 yards. We startled it early in the morning on day 1. It saw us and crashed about 15 yards through the woods, stopped, turned towards us and let out an earth-shaking growl (evidently they rarely growl). Which brings me to a side lesson…
*What To Do When You Encounter A Bear*
First off, the worst thing that you can do to a bear is startle it. So your best bear-deterrent method should be to make some noise when you’re in bear country. Without being annoying and ruining the peaceful mountain atmosphere, make a little noise just so anything in your vicinity knows you’re in the area. Any bear that hears you in the woods is most likely going to try and avoid you. Being so quiet that you accidentally round a corner and come face to face with an unexpected bear would not be a great situation.
If you do happen to accidentally startle a nearby bear that doesn’t immediately turn and run from you, like what happened to me and Austin, here’s what to do…
Make sure you let the bear know that if a fight does go down, you’re going to kick his tail. But, the HUGE key to this is relaying this message without seeming aggressive. It has to be a stern yet passive message. You want to let him know, “I don’t wanna fight you, but if it has to happen, I’m gonna kill you.” You communicate this by holding your ground, bowing up and making yourself look big, and yelling or making loud noise. The bear doesn’t want to fight you unless it feels like it has to be aggressive to protect itself. If you are assertive it will turn and go the other way. This is the method I like to call, “Don’t want none, won’t be none.”
DO NOT turn and run away. This could possibly trigger a chase instinct in the bear. Don’t look or act scared. If possible, keep moving down the trail.
This VERY rarely happens, but if a black bear does become aggressive, DO NOT play dead. That method is only true for Grizzly Bears (and goodness pray you never see a Grizzly in the East). If you play dead with a black bear it will just kill you easier. If a bear becomes aggressive, then its time to put your money where your mouth is, and kick his tail. Fight back with everything you have, that’s your best chance.
When the black bear stopped and growled at us a little north of Fontana, Austin and I bowed up and respectfully yelled at it, “If you value your life, black bear, you’ll keep moving.” It turned and headed the other direction, and we moved on down the trail. Textbook.
Then we dominated 74 miles in 2 days.
*What To Do When You See A Big Ole’ Rattlesnake In The Middle Of The Trail*
Run as fast as you can in the other direction.
Panorama of a sunrise in the Smokies from the top of Shuckstack fire tower. Cades Cove is off in the distance under all those clouds.
I ran the Crazy 8s 8k in Kingsport last weekend. It was my first race since high school track and the first road race I’ve ever run. It was super fun! It started at 10pm and wove in a figure eight through the streets of Kingsport, and the whole town was lining the streets cheering and music was playing and everything was lit up. It’s called the “Fastest 8k In the World,” because the world record time was set there and every year people try to beat it. The winner this year was about 20 seconds off the world record. My goal was to finish under 40 minutes, and I finished in 39:17, so it was a success! Good first race!
Photo taken and edited by Savannah.
Knoxville does a thing every year (evidently, who knew?) called the 24 Hour Film Festival. It’s a basic film festival in that you make a film and submit it for people to watch and have fun and there’s awards and stuff, but it’s different in that you only have 24 hours to make it. 24 hours before the films are due they publish the requirements to make sure nothing is prerecorded. For example, this years films had to include the Knoxville Sunsphere, a remote control, and the dialogue, “I remember the first time I went to jail” somewhere in the recording. You then have 24 hours to write, shoot, and edit your film of 4 minutes or less. Pretty cool really.
My friend and co-worker Jordan Burris won this year’s award for Best Comedy at the festival. He and a few of his friends threw together this video called “P.A.C”, and its really good, especially when you realize they did it all in 24 hours! So I figured I’d show Jordan some love (he’s the guy with the beard that does most of the talking).
