Ah, the hiking trail. A place where you can soak up the wonders of nature. Where you can catch spectacular moon rises from your seat by the campfire. Where you can freely blow snot rockets and poop with a view.
I mean, wouldn't you want to poop here? (I promise we hikers wouldn't make you use leaves as toilet paper for your first poop in the woods.)
I have been backpacking along the Georgia section of the Appalachian Trail for the last three and a half years in 15-20 mile doses at a time. I don't so much possess the desire (or the 6 months required) to thru-hike all 2,000+ miles. I just need a long weekend in the woods with my trusty pocket map and my closest girlfriends who are willing to sustain on reconstituted meals and heavily-filtered mountain water.
My most recent backpacking trip was a significant one. Christy, my best friend of 30 years, was my hiking companion, and for me, our weekend trek was going to complete the 78 miles of the AT that are in Georgia.
I carried a flask of campfire whiskey to celebrate the accomplishment. It pairs beautifully with berry cobbler, in case you desire to try the stuff.
We spent the night before our weekend on the trail by going out for cocktails and total science nerdom at a museum in Atlanta. Read: delight in the fraternization with total strangers who have recently showered and aren't soliciting for extra strips of moleskin. After a few hours of feeling blue-jeans-and-boots-with-heels fancy while we mingled with wine makers and physicists, we were back at Christy's place for our final sleep in cozy beds and taking hot showers before a weekend without any comforts.
No reason to feel sorry for us. We bring this on ourselves by choosing to live like hobos (on purpose) for days at a time. At least we'd have the comfort of engaging in the occasional nasal-relieving projectiles.
We parked cars at each end of our route, and the trailhead was swamped with hikers. We figured it must be because the autumn weather was agreeable since one normally sees that kind of foot traffic when the thru season starts in spring. But we like meeting people on the trail and figured, at the very least, we'd have company each night we camped. Boots laced and the "before" selfie taken, we headed up the mountain to start our 3-day journey of 17 miles and elevation challenging enough to give us hella sexy calf muscles.
And then only 30 minutes in, I was trying to convince myself not to end it prematurely.
Hikers practice a certain etiquette in communication as they encounter each other on the trail. Most of the time, it's talk around a campfire of what everyone learned on the trail that day. But when hikers pass each other, they will ask for map clarifications or report if a water source has dried up. Things like that.
We noticed a trio of guys in their twenties hiking southbound (SOBO) who stood frozen about 50 yards up from us. They were watching a trio of gals hiking NOBO just ahead of us begin to run and scream like mad in their approach toward the men. We stopped in our path, trying to figure what the hell was going on. Maybe it was a snake, and the women had a serious phobia? We yelled up to the gentlemen for guidance.
"Yellow jackets!" they yelled back. "You probably shouldn't come this way."
For the love of beef jerky...
But we had been planning this trip for 6 months, and we are slightly insane. So we started walking up the trail like yellow-jacket-repelling force fields would materialize around us. We didn't make it 20 yards before I had a searing pain in my right thigh, and I could hear Christy screaming. Back down the trail we ran, swatting and hating those 6-legged assholes.
We looked back up toward the women hikers. They must have made it past the nest because they dropped their packs and started checking themselves for stings. The men, fearing the same fate, made the decision to go off trail and up the side of the mountain so they could continue their SOBO journey to the spot where we were standing. Their force fields must have worked because they made it down to us unscathed. They were clearly proud of their life choices.
"Yeah, just go the way we came," they said. "You'll totally avoid the nest."
And so we did. Back to normal conversation as we steadied ourselves on a much steeper incline off the path and thinking we were only risking a few cuts and scrapes from wild brambles.
And just as I made a joke about how I hoped we hadn't pissed off the woodland gods so that they wouldn't send angry tracker jackets (yes, of course in reference to The Hunger Games trilogy), we found the we had walked right to the edge of their nest. It was not on the trail like we all had believed. It was hollow space at the base of a fallen tree.
"Chris? CHRIS? HOLY ----"
Insert all the expletives ever created. They were falling out of my mouth faster than I could see them in my head. I could not tell you what Christy was yelling.
She ran north. I ran south. She made it to the group of female hikers who now had a young gentleman with them, trying to figure out his route through. I wouldn't notice him until later. I was too busy wearing hitchhiking yellow jackets from the waist down. They were angrily straddling my leggings and injecting me with their fire. I didn't know whether to pick them off one by one or swat at them or just wait for them to fall off. I can't even remember how I actually did get them all off. But their removal was necessary for me to see any kind of relief. The pain remained, and it would only intensify for the next few hours.
I was done. I wanted to go home. Actually, I wanted my momma, some numbing cream, and my flask of whiskey. But my best friend rallied the hikers where she stood to get me to come up to her.
"JUST RUN FOR IT!"
Have you ever tried to run in hiking boots? While carrying nearly 30 pounds on your back and hiking poles in each hand? Oh, and while both of your legs are on effing fire?
Yeah, me neither.
I really love my best friend. And I love the trail. So I did what any buttercup would do: I sucked it up.
I ran. I probably looked like a total idiot, cussing the whole way. But I ran. And I made it to the other side.
As soon as I made it past the trail's Threshold of Pain and Hellfire, I removed my pants. No hesitation. My hiking britches didn't even come off all the way since I was laced into my boots and hiking socks. But yeah--totally dropped trou down to my turquoise hiker panties right in front of a bunch of strangers to assess the damage. I was bleeding from several of the stings, including one square in the middle of my right ass cheek. Christy was bleeding from a few, as well, but she was stung from the waist up. The worst of it was on her hand. Out came the first aid kits.
So we're standing there, applying Benadryl cream to ourselves and comparing number of stings with the group of ladies who bolted through ahead of us. The numbers kept changing as we all kept finding more. But thankfully, no one had an allergy.
That's when I noticed the male hiker as he decided to come past all of us wounded women. I was still pantsless with the Benadryl cream in my hand. I offered a cringing smile.
"Sorry for the show," I offered as he hiked past.
He laughed and tipped his hat. "I enjoyed every moment of it!"
Well. I already had on my big girl panties, so it was time to pull up my big girl pants and hike on.
Thanks for reading! Part II to come soon.
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