South Brown Mountain Shelter (mile 1763) to campsite at mile 1785
The trees here are full of secrets. A thousand faces on each one, all sagging cheeks lined with age, all drooping mustaches of Spanish moss. Their arms held wide to grab or shade or conceal. Stretching away in all directions who knows what is out there, certainly not I on this little ribbon of dirt that I call a home. Between the green of the trees and the grey of the smoke we are cocooned in a moving snow globe. The world revealing itself to us one step at a time while our northbound progress gently closes the door behind us. Above us the sky is a flat white, part cloud or all smoke it is impossible to know, but that flat white sky bleeds to the horizon and suffuses the land with a soft gentle light. Across the ground runs the trail of red dirt, our line of breadcrumbs leading us through this forest with all her secrets. And up high? There is no up high here. Only rolling climbs to a small flat campground where with the slight advantage of height one can see just far enough to know you don’t know anything at all.
