Trail Days 2

The hiker prom last night was hilarious. Six of us walked to town and did not see anyone else on the way, but we were a little early. The laundromat was empty. One more person showed up with a bottle of champagne. We decided to wait and see who would come since we had heard a lot of people talking about going and some even outfitted themselves at the thrift store. Of course, it’s a long walk from Tent City since it’s on the other side of town so people may have decided not to make the trek that late. None of us had phones or music so we found VH1 on the TV inside. A few more people showed up and we all started dancing to the top 20 Eminem hits. After about 20 minutes, all four of the town’s police cars showed up and told us we had to leave if we weren’t conducting business. Lesson learned: next time, bring laundry to do while dancing.

This morning I started waking up early but managed to get myself back to sleep until it was too hot in my tent, a little before 9. I went over to wait for my free shower, over an hour wait, but I was able to charge my phone at the same time. Then I basically wandered around entering raffles and getting free stuff all day.

Here is a list of what I got:
– shower including towel, soaps, razor
– breakfast of bars, orange, water
– snack of candy, homemade cookies
– bandana, koozie, stickers
– lunch of hot dog, pb&j, chips, fruit, chocolate milk
– rides to/from town
– foot washing
– medical screening
– tetanus shot
– foot massage
– sunscreen, moisturizer
– dinner of chilli

Also, I won one of the raffles! I got an ENO DoubleNest Hammock from the ATC. I have no straps to try it out and no tarp or bug netting or anything to use it in place of a tent but I look forward to trying it later. It started storming right before they called the raffle so I got to take it soaking wet too.

Stretch and I went to town after dinner to hear Jennifer Pharr Davis speak about her first AT hike, which is the subject of her book Becoming Odyssa. Tomorrow morning she will talk again about her new book and setting the speed record of 46 days.

It started raining again after we left, just lightly, so we caught a hitch back to Tent City and got rain gear on before heading over to Miss Janet’s bonfire. She also had the same band from Hot Springs playing there for a while, followed by drum circle and fire dancing. I got to catch up with lots of hiker buddies.