The next morning, we discovered that it was good that we had slept in the shelter. Aaron A's bivy had broken in the night due to wind, and he had crawled into the already cramped shelter with us. Matt's tent got a little water in it, so he didn't sleep so well either. Some thought it was time to just get off the trail before it got any worse. But, before we left that morning, we would need a really hearty breakfast to sustain us on our final journey. It was the perfect time to fix some pancakes! Especially since we had brought pancake mix and syrup for this purpose. Below are the ingredients and tools needed to properly cook pancakes on the trail:

• Pancake mix - this we had, and in great supply. About 3 pounds of the stuff to be exact. (Spyder stuck around long enough to see this ridicuolously large bag of pancake mix, and thought that this was even more ludicrous than the bags of Tang).
• Bottle of syrup - yep, brought that too. Talk about HEAVY, dead weight.
• Skillet - Uhh. . ., woops forgot to bring that.
• Spatula - now who would've ever think to bring this on a camping trip?! Go figure!
• Butter (or grease) - We didn't have this, but we did have sausages. Those can produce plenty of grease, right? (NO).

Ok, so we weren't entirely prepared to cook pancakes, as we soon found out, but we were resourceful young men, we could figure a solution out, right? Wrong! Well, since we didn't have a skillet or spatula, just a fork, knife, and pan, we thought we could somehow make thin pancakes and scrape them up with the knife or fork. We tried to first make really thin pancake mix by adding extra water. Why not? We had MORE than enough pancake mix to experiment with. But this didn't work. It just burnt the thin runny pancake mix to the pan, partly due to the fact that sausages do not provide much grease, they just burn when applied against a hot pan. So we cleaned the remains of expirement no.1 out and tried a new approach. Why not make really thick pancake mix and then drop it into boiling water sort of how dumplings are made. This was my first idea, and a pretty good one . . ., in theory at least. So we prepared the boiling water and thick, lumpy pancake mix. As soon as Matt, our primary cook for this expirement, dropped the pancake globs in the pot, they liquified in the hot water, making pancake soup. (Definitely one of the most disgusting cooking experiences I have ever witnessed). So we dumped that out and tried to think up a new idea. Meanwhile Justin and Nathan were getting hungry, and since they had opted not to dig into the lunchtime food supply like the rest of the sorry bums, they wanted some pancakes. Well, all we had was excess pancake mix (remember that their was a 3 pound bag of this stuff to begin with), so we poured some gooey uncooked pancake mix into their cups and let them eat it. This was Nathan's idea I think. It was also his idea to eat these 'pancakes' with syrup squirted into the cup. UGH! It nearly made me sick watching those two sit there and spoon feed themselves liquified pancakes. However, I did come up with my second idea, which was to make super thick and lumpy pancakes out of the pancake mix. So thick in fact, that when we plopped it in the pot it would just kind of cook like a scrambled egg would. Hence, Matt and I created the scrambled pancake. Mixing was done using the fork. Actually, this worked to some degree and created the thickest, heaviset 'pancake' I have ever seen. But, Matt and I poured syrup on the scrambled pancakes we had made and actually ate them. They really were the consistency of scrambled eggs and didn't taste bad at all. Everyone else made fun of us, but we didn't care, we were eating like kings out in the wilderness. That is, until I got to my second helping. I managed to get it all down, just like Matt did with his second helping (one helping was about the size of one scrambled egg), but by now my belly was screaming for me to stop. I felt like I was going to explode. Those suckers expanded in my stomach fast and furious! I think those two 'scrambled pancakes' were the equivalent of oh . . ., 10-15 regular pancakes. Just ask Matt, I think he was feeling it too. After the scrambled pancakes disaster, we decided to just burn the stupid Tang and pancake mix so that it wouldn't attract animals. Luckily, Spyder had shown us a neat little trick. Pour a little lighter fluid (or a lot, depending on the situation) onto the campfire before you light it, and it will begin burning beautifully. So, we poured bag after bag of Tang, and all the pancake remains into a stone fire pit that had been constructed right in front of the shelter. This pit was about 1.5 - 2 feet high and surrounded by large, flat stones. We then threw some nearby branches on top of the pit to provide some continous burn to the fire we would create. Using Spyder's trick, Aaron A. poured about 8 ounces of camp stove fuel onto the pit, and with 8 ounces of camp stove fuel remaining in the open container in his right hand, he began to try and light the fire with the lighter in his left hand. (The entire area wreaked of butane at this point). The first two times he flicked the lighter on he was unable to ignite anything, but like they say, third time's a charm! Holding the lighter very close to the fire pit, it finally ignited the fuel that had been poured onto the pit. Flames shot ten feet straight up, five feet in all other directions, and out the bottom of the pit through the rocks. Aaron jumped back in obvious surprise, spilling additional lighter fluid from his open container on his right arm, which just happened to be the one closest to the explosion in the fire pit. Luckily, the spilled stove fuel did not ignite, but the flames did burn hair off his body anyways. Nothin' like