>>270392That night my boots froze solid and were nearly impossible to put on. There is no hell quite like putting on frozen clothes and socks. It was still snowing. Pressed out early with two other guys. Breaking trail through hip high snow. Snow covers the trunks of the trees, so visible blazes are rare. "Are you sure we're going the right way?" We ran into some section hikers who told us we were on the wrong path. Walked a mile back until we ran into a blaze for SOBO's. Shit. We retraced our steps and started taking turns at the front. Every time we saw a blaze we high-fived it and yelled, but mostly we looked for sawn logs and buried bog bridges to find our way. By this point we were walking the ridgeline, so there were drifts up to our nipples. We couldn't see our footholds under all the snow. Stumbling like drunk men: slip, catch, slip, fall, repeat. I never hiked with poles, but that was the only part were I wished I did.
Eventually, caught up by guys from the day before. They started to plow, thank christ. We finally get to the shelter eleven miles from Newfound Gap. It was packed, everybody logjamed there, afraid to continue. Still snowing. One of the older ladies managed to get a call through to the park service. Road was closed. Park was closed. No rangers. Guys that caught us up that day decide to press on over Clingman's Dome. It was five o'clock, and we strongly cautioned them against it. They left anyway. We had a much more successful fire that night, many a sock was toasted. We had about thirty people crammed into that shelter. One gf/bf couple had a breakup in the middle of everything, vastly uncomfortable for everybody. Old man shit his pants in the snow. I seemed to be one of the few that had an adequate bag for those conditions, but I was nearly out of food.
