Sunday March 31, 21.4mi/34.4km

Overmountain Shelter NC (386.0) to Piano Bar Hostel TN (407.4)

It rained heavily through the night, and stopped around 4am, when the temperature dropped 20 degrees. Brr! I woke up to fog, and it was 30F/-1C.

The first 2mi/3km were happily uphill, so I warmed up quickly.

It got colder as I climbed up to Little hump mountain, and Hump mountain.

Supposedly the views are great. I saw fog. The descent from 5500ft down to 2800ft was like traveling forward into spring. Along the way, I left North Carolina for the last time!

I stopped for lunch at the station at 19E, a nice brewery/restaurant/hostel. It was nice to sit by the warm fireplace.

After lunch, another hiker, Bob (PCT ’17) and I headed out into the sunshine and hiked on. The storm was over! Bob (trail name, not real name) is super fast, and I tried to keep up with his 3.5mph pace.

There were nice views of the Bald peaks we hiked over this morning.

And then, a few miles later, we hit the 400mile marker!

We stopped by a nice waterfall, Jones Falls, for a quick break. Even though it’s sunny, it was still very cold out.

The rest of the day was on a nice easy trail, and we passed by a couple more small waterfalls. I think this one was called Mountaineers Falls.

We knew it was going to be stupidly cold tonight, like 19F/-7C, so we pushed on a couple of extra miles to a hostel. It’s fun to be outdoors, but it’s good to know when you’re outmatched and go hide indoors. It was a basic bunkroom and only $10, called Piano Bar Hostel. Which contained neither a piano nor a bar. But it had a shower, which was quite interesting.

After a nice hot shower and dinner, it’s gonna be a warm night of sleep tonight!