Gooch Mountain Shelter to Woody Gap

Day Three –  Sunday, October 2
5 miles in 3.5 hours
Gooch Mountain Shelter to Woody Gap

Ladies, if you can’t pee and poop in the woods, this life is not for you!  I found that I could do lots of things that I don’t like to do – like blow my nose by holding one nostril and blowing the other one out on the ground, yuck!  But I did it.  One of the best accessories that I brought with me was my purple bandana hanging on the loop of my backpack on the front right side.  I wiped my nose a lot with it, but I didn’t want to blow my nose in it!  So I had to resort to the other means.  By day three, my nose was sore and raw from wiping it.  I guess the cool weather, plus the damp leaves, etc. was to blame for that.

Oh yea – be careful where you squat.  We saw lots of three-leaved vines out there and I was successful in avoiding them – UNTIL the very last day of our journey when, evidently, I squatted in the wrong place and came home with a good patch of poison ivy in all the wrong places!  Ouch!



3.5 miles to go on our short day.

We have a short day today!  Hallelujah!  We were ready for one, I was so grateful by now that we had planned to go into town tonight to rest up and re-group.

The hike down Ramrock Mountain into Woody Gap was pleasant and short.  It was strange, on the way through the forest we began to see what looked like bears up in the trees, but found that it was only large knot holes on the side of the trees, ha ha.  I’m glad we were not walking through here in the dark!

The tree knot that looked like a bear!

Our shuttle awaits.

We were met at 12:30 by Josh to go back to the hostel for the night. 



We enjoyed a good hot bath, did our laundry and rested until supper time.  Then we went downtown Dahlonega to Porterhouse Steaks and enjoyed a wonderful, fulfilling, LARGE meal of Sirloin steak, baked potato, green beans and bread.  Umm, umm, good!

We were very glad that we had planned a short day today.  After 2 and a half days on the trail we were VERY sore!  Our Florida flat-lands had not prepared us for all the ups and downs of the mountains.  I took lots of Ibuprofen over the next several days.   



We made it!

The view from Woody Gap.

Before going back on the trail, we took a hard look at our packs to see what we could leave behind.  Every pound makes a big difference when you are climbing a mountain!  Anything we didn’t use on the first phase would be left behind, except for the rain gear.  We have been very fortunate so far not to have to deal with rain, but you never know.  For me, out goes the change of clothing except extra socks, the thermal top and bottom, the camp towel (a bandana works just fine for a small towel and is lighter), the headlamp (although this went back in the pack on the next phase of the trip after the wild night we had in the woods), and some of the snacks.  Okay, I’ll admit it – out goes the mascara and the face powder compact.  (I wanted to look good in the pictures!! But after three days of not using these products, I didn’t care anymore.)  Although I did later put back the compact, not for the powder but for the mirror.   This picture looks like others were trying to lighten their load too, ha ha. 

I made a little difference in the weight, but not much.



I's a sock.