Speaking of creepy, I heard there is a tradition on the summer solstice. Hike Naked Day, is this a real thing?
Originally Posted by Cedar1974
uh yea.... keep your underpants on...
Dogs are excellent judges of character, this fact goes a long way toward explaining why some people don't like being around them.
Woo
I was also planning to keep my shoes and socks on as well. Didn't think about still wanting your undies to protect your block and tackle.
There are hikers who hike naked on Naked Hike Day. I imagine it would feel liberating, but I don't want to find out. I wouldn't even want to cross paths with someone hiking in the buff. There are good and bad arguments to be made concerning the human body. One day at a popular water park in southwest Ohio a few years ago, I was walking around with my wife murmuring under my breath "that's a bad argument" "that's a pretty weak argument" "now that, that is a good argument." The wife asked what I was mumbling about. I explained bikini argument protocol to her. Bikinis (and trunks or thongs on men, I suppose) were meant to be worn by a certain segment of the population. And there are good arguments for the bikini. Freedom of movement, covers all of the girl bits, allows the skin to cool rapidly or tan evenly, etc. When you run into other segments of the population who for whatever personal reasons have decided to subject us all to bad arguments for the bikini, that is when you begin running into problems. I got an elbow in the ribs from my wife. But not half an hour later, under her breath, I heard her mumbling, "that's a BAD argument." The same applies to Naked Hike Day.
While doing a section hike in northern Virginia, I kept seeing this older guy in the shelters about every other day. I never saw him pass me on the trail, or in between the shelter on the trail. My last night on the trail, at the shelter, I just asked him, how are you getting ahead of me on the trail yet I never see you on the trail. I just was not getting a good vibe. He then explained he yellow blazed up and down the trail, would hike 3-5 miles to the shelter. I mentioned this to some hikers who have been on the trail more than myself and they all knew him/ or of him.
got to love the trail and the stories we each bring.
At Rich Mountain fire tower north of Hot Springs three years ago, my party met a gentleman from Charlotte, North Carolina, who was having a very rough day. He had just retired from law enforcement. This was his first day on the AT since he'd backpacked some as a Boy Scout many years before. He was hiking solo and tenting in a flat area a tenth of a mile or so north of the fire tower. He was creeped out by what he'd seen that day, obviously welcomed the company of our group of six, and told us the story of his hike north from Hot Springs earlier that day.
Somewhere north of Pump Gap that morning, he came across a large timber rattlesnake on the trail (most of my party also encountered the snake a bit later). Then, when he approached a field just past he pond, there was a car parked with an older man in bad shape standing beside it. The man was disheveled and had a large bandage on one side of his face. As the backpacker approached, the old man said, "Does this look bad?" as he pulled aside the bandage, revealing a gaping sore. Just past that at the highway (U.S. 25?), there was a car parked on the dead end dirt road beside a blackberry patch. A young couple was copulating on the hood.
The creepiest person I've ever met was at Doll Flats last August. He was a young man, very dirty, carrying a large container of what appeared to be dirty water (he said it was moonshine), and armed with a bow and quiver of arrows. His language was abundantly, stunningly profane. He said he'd just been robbed at gunpoint by two "rednecks" near Highway 19e. He'd then seen where the two rednecks turned their car off the highway. He followed it, found they'd left it while going into the woods, and he'd stolen their moonshine. He asked us a few questions about who we were. One of my backpacking companions mentioned that his grandfather had been a dairy farmer in the western North Carolina mountains. To this, the young man said, "He must have been a fascist. He must have been a Nazi." He repeated this a number of times. (The charge was ironic since that dairy farmer had served in the US Army in the European Theater during WWII, fighting Nazis and fascists.) The last I saw of this young man was after I shouldered my pack and began walking south on the trail, leaving Doll Flats behind. I looked behind back at the flats (making sure the young man wasn't following or aiming his bow our way) and saw him walk into the field, look up at the mountains, and begin screaming profanity at the heavens. Here's my Trail Journals account of the Doll Flats creepy guy: http://trailjournals.com/entry.cfm?id=509956
Coincidentally, we hiked the same section last August. Hiking northbound, I stayed the evening of 8/9/15 at Overmountain, I recall you and your friends as I departed early the next morning. Strangely enough I passed by our friendly, but quirky, archer that morning shortly after I departed OMS. Sans the vulgarity and profanity, but again, we never engaged in anything more than pleasantries. The exception, he was southbound, coming down Little Hump Mt. I was slightly taken back by the recurve bow and quiver of arrows, only because I don't regularly see that ensemble while hiking. We passed with the obligatory greetings and well wishes. You met him at Doll Flats a few hours later? NB? Guess he could have been fetching water from the spring at OM and turned back NB after we passed. Needless to say......interesting young man, at least in appearance.
Termite fart so much they are responsible for 3% of global methane emissions.
That's interesting, but if the dates are right, you must have seen him the day after we did. We did a four-night hike northbound, with the last two nights/three days as follows: 8/8/15 - 15 miles from Clyde Smith Shelter to Overmountain Shelter; 8/9/5 - 18 miles from Overmountain Shelter to Mountaineer Shelter; 8/10/15 - 15 miles from Mountaineer Shelter to Dennis Cove Road.
So we saw "Robin Hood" mid or late morning of the 9th at Doll Flats, while it sounds like you saw him on the 10th. I was the last of our group of five on the trail. He showed up at Doll Flats, walking northbound, about five minutes after I arrived. Nobody in my group, all of whom arrived earlier, had passed him on the trail, and three of our group were filtering water at the time I arrived and didn't see him until they returned to the flats.
Correct, seen him the morning of the 10th. Sorry, I must have misidentified your group with another that was staying at OMS, they were very similar in the demographics you illustrated in your previous post. That was an incredible section hike, IMHO.
Termite fart so much they are responsible for 3% of global methane emissions.
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