Today we had a shorter hike from cable Gap Shelter down to Fontana  Dam shelter, aka “the Fontana Hilton”. Really just a regular wooden shelter, but a couple hundred meters away, it had a brick building housing bathrooms with flush toilets and a coin operated shower.  (It’s the little things in life!).

We got rained on a little bit at the beginning, but aside from some boulder scrambles at the top, it wasn’t a bad hike.

With spring coming, we saw some new vegetation popping up.

When everyone finally made it to the shelter, Alex (Dr Thor) decided he was going to push on to the Smokies and hike 10 more miles to the next shelter.  So we are down to a group of 5 for now.

After we settled in at the shelter, we took turns taking a “shuttle” into town to get hot dogs and  beer at a gas station.  They actually had it on tap!

With pretty much a 100% chance of rain and thunderstorms tomorrow, we are to take a zero day and stay at the lodge before taking on the 5 day trek through the Smoky Mountains on Wednesday.