the smell of burnt human hair in the mornin'! Brad and I had been standing nearby and both jumped back instantly to avoid the licks of flame going everywhere. Aaron apologized later for his complete lack of incompetence, and no one was hurt. Unless of course a fly happened to be within 5 feet of the fire pit, in which case it would have been vaporized. After this we all were cleaning up, packing up and getting ready for another long hike. Some of those in the group decided that they were sick and tired of hiking, and just wanted to get back to civilization. We had talked on and off about trying to find a place to leave the trail early already in our adventure, but we had never made a firm decision. It was put to a vote. I personally didn't mind hanging out on the trail another day, but the vote went to those in favor of finishing our hiking by the end of the day. So I found what looked to be a good place to leave the AT on my map, and although it was ten miles away (not counting all of the up and downs of the AT) we decided one long day of hiking was going to be better than two. So we packed up and set off. The destination was another shelter that looked like it had a side trail that led down to a nearby road. From here we could simply climb our way off the mountains and call my aunt and uncle for an earlier than expected pick up. As we trudged along we tried to sing or talk, but usually we just kept quiet, because by now we were exhausted. Now at this point I'm going to have to make a plug for the BEST pair of socks ever. The day before, we of course, were soaked to the bone. This included my boots, socks, pants, underwear, shirt, and any other item of apparel that was worn on day 3. Since it was such a hot and humid night, none of our wet clothing even began to dry out. But, since I only had one pair of wool socks, I had to wear them regardless of the fact that they were still all wet. The socks I wore were SmartWool Socks. They are made from marino wool and are extra soft to the touch (unlike a lot of wool products which take a little getting used to). To make a long story short, these socks still felt great the entire 12 miles we ended up hiking on the last day. And my boots were still wet too! Now that right there, wet socks AND boots, is the perfect combination for how really wicked blisters begin. But, to the socks' credit, I didn't get one blister, NOT ONE! I did have heat soars on the tops of my toes, but that was due to a very steep decline in the trail right at the end which lasted for at least 3/4 of a mile. Cramming my toes into the ends of my shoe on this decline is how the heat sores began, and if it wasn't for the SmartWool socks, I would have had major blisters. On with the story... So, we hiked, and hiked, and hiked some more. 10 miles was getting longer and longer. This is when we discovered a very interesting couple miles of the AT. As we hiked, we came across a nice, beautiful section of trail with plenty of ferns and rodendren bushes/trees. But just as soon as we had entered this area, all of these thorny bushes, stinging nettle, and other assorted ugly undergrowth greeted our legs and arms as we hiked. This pattern of thorns, then ferns, thorns, then ferns, continued most of the fourth day. That's why we would chant, ~FERNS~ in a sing-song happy voice and contemplate the wonderful world of heaven. Then, when we got to the thorny, stinging nettle sections, it was *!Thorns!*, spoken in an angry, devilish way, accurately describing the pain and torture that the Netherworld must have. Just about everyone's legs got cut, scratched, or itched all day because of those stupid stinging nettle bushes. They were everywhere!! We stopped for lunch, but luckily the scambled pancakes had expanded to about ten times their original size on the plate while digesting in Matt and I's stomach, so we were not quite as hungry as everyone else. At our lunch time resting spot we were at one of the highest points on our map (I think), and could look almost straight down to the Watauga Lake below us. It had to have been a good 1500-2000 feet below us. It was a rather spectacular sight considering we had climbed that high under our own power. We were all tired, but we were past our halfway point to the shelter, and freedom from the trail. Once more, we slugged our packs over our shoulders, got up on to our weary feet, and started to hike once again. Eventually we made it to the last shelter, and what I had thought was a trail on our map for getting down off the mountain must be around the shelter somewhere. However, the shelter was only about 20 feet from a several hundred foot cliff! We searched and searched, and took a few pictures, but couldn't find this little side trail as we had seen it on the map. After about 30 minutes of resting and all of us searching for this side trail, some people decided to just look at the map again while having a much needed rest in the shelter. As I was looking out over the cliff to the lake and trees below, I heard: "Jeremy, come over here!" Interesting, why are they 'demanding' I come over there? Oh well, I turned around and walked the ten or so feet back to the shelter where everyone was sitting. "What?" I ask Aaron Alexander. "Look at this map again, show us where this trail is," he says. "Right here," I said, as I pointed to a dashed-dotted line on the map leading away from our current position. Aaron Alexander then pointed to the map legend and said: "That's a county line, you idiot!" Ooooops! I just made a BIG mistake. "Oh." I said. At this point, everyone started making fun of me, and rightly so, for I had led them astray. Needless to say, our plan had backfired. Some laughed, some cried, most were mad, and I just felt pretty bad for being so