Trail of Terror, page 26
“Maybe you’re right,” Rachel agreed.
“Of course, I’m right,” Marcy shrugged. “He was probably just some mentally desiccated numb nut — a local hillbilly douche bag like in the movie Deliverance — wondering if his credit card was gonna get declined because he never made a payment. Probably stopped by on his way to the local monster truck rally.”
“I sure hope you’re right, this guy really looked evil,” Rachel trailed off.
“I wouldn’t worry about it, in order for a man to be truly evil, he’d have to be a woman,” she joked. “After all, we are in the backwoods of Georgia, you know — half the locals around here are so poor they can’t afford to pay attention…their welcome mats around here don’t say ‘welcome,’ they say welfare,” she laughed. “Give me thirty minutes and I’ll meet you back at the room with the two Nazi women.”
CHAPTER 42
EARLY THE NEXT MORNING at 7:00 a.m., Rachel awoke to the buzzing of her cell phone alarm. She heard the familiar sound of Marcy snoring loudly on the bunk above like an idling pickup truck. Still groggy, she rubbed her eyes then lifted herself up on one elbow and looked at the bunkbeds on the other side of the room. She was surprised to see the two German women had already dressed and were gone. She’d never heard a peep or any sound of them when they left.
Rachel hopped out of bed, headed toward the bathroom and shouted, “Time to get up!”
“Leave me alone — your alarm clock is clearly jealous of my amazing relationship with my bed,” Marcy moaned. “I think I’m having a bedgasm…I just wanna lay here and prolong it for another hour or two.”
“Remember — breakfast buffet!”
“I’m on it!” she replied, suddenly awake and jumping down from the top bunk. “Hurry it up, I was horny, now I’m really hungry.”
“Your last name is ‘hungry,’ first name is ‘always’,” Rachel joked.
“See — you don’t really understand.”
“Understand what?” Rachel intoned.
“Like, I have this hunger management condition that prevents me from dieting like you — it’s called being freaking hungry,” Marcy yelled. “Hurry up!”
Thirty minutes later, they checked out of their room and entered the restaurant in a semi-starved mode carrying their heavy backpacks and trekking poles. The restaurant was larger than they’d realized. They were immediately overwhelmed by the savory smells of sizzling bacon and sausages, fried and scrambled eggs, french toast and pancakes oozing with butter and hot maple syrup, orange juice and freshly brewed coffee.
The place was overflowing with people — mostly hikers loading up their bodies with much needed calories and carbohydrates, others appeared to be locals and their families from the nearby towns of Blairsville, Jacksonville and Owl Town.
They were all there to enjoy the food and gab at one of the most unforgettable places on the Appalachian Trail. But the priority of the moment was food. Lots of it, enough to feed half of the neighboring counties.
Tables were lined up in two long rows over 30 feet long, with wooden bench seats on each side. There must have been over 100 guests all sitting next to, or across from each other. Backpacks and hiking gear lay in neat orderly rows on the opposite side of the large room. The restaurant was loud, a cacophony of different conversations, laughter, the sounds of plates clinking and silverware clanging.
Rachel cupped her hand and whispered to Marcy, “I certainly see quite a few overweight people who have visited the buffet far too often. Not to be judgmental, but there’s an awful lot of future health issues sitting here at the table.”
“Yeah,” Marcy affirmed. “Just like everywhere else, people overeat at these buffets just because they’re out to get the maximum bang for the buck…maybe you should consider opening up a family medical practice nearby.”
“Let’s set our packs down and check everything out before we start grabbing things.”
“Sounds good,” Marcy agreed, “we can get an overview of the food offerings before loading up on the first thing we see.”
The place was clean, bright and comfortable, and the food selection was outstanding. The salad bar looked enticing, colorful, well-stocked with vegetables and healthy. It was strategically located up front where patrons encountered it first, before seeing the entrees.
