A lot happened Memorial Day weekend, in addition to Anne delivering a new baby girl...
Saturday,
Ashley and I rode the motorcycle to the Tennessee Renaissance Festival. There's jesters aplenty, legs of fowl, shanks of beast, a jousting tournament, magic, shopping, a king and queen, and even a real castle! Oh yeah...and a TON of nerds.
Sunday,
we drove about an hour south of Murfreesboro to do a 2-day backpacking journey on the Fiery Gizzard Trail. The FG is a creek that winds from the Grundy Forest Day loop down to Foster Falls State Park, and through some very scenic parts of south central Tennessee. See?
The first day was great. We hiked along the creek's gorge over mossy boulders, dirt paths, and even some rock piles. There was a lot of climb and descend. On one of the lower points we spotted about 50 butterflies feeding on a creekside rock. I sneaked in among them to snap a few photos. The last 1/2 mile of the day 1 hike consisted of a 400 foot ascent to the raven's point campsite (ouch). We took a short rest before pitching the tent. After that we took a short walk to a stream to filter some fresh water. I had drank most of what we brought along. We also took another 1/2 mile walk out to the edge of raven's point.
Day 2 we woke up sore...but even after the 7 miles from day 1, we had 8 left to go. So, after brewing some coffee and eating breakfast, we grabbed up our gear and started off again. The trail was much more friendly, staying mostly above the ravine. There was only 1 point that descended back down, Laurel Gorge, but it was only about 200 feet down.
Near the end of the trail, we ran into 4 or 5 different sets of climbers scaling the wall of the gorge. Apparently Foster Falls State Park is something of a climbers mecca. We reached the falls minutes later, and relaxed in satisfaction of completing the hike. Also the PBJ's we had helped to increase the satisfaction substantially. Then we went for a dip in the blue hole at the base of the falls, but the water was SO SO cold, that we basically just got ourselves wet and said..."That'll do."
All in all, a great first backpacking experience!
-M
