Puma Ghostwalker

I have no idea of the time when I approached the empty shelter at Cable Gap
but it was a welcome sight……OMGess…..
As I was setting up camp, this will be the very first time I will sleep in a shelter
in the last 157 miles of my journey. Gathering wet wood for my Zip-stove really started getting on my nerves and here was no exception I was so frazzled from “the belly of the beast” storm. My stove smoked so badly from the wet wood all the time and carbon was building up on the bottom causing an insulation barrier that made it take to boil water and cook. Then out of no were was a hiker from the south like me, she looked so happy to be here.

Susan was a young school teacher from Tennessee out hiking by her self and I have to say, I always loved it and admired a woman out here hiking alone. Only when you’re alone in the forest, you get that deep understanding of you with nature…..no distractions of another person to talk to or feel close to you taking up head space…. You become one with the wilderness, Earth-mother….. Our Mother Goddess… Susan was such a joy to have around though and we hike from time to time all the way to Hot Springs North Carolina.

I was so hungry and fill my 2 quart cook pot up with chicken noodle soup from Bear Creak, I ate every bit.

We talked until it got dark and Susan suggested we hang our gear and food on those dangly bits of rope in the front of the shelter.


Kitea had been caught up in the storm as well and just as stressed as Puma and Susan when she approached the shelter. She was surprised to see Puma sleeping in the shelter,
taking up all of the left side and Susan had all of the right. Kitea was hoping for this moment from the very beginning of the hike when she first met puma back before Gooch Mountain Shelter. She approached the shelter on the side close to Puma sleeping with his head toward the front. Closer and closer she moved so silently like a ghost. She stood right at his face, she could hear his heartbeat and feel hers. That that very moment Puma reached his arm out from under the blanket touching her face, scratching her ears and neck. From the time she started to purrrrr, Kitea transformed to her human form. Something she hadn’t done in a very long time and with the swift and gentle speed
of a mountain lion she leaped quietly to his side and under the blanket, along side his warm body, Puma instinctively bringing his arm over her shoulder holding her closely.
A calming feeling came over and a warmth that touched the deepest part of her soul…..
He the one for sure she said and slept motionless till about 4:00 am. and disappeared into the forest fresh, rested and in love.

When I got up from the best sleep I had in a very long time I noticed a mouse got into my pack and found my food and ate into my trail-mix. That was the second time that happened, the first time I had put my food on a rope in a tree at Dan Gap in Georgia.

Susan was a very fast hiker compared to me, she was off and running excited to make her resupply in Gatlinburg Tennessee. She was meeting her family and boyfriend there, taking a few days off trail to spend some quality time with them. I on the other hand
Made planes from Franklyn to resupply at the Fontana Dam, I had mailed my laptop to the Hike Inn... motel.

I made it down to the Fontana marina where I could use a phone and call the Inn.
The woman said she will have someone pick me up, to just sit tight. They had a soda machine but the power was out and I was out of luck. Some bicyclist drove up in there SUV a husband and wife, we talked about the storm, they got caught in it and left there bikes off to the side and got a lift out. The woman had so much energy, she was incredible, wanting her husband to take some photos with me, then she put my pack on her and I said to her husband…..is she always like this.. he just smiled and nodded.
I made a new friend that day and we are still in touch and share our stories.

My ride showed up and the first thing the woman said to me was……..
Your one of the survivors…… apparently the storm I called…

“The belly of the beast”

It produced three tornados and devastated a camp park on a river. Power was out in the whole region, she said the power company told her she won’t get power where she lives for a week or more. She said the storm killed some people and I’m so lucky to have survived it…..