Trail Scent

First of all apologies for the American spelling and typos that this will be riddled with. I am dictating as I walk and relying on the iPhone to hear what I say and turn it into text.

We have come out of the great Smoky Mountains and on the other side of that six thousand foot barrier, everything has changed. The rain has stopped. The forest has gone from fire scorched gray to green. The ground is covered completely with small leafy shrubs less than a foot high, most of which are in bloom. Wildflowers are white and blue and red purple. Above us, high above us, the canopies are pale, it’s still early spring and the leaves shine bright and new in the sunlight. Even the trees are flowering. Some of them, dogwoods I’m told, sprinkle the trail with white blossoms. Others flower bright yellow, or blue. 

The constant thunder storms seem to have taken a break, at least for now, and we have brilliant blue skies and a lush green forest surrounding us. We cross a stream every 20 minutes or so, collect a little more water and move on. Tonight we camp early, relaxing by a stream before tomorrow heading just 3 miles into Hot Springs, a resort town built around the volcanic mineral baths for which it is so creatively named. It’s been a truly idyllic day of hiking. 

We spent last night in a tiny campsite, with space only for us. Also beside a small stream, the campfire dried out all of our things after so many wet days on end. It was the most relaxing evening on the trail so far. 

But I promised to tell you about the smell. Since making that promise, I’ve taken to cooking over the campfire whenever possible. It helps conserve gas, and it blackens our a shiny titanium cooking pot to a satisfyingly rugged charm. It also means that I now smell as much of cooking smoke as I do of my own secretions. I think this is probably a good thing.

I have discovered an acrid, searing, gagging – almost weaponized – odour  arises remarkably quickly when a person has sweated into the same clothes repeatedly for days on end. It is not ordinary BO, or even a variation of it; having more chemical harshness of burning plastic, hot metal and I don’t know what!

My clothes are very high-tech, carefully chosen to be light weight, quick drying, UV resistant and chemically treated to repel ticks and mosquitoes. They are also, supposedly, less prone to stinking than other fabrics. However, after only a few days without at least a rinse those high-tech garments are evert bit as stinky as the very worst public transport neighbors I’ve ever encountered. 

What has surprised me is that it is very much the clothes, not the person, that develop the smell. Whilst it is marginally less offensive when the stench is of your own making that doesn’t help too much when those stinky clothes are also your pillow at night!  

Every chance I get, when the weather permits, I therefore wander downstream a little, strip off and rinse everything out. It is usually dry enough by morning, I’ve only been caught once (and everyone does the same), and trail life is so much fresher for it!

(Footnote: I’m editing this in a hostel after resupplying – more on that later – and just heard a direct quote from the hall near the washing machine: “so, what is your secret to getting the stench out?” Glad it isn’t just me!)