DAY ONE
Arrived at the trailhead on a picture perfect, sun-drenched day with temps in the lower to mid 50's. Gathering also was a group from the Ozark Society, Shrevesport Chapter. They were split into two groups, one doing a 6 mile out/back day hike and the other hiking all the way to Ouachita Pinnacle (about 9 miles) where there was road access and vehicles waiting.
My hiking buddy made the comment that he liked the Ouachita Trail better than the Ozark Highland Trail because the trail tread wasn't as rocky. I was thinking that his observation was a little premature.
We had planned a short mileage first day to the Blue Mountain Shelter at about 4.5 miles because we weren't packing tents. Played leap frog with the day hikers and chatted with them some at various breaks.
Just as we reached the spur trail leading to the shelter, we saw a couple of west bound backpackers (we were hiking east) heading in that direction also.
Come to find out that one of the guys was a Appalachian Trail thru-hiker. (A thru-hiker is one who hikes the entire trail in one season and the AT is 2175 miles long traversing the mountain chain from Georgia to Maine.)
Needless to say, we had a very interesting conversation over lunch at the shelter. They eventually pushed on and we proceeded to gather firewood for the evening's hot dog roast. (For the last few years we've wrapped a pack of dogs in foil and frozen them the night before our first day on the trail. By the time we're ready to cook them, they're thawed but still cool.) Yum