Springer Mountain 2194.3 to Amicalola Fall State Park 0.0 (8.8 miles, 2194.3 total miles)
After another night of reboiling my Nalgene water in the wee hours of the morning, I didn’t wake up as warm as the day before, because there was a 10 degree wind chill ripping through our campsite. I hadn’t paid much attention to wind chill measurements on trail, because atweather.org didn’t provide them, and I found out later they had to be manually calculated.
As I started to pack up, it became obvious I was going to have to make a side trip to the privy before continuing. I needed to grab my food from the bear box across camp anyway, so I made my way over through a quiet path past various scattered tents and hammocks. A gorgeous sunrise was visible through the trees, a vivid orange sun peeking from behind deep blue clouds.
By the time I was done in the privy, sunrise had become even more spectacular, and I heard Lentil comment on it as I was exiting. I was pleased to see her, just the person I needed to talk to. I couldn’t hold my silence any longer, and I felt I shouldn’t have to miss out on celebrating with my friends that morning for something I hadn’t asked for.
What happened the evening before burst out of me, the weight lifting off my chest as I told her. In dismay, Lentil told me this wasn’t the first example of this type of behavior from Flamingo in the past five hundred miles, but it was certainly the most overt she’d learned about. Immediately I felt validated and heard, and I further explained to her that I didn’t feel comfortable being in a group summit photo with him.
I knew I would look back on those pictures for the rest of my life, and couldn’t stand the idea of being reminded of what had happened every time I did so. Lentil snapped into big sister mode, telling me she would handle it, making me feel safe and cared for all at once. My spirits restored, I returned to begin packing up my things, intensely aware that it was my last time packing up in below freezing temperatures on this trip.
Over the last few days of contemplation, I had come to feel that getting on trail had come with a sense of of deep freedom. No job to clock in at, distance from the worries of life in society, time and space to decompress and get to the root of what is really needed to survive and thrive.
Yet I’d begun to feel that getting off trail was going to be its own type of freedom. No more living in freezing temperatures, hiking after dark to make miles, having an unfinished goal constantly over my head. Don’t get me wrong, I am deeply in love with thru hiking and already can’t wait until my next one, but it was going to be a relief to have a break from the hard parts and have the freedom to have a car again, to have unlimited electricity and plumbing, to let my body rest and recover instead of constantly pushing it to its limits.
I’m a big fan of the phrase “variety is the spice of life”, and entering a new chapter while closing such an important one to me felt good and right. I wasn’t totally exhausted, and I could have kept going if I needed to, but rather was ready to continue following this journey to its end. Soon I could go anywhere I wanted and do anything I wanted to, not married to a singular goal and constantly calculating how fast I could hike the next mile and what time I could get to camp.
We were all ready to head back to the summit around 8:30, and as a surprise were joined by Beer Girl as well. I was very happy to see her, especially because I knew Slice was coming to celebrate the end of my hike today and join us for the cookout. She’d finished 10 days prior and lived somewhat in the area, and Beer Girl and Slice had been quite close on trail. Beer Girl kept saying she was finishing a day after us, so I hadn’t been expecting this, and hoped she’d be surprised to see Slice later in the day.
At the last moment I was about to chicken out as we were getting ready to take the photos, feeling nervous about the situation again. I told Lentil not to worry about it, but she told me no, she was going to handle it. And she did, taking Flamingo aside and speaking with him quietly but communicating clearly. It was a little awkward while everyone else wondered aloud what was going on, but after a minute we were back on track, taking our photos together and a couple more individually.
Flamingo stood to the side and waited till it was just Lentil, Looseleaf, and I. At that point he did apologize again, though claimed it was an accident from trying to hug me while I was still wearing my pack. I’d thought it through over and over again, had received and given many hugs to and from others with packs on during multiple hikes, had felt exactly what he did and how he did it, and noted the height difference between us that made it all but impossible that it had been a mistake.
