Loner at Tinker Cliffs

This series of photos is form a video Jeff aka Loner made by placing his camera somewhere on the mountainside and letting it film as he walked into view.  I'm so glad he did.  While I enjoy the hiker cam as he walks along so we can feel and see what he is, I really like to watch him as he tackles various parts of the trail.

Tinker Cliffs, like McAfee Knob and Angel's Rest is another iconic natural landmark along the Appalachian Trail. I don't think it's one of the most difficult, but I think hikers find it fun to challenge their bodies in different ways from hiking straight up a mountain or climbing up using the metal grab bars.

While Jeff has been a hiker for many years, he hasn't been a rock climber.  I know he has probably navigated rock faces in the Piedtmont foothills and Blue Ridge mountains where he hikes locacly on the border between Wetern South Carolina and North Carolina, but I'm sure each encounter is very different.  It appears that some of the rock climbing is one place where the hiking poles seem to be a hindrance rather than an aid.  On the flats and going down hill on paths they help ortect the knees by talking some of the weight off of them, but here they're just a nuisance hikers have to carry and climbing up rock faces they're just a hassle to the point where hikers throw the poles ahead of them, hoping they don't tumble down the mountainside so that the hikers can have their hands free to grab handholds in the rock.

Loner at 720 miles

Jeff aka Loner has now reached 720 miles and posted eleven new video's up on his you tube site, Loner AT 2012. He found an outfitter in Daleville so finally has good new shoes.  His first pair of New Balance lasted 630 miles and then he had to make do with a pair of wanna be Keds from the General Dollar for the next 90 miles because there was no outfitter in the town before Daleville.  He hiked one of the rockier more cliff side areas in those wanna be sneakers.
The lost mail drop boxes showed up - so Jeff ended up with 7 resupply boxes at one time. Not cool to carry a couple of miles to a hotel.  He had some trail angels give him a lift so that worked out and he bounced some of the food boxes forward. 
He finally got the copy of Appalachian Trials I sent him.  A great book by Zak Davis.  And he was able to buy another AT Companion since the second half of his did get lost in the mail, but the one he has now is last year's.  Hopefully it won't steer him too far off the current AT, but better than none.  He was walking the wrong way towards Pearisburg, but luckily he was pulled over at the side of the highway and the police officer was nice enough to tell him which way to go.
Check out the videos - some awesome scenery and some of the most celebrated spots on the trail such as Dragon's Tooth, Angels Rest, Tinker Cliffs and McAfee Knob, as well as a cooking lesson and a toga run to the laundry.
My computer at home isn't working right now so posts and photos will be few abnd far between.  But Jeff's videos more than make up for my silence.