The two women took a minute or two to look over the entire food display: Normally, it would have been a test of willpower with the endless steam tables of temptations and enough calories to clog an elephant’s arteries, but they were famished. As they grabbed plates and their silverware, Rachel pointed to a handwritten sign on the wall above the food that read, “Welcome to the Mountain Crossing Breakfast Buffet…All you can eat — you CAN have it all. The only rules are: (1) You take it, you eat it, and (2) No take out plates allowed — no exceptions!”
“The key is to not get gorged and attempt to eat everything we see,” Rachel warned. “We might need a couple of stents or bypasses, or maybe a shot of insulin.”
“Golly, I’ve never heard that one before, why not? I mean, every Merriman-Webster Standard North American English Dictionary definition that I’ve ever seen, says the word ‘buffet’ means eat everything,” Marcy chortled.
“Because over-eating greasy foods can trigger heartburn and acid reflux, also known as gastroesophageal reflux disease, or ‘GERD’,” Rachel replied. “It puts pressure on the lower esophageal sphincter muscle, which is located at the bottom of the esophagus. Your stomach is only about the size of your fist, eating too fast makes it harder for your digestive system to perform the way it should — it’ll slow you down.”
“As a veteran eater of many endless buffets, I can assure you I’ll be okay,” Marcy huffed, as she began to pile her plate high with scrambled eggs, bacon, and toast. “And just FYI,” she added, “I’m coming back for a second or third plate, including some of that to-die-for bread pudding, a few donuts and maybe a banana and a blueberry muffin…I may not have to eat for days, after this.”
“Well, at least eat slowly, the fat and sugar calories can be staggering.”
“Hey girl,” Marcy quipped, “I don’t have to starve myself of calories to be gorgeous, beauty comes in all shapes and sizes — I’m a little ‘plus-sized’ in case you haven’t noticed — some men happen to like women with great big butts.”
“Yeah — and they all live in foreign countries — oops, I didn’t mean it to sound like that — anyway, I just meant a little frozen yogurt might be good for digestion, or maybe some fresh fruit if you need something sweet,” Rachel ended.
As they surveyed the two long rows of tables looking for some empty spaces, they saw Logan and Georgianne waving them over. They sat down across the table from the owners. Both were drinking hot steaming mugs of coffee.
“Morning’ ladies,” Logan drawled, he pronounced it “mow-ning.”
“I see you decided to come to our grand breakfast buffet,” Georgianne added, staring at Marcy’s heaping plate overflowing with food.
“Yeah, unbelievable — this is kind of like a Roman orgy,” Marcy mumbled. “Can’t beat an all-you-can-eat” buffet meal with a set price. It can be a good value, especially if you stay aware of what you are eating.”
Logan lowered his voice, “The breakfast really is not meant to make a profit — but we do make money indirectly, that is — the buffets only get people in the door, then they buy merchandise and come back. We break even on the food because it normally needs fewer employees. Plus, we don’t need servers to take orders and wait tables. Employees are expensive.”
The four chatted for the next thirty minutes about the weather, trail conditions, funny hiking stories, Georgianne informing them that the two German women had been the first to go through the food line at 6:30 a.m. and had already left.
Logan suddenly looked around surreptitiously, looking a bit nervous, he leaned forward and said, “You two seem like nice girls…since you’re done eating, I want to warn you about something I heard about this morning from a local sheriff’s deputy who likes to stop in several times a week.”
“Oh, what’s that?” Rachel responded, drinking a cup of coffee.
“He told me that several days ago while doing land surveying work about ten miles north of here, two surveyors found the body of a woman in the woods. They searched the area and sure enough there was a body. It proved to be true.”
“Any idea who she was?” Rachel asked.
“Not yet, no reports of anyone missing yet,” he said. “It’s sad. Anyway, I wanted to warn you two to be careful when you’re in the woods and try to stick near people and avoid anyone who looks suspicious…just saying…make sure you cover each other’s backs.”
“We’ll be careful,” Rachel replied, looking at her watch. It was time to hit the trail again. Other hikers were leaving in clusters.