Not only that, but how nonchalant he’d been about it the evening before. How if it had truly been an accident the response would have been different and much more concerned. How there was an established pattern of behavior from others I’d now heard about. I told him it felt quite purposeful, and that I wished him the best of luck with everything in the future. I didn’t have anything more to say to him about it, and just wanted to concentrate on giving myself a better end of the hike as I made my way to the Amicalola Arch.
We let him hike away in front of us, quickly signing the logbook that lived in a metal box inlaid at the summit rock, freezing cold by this point and ready to start moving. The Approach Trail is 8.8 miles of mostly downhill with a couple little climbs interspersed, culminating in a series of metal and wooden staircases that descend past Amicalola Falls to the state park at the bottom.
We met up with Happy after a bit and started hiking with her, talking about the end as we went. It still didn’t feel like the hike was over, probably because we were still hiking half a day and had woken up in the woods. I didn’t think it would sink in until it was fully over.
The hike felt easy as could be, with very little food in my pack, on a beautiful day that was sunny and warming up, and good friends to walk with. When we were a few miles from the park, we saw Lentil and Looseleaf’s friend Anna hiking north, surprising us all. She’d had a bike trip that was cancelled this weekend and was unexpectedly able to come to the cookout after all.
Anna turned around and kept going with us, and soon we came upon Milky Moo and Painkles waiting near the trail to finish with everyone. The miles flew by as we walked in a line around twisting curves and over crunching leaves. We passed many day hikers as it was a Saturday, some of them recognizing what we were doing and hiking toward, congratulating us and asking questions in turn.
At the parking lot before the first waterfall view, Anna headed over to her car to drive down and meet us at the bottom of the falls. The platforms were a buzz of activity, full of people admiring the 729 foot waterfall, the highest in Georgia.
The excitement was mounting inside of me as we jested about the signs marking “strenuous” stairs. Of course, we were descending them, but even climbing them would have been a breeze for us now, so high on adrenaline and success.
Now it was starting to feel like the end, and I couldn’t wait to arrive at the arch. In 2016 I’d stood under that arch holding Frankie, the one and only time I’d ever been there. I’d driven Spider and Seven there and hadn’t been able to resist standing under it. It was a magical looking stone monument with a cobbled path leading to the forest, a perfect place to start or finish a thru hike.
I followed Lentil down the metal stairs, winding our way lower as we paralleled the falls. She hurried down them, passing around day trippers when they stopped to take in the view on small landings every twenty stairs or so. At the bottom of the main falls we stopped to admire the rushing water from below.
After stopping at one more large viewing platform further down more stairs, we began following a smooth pavement path when Happy spotted her mom and raced down to meet her. Their reunion made me tear up, and Happy’s mom gave us all warm hugs, while a couple of Lentil and Looseleaf’s friends showed up. Happy’s best friend had also driven down with Happy’s mom as a surprise to finish the 27 miles with her the next day.
We all walked down together, around a pond, through another parking lot, and to a large pavilion where the cookout had been set up. I said hi to Bruce Leaf and the other parents who’d come, waiting till the greetings were done for us all to walk to the arch a bit further into the park.
We hadn’t realized it was still a quarter mile past the pavilion, but we followed the markings that Sticky Fingers had pointed out for me, charging toward our final destination. I spoke with Slice on the way who said she’d meet me there. I was so excited that I ran a few times, a few paces ahead of the others. Getting to the arch felt more meaningful than Springer in that moment and I could hardly contain my enthusiasm.
Spotting it ahead, just across from the Visitor Center fully under construction, I ran through it, stopping to hug the arch itself while Slice recorded the whole thing and a few people looking on applauded. Slice embraced me in a tight hug, while the rest of my trail family got ready to cross the arch behind me. They held hands and stepped through together, while Slice recorded that one as well.
What followed was the same routine from Katahdin and Springer, taking lots of group and individual pictures. Cheerio arrived after us, embracing his girlfriend and his father who’d been waiting at the arch too. We congratulated him then made our way back to the party, all of us ravenous.
There were burgers, dogs, chili with toppings, lots of snacks and desserts, and sodas. There were many vegetarian and vegan options as well to accommodate the others, and I loaded up a plate, so happy for real food at the end of my hike.