stupid. So now what to do? We discussed our options: Stay at the shelter and spend another day on the trail, or hike another 2 miles down a pretty steep incline to reach the Watuaga Dam state park area where we would surely find water, restrooms, and a pay phone to call for extraction by my aunt and uncle. We decided to hoof it. And ohhh... did we hoof it! The final 2 miles down managed to jam our toes firmly into the front of our boots the entire way, as the descent was indeed quite steep. By the time we arrived at a road that the trail crossed at the Watuaga Dam state park we were all entirely exhausted. As we were finally relieving our backs of our packs, we started talking about how to find a pay phone or someone to help us get in touch with my relatives to come pick us up. While we were standing there discussing what to do, Aaron Alexander went to move my pack which was leaning against something which he wanted to get at. He grabbed my pack, and with a stiff jerk, nearly launched it through the air with one big heave. "Oh my gosh!" Aaron exclaimed. "Your pack is light as a feather!" And it was true, my pack had grown considerably lighter, as all of ours had during the past 4 days on the trail, but apparently mine was A LOT lighter than everyone else's pack. Everyone came over to feel for themselves just how light my pack was, and I received a fair amount of criticism for having drank so much water during the past 4 days, while maintaining the lightest pack of the bunch. Ooops! As night began to fall and we continued to debate what to do next, a late model Ford van came around the corner and stopped at our resting spot. Leaning towards the passenger side seat, the driver of the van (who was clearly a local Tennessee bumpkin) asked us if we needed a ride. I asked him if he knew how near a pay phone might be, as we only needed to contact my relatives to get picked up. He said him and his family were heading down to a picnic area that might have a pay phone, and offered to drive us down to the pay phone if we wished. Quickly assessing the situation, we decided it would be best if two of us went (for safety sake) so Brad and I hopped in the back of their van. We thanked this family for helping us out, and we headed off to destination unknown. Now, you would think that this is where the adventure ends, but no, it gets even better. Imagine the most stereotypical rednecks, and you now have in mind what these people looked like, including their two grade school aged children, a boy and a girl, that were sitting in the back with Brad and I, motionlessly staring at us. The van, too, will help set the picture of this family in your mind. The back of the van was more or less gutted of seating... well, not exactly because while Brad and I were sitting against the door-side wall of the van, the two children sat opposite us in a beat up, no legs couch that would have been great at a college campus, after football game, victory front-porch burning. The interior walls of this van were, no joke, cheap wood veneer. Hanging out of the center console (where the radio used to be) were two 6x9 speakers which were apparently hooked up to the radio which was sitting on the floor of the van between the driver and passenger seats. The windows were dirty, there was a slight funky smell of steal and sweat, the children's faces were dirty, the wife's hair was mangy, the guy had a mustard stained T-shirt, and it seemed to be taking an incredibly long time to get to this picnic area through an increasingly wooded drive as the sun continued to set. Clearly we were living Deliverance! Fortunately, it was not Deliverance. We arrived at the picnic area, and indeed there was a pay phone near the picnic sites. The family dropped us off at the pay phone, we thanked them profusely for helping us, and they were quite congenial to us as they bid us goodbye and drove the remaining 200yds to the picnic area. While Brad and I fumbled with the few quarters we had and tried all of my aunt and uncle's various phone numbers to get a hold of someone, one of the children of the redneck family came walking up and offered us a couple of Cokes. Wow! How cool! They may have had the scariest looking van I have ever ridden in, but they sure were kind folks. Thank goodness for southern hospitality. Brad and I gladly accepted, and thankfully managed to contact my cousin with one of the very last quarters that we had on our persons. We explained where we were in the park, and asked if my aunt could come pick us up. They said it would be a while, but they would come pick us up. Brad and I decided to wait at the picnic area so that they could retrieve us first, and then we could direct them back to the rest of our friends. We waited for at least 30 or 45 minutes, but eventually they showed up, with all of our friends in their truck and van! Apparently they ran across the rest of our crew on the roadside, but had a hard time locating the picnic area that Brad and I were at. My cousin, being kin, mentioned immediately how badly we all stank. But that was OK, they were going to take us to get some pizza at a local restaraunt in Boone, NC, and then take us back to their house so we could clean up and have nice, cold showers away from all the summer heat we had endured the past few nights. So ends our Appalachian Trail Trip - one I will never forget, and a trip that I don't wish to repeat. P.S. I'm fairly certain that our waiter at the pizza place that we went to simply wanted to die from the stench of 8 guys stinking up their entire place right before closing time. I also think we may have destroyed my aunt and uncle's toilets, showers, bathtubs, and bathrooms with our filth and stench, but I've never been able to confirm either of these things.