“Thanks, so much for the hospitality and the pleasure of meeting you,” Rachel told Logan and Georgianne, as they were leaving. She and Marcy shook their hands, loaded their backpacks, grabbed their trekking poles and left the restaurant.
“Come back and visit us again sometime,” the owners said, waving goodbye as the two women walked away.
“Why didn’t you mention something about the weird guy you saw in the store last night?” Marcy commented as they exited the restaurant.
“I don’t know — I guess I didn’t want to come across as paranoid and a schizophrenic, I guess,” Rachel sighed. “I’ve already dismissed it as just my imagination playing tricks on me. It was probably nothing…what would I say anyway — that he looked dangerous? That I’ve had dreams about a guy chasing me since I was a child? The police would just think I was another nut job.”
“Yeah, you’re right. They’d think you just described a third of the local male Bubba population living in the Chattahoochee National Forest,” laughed Marcy.
CHAPTER 43
AFTER LEAVING MOUNTAIN CROSSINGS at Flatrock Gap, the two women crossed I-129 and began walking eastward on the Appalachian Trail once again. Their next destination was Hogpen Gap, seven miles through the rugged mountainous wilderness terrain.
They carried enough food and provisions for a week, about how long Rachel calculated it would take them to leave Georgia and reach the North Carolina border.
The trail ascended steadily from the highway, as they walked with their trekking poles, quickly leaving all sounds of civilization behind them, and they soon entered the remote Raven Cliffs Wilderness area. The trail continued its ascent, they trudged forward as the trail carved through switchbacks and passed trailside campsites in a 700-foot slow climb up Levelland Mountain.
The Appalachian Trail crested at the Levelland Mountain summit. The 360-degree views were awe-inspiring and stunning from towering mountain top: Lush green forests speckled with rocky outcrops as far as they could see, especially at daybreak, when the sun started to rise like a brilliant yellow orb on the far eastern horizon.
After a 30-minute break, they resumed walking, following the marked trail as it descended the mountain, switching back in a descent toward Swain Gap. The trail soon skirted Turkeypen Mountain and Rock Spring Top, and they passed trailside campsites on both sides of the trail. They continued east, walking a rolling ridgeline under a shady forest canopy, passing through a green, fern and wildflower-filled forest.
They took an hour lunch break at Wolf Laurel Top, then descended to Baggs Creek Gap having covered nearly six miles of steady walking. Pressing on after lunch, the trail ascended from the gap, and they steadily gained elevation in a final climb to the Cowrock Mountain summit.
They were nearly exhausted, but the summit offered stunning views of the surrounding mountain side and they took several more pictures. Here, the mountain peaks were notably more angular and pronounced than the rounded, rolling scenes from Blood Mountain to the west.
“How much farther to the pigpen gap place?” Marcy asked. “I’m so tired the bags under my eyes are becoming bigger than my boobs.”
“That bad, eh? You shouldn’t have eaten so much,” Rachel chided, as she checked the GPS coordinates on the Garmin. “About a mile and a half further…it’s called ‘Hogpen Gap,’ by the way.”
“Whatever — everything is named gap around here,” she moaned, “lead on, captain.”
Rachel took off with her long strides taking the lead, Marcy followed wearily about ten feet behind taking short choppy steps. Within minutes they wormed their way onto a winding, twisty trail and through a thick old-growth forest of tall oak and elm trees, with glimpses of breath-taking views through the small windows in between huge woody giants. It seemed like Sherwood Forest right out of a Robin Hood movie.
Within an hour they reached Hogpen Gap, one more of many dozens of “Gaps” of North Georgia. They spied a vacant primitive campsite with a firepit, with plenty of room to lay down their tents for their overnight stay. It had spectacular long-distance views of the North Georgia mountains. Several hundred yards away, Rachel located a freshwater stream where they could replenish their water bottles.
Having set up their tents and using the last of their water to cook their meal, they decided to relax.
“We better go and fill our water bottles before it gets too dark,” Rachel pointed out. “The tablets destroy viruses and bacteria in 15 minutes, Giardia in 30 minutes, but it takes nearly four hours to get rid of Cryptosporidium parasites.”
