We left Low Gap Shelter with a plan to go a few miles to another campsite. I did not want to hike long because it was Gig’s birthday. We started hiking; up again! We started playing a game on the trail. I picked a word to say, spell, and say. Once I spelled the word right I would use the last letter of the word I chose and use it to pick a word that started with that letter. I would then pass that word to Tipawa and she had to say it, spell it, and say it. Then she would pick a word and pass it down to the next person; and on and on…

And so we passed the hike this way for most of the day. Found a really nice waterfall:

Tipawa’s Waterfall

And Hiked…

As the day wore on I realized that we should have come to the site we were heading for. We had passed a few sites, but we were looking for one near a waterfall. We hadn’t seen a waterfall. Or had we??? Could the little waterfall we passed been the one we were looking for?

At the next break I double checked our Appalachian Trail Guide. The guide called what we were looking for a “Cascade.” I had looked at the guide and decided to go to that place when I was tired the night before. Somehow my brain translated cascade to waterfall… I could of swore it said waterfall. Well, now it was looking like it was going to be a long day…

We hiked on to the next Gap and got there around 19:00. But the site was a long one along a hillside and had some dangerous looking trees above our heads… We discussed it for a few minutes and decided to head for the next Gap.

And so, we got out our headlamps (just in case) and headed down the trail. We hiked… After an hour or so we came to another campsite that was too small and stopped for a break. If we could find the Gap we were looking for we could hike a side trail 1.4 miles to a place called Enota Mountain Retreat and stay the night. But, we couldn’t find the Gap. This was a crazy part of the trail, it seemed nothing matched the guide.

We hiked on as it got dark… Another Night Hike!

After another hour or so we came to a sign that said camping and decided to stay there no matter how big it was. We had hiked enough for that day… But the campsite was a nice one.

When we got up the next morning we realized we had passed the Gap we were looking for the night before (the small campsite that wasn’t marked) and had walked a total of 6.4 miles.

I know it don’t sound like much … But again, we are still out of shape and this is the mountains after all…