“I look like a mom!” my nearly fifteen year-old daughter Hannah declared in horror as we stood at Winding Stair Gap in the heart of the Nantahala Mountains to head north along the AT for a three-day hike to Wesser, North Carolina. I had made her wear a pair of my quick-dry shorts with pockets instead of the pink ones without pockets she had chosen. When backpacking, pockets function as a weight-free tool. During the day they carry your map, camera, bug repellent, and bandana for easy access; in the evening, they hold your headlamp, beanie, and other handy items to keep you from having to go back and forth to your tent or pack. The upshot of Hannah’s complaint, however, had nothing to do with utility. The shorts had no shape, she grumbled, and the color scheme of her outfit amounted to no scheme at all. Trying to fathom the depth of her distress, I asked, “So, who is going to see you out here?” “Boys,” she answered. I rolled my unsympathetic eyes and replied, “You won’t run into any boys in these mountains. It’s not as if we are in a more popular place like the Smokies, and even there, people are few and far between. Besides, we are hiking midweek when hardly anyone is on the trail.” With a step we took off steeply up the path. Soon the butterflies that swarmed Hannah freed her from self-consciousness, immersing her in nature’s delight. Up and down, up and down we went, passing an abundance of late summer flowers—tick seed, Joe Pye weed, and Turk’s cap lilies. Even with the humidity of the day we made good time and arrived at the Wine Spring campsite by 4:30, giving us plenty of time to pitch our tent, do some chores, and relax before supper.
When we went to the little spring to fetch water, much to our dismay we saw it clogged with ramen-like noodles dumped by a careless hiker, or so we thought. Upon closer inspection our stomachs lurched. The small noodles had segments: they were dead larvae, lots of them. We briefly speculated about the cause of the disgusting sight: non-biodegradable soap in the water? a hatching after a downpour and drowning? I followed the little creek that came forth downstream until I found a clear pool for filling our water bags. To purify the water it would take the filter and iodine tablets to ensure we killed every possible contaminant. We would boil water for our food anyway, making dinner safe, and we had enough fuel to boil the next day’s water. Such purification might have seemed like overkill, literally, but we did not want disease. Back at our site while the iodine tablets did their job in our water bags, we busied ourselves with tasks: hanging a long rope over an appropriately sized limb to keep our food safe from bears, stringing up our tarp in case of rain, and arranging sleeping bags, clothes, and personal items inside our tent.
Suddenly, we heard the voices of an arriving group. Boys, teenaged boys!—making me an unintentional liar. Hannah’s eyes widened and shot darts at me. We glimpsed the group setting up their tents on the rise across the creek. She whispered accusingly, “You said we wouldn’t see any cute guys on this trip. Here are cute guys and I look like crap.” She looked fine to me, but the teens looked pretty scruffy. Cute clearly lay in the eye of the beholder. The boys had come for the night. We were stuck. Our unspoken plan? Avoidance.
Their leader, a young man in his mid-twenties, soon made avoidance impossible when he strode to our site accompanied by two teens. Hannah glared at me for my gross “mom” miscalculation. The leader spoke, remarking the horrible condition of the spring. Hannah looked at me even more fiercely as if to say, “Do not engage in conversation. I know how you will start talking, and I will have to continue standing here being seen by them.” The man said they belonged to a Christian summer camp near Lake Nantahala. “Oh, no!” I groaned silently to myself as a cascade of evangelical stereotypes tumbled through my head. I dreaded the moment when they would ask, “Are you saved?”
As if in slow motion I saw the man’s face forming a question. “Are you…” he looked around and then zeroed on me, “all set with water for the night? What did you do about the spring?” Relieved that he had only asked about the spring, I nevertheless felt awkwardly stuck between Hannah and the boys. I could not say, “Go away. My daughter does not want to be seen by you because of her shorts.” I had to answer; they needed water. I felt a bit like the man in a story that Jesus told whose friend, presumably a neighbor, came at midnight to his house when he and his family were already in bed. The unexpected neighbor shamelessly banged on the door, and desperately asked the man for three loaves of bread. The neighbor explained that he had had a friend arrive extremely late and had nothing to feed him. The man gave the neighbor bread, though not with the warmest of hearts. Codes of hospitality and persistence had moved the man to mercy. I told our own unexpected neighbors about the clear pool of water a few yards downstream. I added that we were filtering and using iodine for good measure. The group’s leader nodded and said, “Sounds like a good plan. I think we’ll do the same.”
