After a stormy night, we packed our bags hopped on the shuttle and headed back to the trail.  As we were leaving, we got a nice send off from one of the party, Naked Savage. He had to wait in town on a package, but was also in bad shape from blisters, 3 lost toenails  and knee trouble.

Can you find the Savage?

The climb up to Wayah Bald was pretty easy.  In fact at one point, we were surprised to have already covered 4 miles in little over an hour and a half

The view from the top of Yawah Bald was incredible!

But what really stood out was the damage from last year’s wild fires. The trees in the picture below are not in a shadow, they were actually black.

The old stone fire tower was still there, but it’s wooden tower had burned down.

After the tower, we hiked mile to the Yawah  Bald shelter, set up camp and built a fire.

Going to be a cold night.  It is about 20 right now and falling. Going to be tough getting out of hammock in the morning!