It was amazing to have finished with a group of flip floppers, and to have Slice there as well, who’d also done a flip flop. The atmosphere was jubilant, all of us soaking in the perfect way to compete our respective journeys. OB and Not Polo joined us, as well as Beer Girl after we’d had dessert. She had a burger and soda before Slice and I walked her over to the arch, taking her picture and celebrating the end of her hike as well.
No one had seen Flamingo since that morning, and it seemed he’d decided to leave on his own from the parking lot. We hadn’t told him or asked him not to come to the cookout, but it definitely made me feel more at ease that he wasn’t there.
After everyone was stuffed and the food and decorations had been packed away, people starting leaving in groups. Tears were shed and goodbyes exchanged, my second time experiencing this type of parting.
I’d gone through so many other partings before on trail it wasn’t as hard for me as for some, especially those who’d been hiking together for 1600 miles and were now going their separate ways. It also helped that I was leaving with Lentil and Looseleaf, all three of us happy to be spending a couple more days together, hoping it would help us transition off trail a little more smoothly.
We loaded into Bruce Leaf’s truck with his wife, Francis, the bed full of leftover food and our packs, making our way back to Clayton. By the end of our hour plus drive, my knees and legs were stiff from sitting for so long, and I was very excited to get back to such a wonderful house.
It was a little strange to be back at Bruce Leaf’s home so soon again, but also feeling like the four days that had passed since I’d been there had been a lifetime. I got settled into one of the upstairs rooms while Lentil and Looseleaf dropped their things in the guesthouse.
I asked Bruce if I could use his sauna shower that he’d urged me to try the other day. I’d forgotten about it after the rainy day, but was more than ready to give it a go now. I sat in the steam for what felt like 10 or 15 minutes, deep in contemplation, feeling what seemed like the accumulation of 2,200 miles sweat out of me.
It felt like a rather spiritual moment, and the hot water and high water pressure of the actual shower left me totally cleansed and purified, the cooler air outside the shower feeling like a blessing. It was a blissed out experience of calm and total contentment to realize I’d accomplished one of my deepest dreams and goals in life, and I’d earned a rest to reflect and absorb what it meant.
I ate a warm bowl of minestrone soup that Francis had made, washed down with a piece of apple pie from the party. I did my laundry and then read a little before going to sleep. In between the sheets of a queen bed, watching stars twinkle out of the large window next to me, I felt complete.
Epilogue
What’s next for me? It’s been nearly a week since I finished the trail, and I’m still figuring out the answer to that question. I spent a few days with Lentil and Looseleaf, which was amazing and really did help the off trail transition. I next went to visit Miss Janet, and was able to help her throw Hiker Thanksgiving in Hot Springs, NC.
It was a bit painful to leave there, my last large gathering with other hikers over until Trail Days in May of 2023. In June, I have a job lined up at one of the hostels on trail, something I’ve wanted to experience since my first time on the AT. Between now and then I’m still figuring out, but I really feel called to continue traveling and working seasonally, hiking trails, and writing as much as possible.
The ultimate goal would be total freedom to travel as much as I want and actually make a full or partial living off my writing. I’ve known what I wanted out of life for many years, but I have spent a long time unable to pursue those things due to other responsibilities I had and fear of failure.
Living a simple life on the trail for six months with people that understand me has helped me clarify how I want to feel and what I would like to accomplish in my life. Documenting this hike in such detail has given me the space and freedom to explore my inner world and dig in deep to my own emotional state and journey.
I owe a debt of gratitude to all those who’ve read my writing throughout this hike, sent me words of encouragement, financial support, and trail magic. I’ve been gifted beyond belief from trail angels, other hikers, friends, and family on this journey. Helping throw Hiker Thanksgiving this year has been the first step in a lifetime of paying it forward the best I can.
I will keep publishing on here when I have something to write about, and will hopefully find other platforms in the future to share my writing as well. Thank you all again from the bottom of my heart. Happy Trails.