Apparently our dutiful kindness had cracked open the door of hospitality because one of the boys, taking in our campsite a few yards away, suddenly felt free to ask, “Is that an Osprey backpack?” “Yes,” Hannah piped up. The boy continued, “That is the best backpack.” Looking directly at Hannah he also asked, “Is it yours?” “Yes,” she replied, surprised by what a hot item the backpack was and she was, too, by association. When Hannah volunteered to show him the pack, I knew that barriers had fallen. I offered to lead the trio to the little pool of water, and the three quickly followed. After taking a good look they scampered back up the creek and the rise, returning a few minutes later with filters and water sacks to collect their water. Before the evening wore on, we visited them at their site and learned they were hiking a section of the Bartram Trail that overlaps the AT for 2.4 miles. We sighed a collective disappointment because discovery of our different routes meant we would not meet the next evening now that we had become trail friends. By the time Hannah and I said our good-byes, then finalized our preparations for the night, we paused to stare at the glorious reds, oranges, and deep pinks streaming through the trees at sunset, grateful for such a sight and for the good neighbors whose proximity would help us sleep better.
The next day we bid farewell to our backpacking friends and hiked first to the unique Wayah Bald stone lookout tower which, alas, we could not climb because it was under repair. Still, from the foot of the platform we saw ridge upon rising ridge of blue-green mountains as far as the eye could see. For the rest of the morning and into the early afternoon, the sun shone in and out of the gradually thickening clouds, fortunately shining when we passed two stunning vistas.
With the sky darkening considerably, we faced the decision at a late lunchtime of whether to eat or to delay our meal further and press on to our next shelter before the rain started. We admitted that we needed food, rain or shine, but even as we ate and the sun peaked through the clouds, thunder rumbled in the distance. Would it hit us or skip us? Hope springs eternal that a storm will miss you when you are hiking. Restored by lunch, we started our long approach to the Cold Spring Shelter hoping to arrive ahead of the storm, but in less than fifteen minutes the heavens opened. Rain will put pep in any hiker’s step especially when shelter is near, and over the better part of a mile Hannah’s step quickened ahead of mine, though I did not lag far behind. Arriving at the three-sided shelter, we took immediate refuge inside. We dumped our packs against the far wall and peeled off our rain gear. The rain came down in sheets, so heavily that it formed a screen between us inside and the outdoors only inches away. The Cold Spring shelter, originally built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in 1933 and refurbished since, stood as one of the less inviting shelters along the AT. Smaller than many others, sleeping only six instead of the more usual eight to ten, it had no extended front porch area between the sleeping area and the front eave, no skylight in the roof, and the sleeping platform lay less than a foot above the ground, but it offered cover. Fatigued by our hiking and the press of the rain, the shelter provided a good place to take a nap, so nap we did until the storm passed. About forty-five minutes later when the sun appeared bright and strong, we emerged from the cave-like structure, hung our wet rain gear to dry in the sun, and took a look around. Five yards away from the front of the shelter, the spring seeped from the side of the mountain to form a modest pool, then ran twenty yards farther down to a second, larger pool. Cables for hanging food bags dangled from a thick, long wire strung between two trees above. An expansive patch of bee balm flourished just beyond. Butterflies swarmed the red flowers, and in the early evening a hummingbird hovered to feed.