“Ah, do we have to do this now?” whined Marcy. “Crypto can’t be that bad.”
“Yes, it most certainly is!” affirmed Rachel. “Cryptosporidium infection is an illness caused by tiny, one-celled cryptosporidium parasites. When cryptosporidia enter your body, they travel to your small intestine and then burrow into the walls of your intestines. Later, cryptosporidia are shed in your feces. In most healthy people, a cryptosporidium infection produces a bout of watery diarrhea and the infection usually goes away within a week or two…you really want to get the diarrhea?”
“Oh, hell no…I’d rather poke a sharp pencil in my ear drum.”
“Well then, grab your water bottles and let’s go fill them up and purify them,” Rachel insisted.
“Okay, okay,” Marcy mumbled. “I knew I shouldn’t have hiked with a doctor.”
“I can hear you!” Rachel trilled as they each grabbed four empty quart water bottles and walked down toward the nearby stream.
Dusk had started and darkness had started to settle in. They had to hurry.
After hustling down to the stream, they squatted down and began filling the containers, one-by-one. As each container was filled, they then dropped the necessary number of purification tablets in and shook them vigorously.
They were on their final containers when suddenly, Rachel heard unfamiliar sounds that resembled a series of barks and grunts. Her head shot up, she looked around and saw nearly a dozen female elk exit the forest, about 100 feet downstream from them. The cows were accompanied by numerous calves, several of them drinking from the stream.
“Look at that!” she whispered to Marcy, pointing with her finger.
“What are they, deer — are they dangerous?” Marcy stammered.
“No, they’re just elk, most of them are relatively tame like a deer…I suppose,” she replied. “Anyhow, nothing to worry about…like bears or wolves.”
“Where are their antlers?”
“Only the males grow antlers,” Rachel answered, as if everyone should know that.
The two women watched quietly as the herd approached the stream with their typical regal and stately gait. They entered the stream and drank.
The calf elk sounds were not very loud and were very similar to the sounds that the adult cows made. Calves called to their mothers as they kept track of each other while the herd was grazing, drinking, or on the move.
“There is one thing we need to be careful of, though,” Rachel said.
“What’s that?”
“In early summer like this, the cows are more aggressive around their newborn calves,” she warned. “So, when we leave, we need to do whatever we can to stay out of their way and not frighten them.”
Oh, crap!” Marcy muttered, “now you tell me. What do we do if one of them charges us?”
“If one of them starts walking toward us, it’s not trying to be friendly, but likely warning us off — just grab your water bottles and slowly back away,” she answered.
“What if it charges, though?” she repeated.
“If it charges — it’s trying to drive us off, then run like hell!”
“Why is it that the elk are so close to us? I thought they were wild animals and avoided all humans.” Marcy wondered.
Rachel thought for a moment, “Probably because they are “habituated” to the presence of people.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Habituation means that the animals have become used to the presence of humans and their normal reaction has been attenuated.
“Maybe it is safe to be around them,” Marcy decided.
“Actually, no, the opposite is true,” Rachel guessed. “As the elk have become habituated to us, their natural fear reaction is reduced. This does not mean that they are tame, nor are they pets or safe to be around. I suspect they are so used to seeing hikers on a day-to-day basis, they are no longer nearly so wary of us. When wildlife loses its fear of humans, this is never a good thing.”
“So, if one of them charges, we should run?” Marcy said, staring at the herd. “Got it covered.”
“Yeah, an elk charges, you should run,” Rachel explained. “Unlike bears, for which it’s a terrible idea, running is your best bet for evading a charging elk.”
“Then what?”
“Well, find a tree to hide behind in order to avoid getting trampled,” Rachel guessed. “If we have time, climbing a tree is a good option, but not always feasible. Remember though, a charging elk isn’t necessarily trying to take us out so much as drive us off. Once it feels we’re a safe distance from its calf, the animal should leave us alone.”