By 6:15pm when we had finished supper, cleaned up, and moved into our evening routine, we commented that it seemed we had the place to ourselves—without boys. No sooner had the words escaped our lips than two college-aged men showed up huffing and puffing and looking around as if puzzled. Perhaps we were the unexpected neighbors this time? Moving our stuff closer to one side of the little shelter as trail etiquette dictated, I said, “Welcome. Are you expecting many more to join us?” “Yeah,” one of the men answered still out of breath, “about twenty.” My eyes must have grown wide because he quickly added, “We’re a Boy Scout troop. We’re going to camp on the ridge up there where the tent sites are.” Hannah leaned against the shelter wall in resignation—more cute boys.
Before long, the rest of the troop tromped in and continued the short way to the ridge. I was glad the scouts had made it after the heavy rain, but when I heard intermittent distant thunder I had my doubts about the weather for the remainder of the evening and night. I hoped the storm would stay far enough way to give the scouts time to set up their camp, cook their dinner, eat, and clean up. They pitched their tents and tarps, but a powerful shower fell just as they finished. When the downpour eased, several of the leaders and one teen came to the spring clutching their filters and water bags. Chastened by our experience from the evening before, Hannah and I were ready to meet our new neighbors by lending a hand. It did not look like there was much we could do, but anything in wet weather is a bonus. We volunteered to join them in collecting and purifying water from the spring to speed them in their process. I pumped water with my filter, and Hannah teamed up with the scout to hold a water bag while he filtered. Talk happens under such circumstances, and we learned that the boys had come a quite a distance to reach the Nantahalas, from southern Louisiana, and already they had hiked several days. We shared oo’s and ah’s over the common views we had seen, and talked about how quickly we had donned rain gear when the first storm broke. I remarked that this was the first time I had ever met anyone from Louisiana on the AT. We mutually regretted that the weather would prevent us from sharing a campfire. The scouts would be good neighbors for the night because we knew that we would rest better for having them near. Trail sync fell within a couple of hours, quiet simultaneously blanketing them on the ridge and us in the shelter. The rain fell as a persistent mist through the night.
Trail sync held true into the morning, though for Hannah and me it was because we decided to sleep an extra forty-five minutes when we first awoke and saw the sky was still drippy. We converged with the scouts again over the spring, but Hannah and I left earlier from the campsite: with only two of us to eat breakfast and pack our belongings, we could leave sooner. Setting out in a dark fog that had taken the place of the rain, we climbed the rest of the way to Copper Ridge Bald and then descended 1,200’ over three miles to Tellico Gap, a key landmark in the day’s journey. By the time we neared the gap, the fog had burned off and I could see that the dirt road up and over the gap had been significantly widened since I had hiked there twenty years earlier. Huge TVA transmission towers loomed overhead, and power crackled as it surged through the high tension wires.
Whereas years before my husband and I had popped out at the gap and stood in solitude with only the wind blowing around us, Hannah and I came upon unexpected neighbors yet again. Half a dozen men—some in their 50s and 60s sitting in camp chairs, others in their 20s sitting on coolers—the scouts’ support team, waited with snacks and water. Their van, parked farther down the road, stood tucked out of sight to the side of the road. The men chivalrously offered Hannah and me their seats, and because Hannah and I had planned to take a longish break at the gap to refuel for the strenuous climb immediately ahead, Hannah accepted with a grateful, luxuriating sigh while I politely declined and sat on the ground. We chatted with the men as we munched our food and drank from our water bags to lighten our load, despite the men’s generous offer of water from their coolers. We learned that the troop hailed from Metairie, Louisiana; that they had done this same hike with the scouts several years earlier; and that they had come with a new set of boys for them to earn their long-distance hiking badge.
When one of the men asked where we lived, and we replied Charlottesville, Virginia, another man immediately chimed in, “Hey! Do you know the Raising Cane’s chicken place?” “Of course!” we said. We gushed about how we enjoyed the food and also frequented “Cane’s” for its support of our local high school. Hannah lit up with her special magical smile and told them how “Cane’s” had catered her prom and how we knew that the manager tried hard to keep teenagers employed by flexing work schedules around athletic practices and drama rehearsals. With a big smile through his white mustache the man said proudly, “Well, that manager is my son. You go there and tell him to give you some free chicken. His name is Claude, and mine is too.” Claude, Sr., went on to say that his son had moved to Charlottesville about a year earlier and now had a baby, but he had not visited Claude, Jr., yet. Hannah and I could hardly believe what we were hearing! The men so enjoyed the happy quirkiness of it all that a few minutes after the troop showed up and had settled into snacks and drinks, the men shouted “Y’all are never gonna believe this!” The boys, who had simply seen us as the people they had camped with the night before, started saying, “No way! That’s unreal!” And it was, in light of our usual expectations. But perhaps fellow hikers and Jesus’ stories about mercies whether large or small, wholehearted or grudging, challenged our expectations.
We continued to sit with each other, eating, drinking, and chatting, when out of nowhere two, white safari-styled jeeps carrying four passengers crested the dirt road on a rustic tour of the Nantahalas. Each vehicle had a semi-open top: a canopy that provided plenty of shade and elevated seats, all for enhanced sightseeing. The passengers looked at us bug eyed, clearly unprepared to see people in these “wilds,” and not quite sure what to make of us, neither fauna nor tourists like themselves. As they passed out of sight down the other side of the mountain, Hannah turned to the group and spoke with a British accent: “And here we have the backpackers in their natural habitat. If we are quiet and patient, we might even see them eat the trail food known among the natives as ‘gorp.’” We all laughed. One of the younger men then said, “You are so right. They were looking at us like we were in the National Geographic!” Unexpected neighbors indeed. After more laughter, Hannah and I packed up. Ten sweaty minutes later, panting our way up the trail, it dawned on us that we had failed to take Claude’s picture. We berated ourselves because we knew how great it would have been to have a picture as proof that we had met him, but we were not going back. When it comes to a steep uphill, hikers have a saying, “There’s no giving up real estate,” and in this case as we climbed 800’ in 1.2 miles to Wesser Bald, the maxim held true.
We had one more ascent that led to a stupendous overlook of the Little Tennessee River, known as the Jump Up, and then it was a dramatic four-mile downhill to our car. Down, down, down we went. In the first half mile, we negotiated narrow, hairpin switchbacks, taking tiny careful steps to avoid pitching off the mountain. We passed a cave, descended some solidly built rock and wood steps, and hiked down excellently maintained tread way. A small cluster of the scouts leapfrogged ahead of us. Several times we berated ourselves further for not having taken a picture of Claude and hoped that our friends would believe us when we returned home. Steeply down we continued, Hannah’s feet periodically begging for relief and the brake shoes in my knees groaning over the extra wear the mountain placed on them.
Nearing the end of the trail we could hear the traffic from a major road, US 19 at Wesser. The scent of hamburgers cooking on the grill at the Nantahala Outdoor Center wafted across the road and through the trees, and our stomachs grumbled not only for food but civilization. Still in the woods but about thirty yards from trail’s end who did we see but Claude?! He was waiting for the other scouts. When I asked Claude if we could take his picture, he did not hesitate with a “yes.” After snapping photos, we assured him that we would look up his son.
Back in Charlottesville, however, we did not go directly to Raising Cane’s. We waited for several months, feeling awkward because we did not already know Claude Metherne, Jr., and we decided it might be best for time to pass so that Claude, Sr., could tell his son about us. We thought the story of how we met Claude, Sr., would sound more believable coming from Claude, Sr., himself rather than from a couple of strangers who simply showed up in a store and told such an improbable tale. The longer we waited to visit, the more anxious we became. In retrospect, how and where we met Claude, Sr., seemed genuinely outrageous. Screwing up our courage one day, we finally went when we knew a high school friend was working. We asked if the manager, Mr. Metherne, was there. When the teen answered yes, I said in my best parental mode, “Give him this message word-for-word. He will know what it means. ‘The people your father met on the Appalachian Trail are here.’” The teen, though puzzled, went dutifully. He returned followed by Claude, Jr., who came towards us with a huge smile and an extended hand. Although we had the picture of Claude, Sr., with us, such proof was unnecessary. The three of us chatted for quite a while, happy to know each other as new neighbors. Hannah and I did not ask for free chicken; some things in life are even better.