Number of Days Afoot: 10 days, Day 1 AT - Day 10 AT

Distance in 1978: 87.9 miles

Blood Mountain, 4,458 feet summited 27 March 1978

Springer Mountain, 3782 feet summited 01 March 1978

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Amicalola Falls State Park, Chattahoochee National Forest,

The approach trail, also know as the Springer Mountain trail is a foot path from Amicalola Falls State Park to Springer Mountain, which summit, is the official southern terminus of the Appalachian Trail. The approach trail leads north and upwards from the state park along Amicalola Falls.

There is a forest service road near the top of the remote summit of Springer mountain, but this road is very primitive making the summit difficult to reach by automobile, so most hikers opt to take the 8.8 mile blue blazed approach trail which begins near Georgia SH 52 in Amicalola Falls State Park.

The approach trail is a blue blazed trail, the blue color indicating that it is a side trail from the main white blazed Appalachian trail.

Excerpts from pages 31-32

The Journey to Katahdin begin on a clear cold day in northern Georgia. It is still early in the morning on the first day of March in 1978, the toilsome pace has been continuing for well over two hours when on the side of the trail, there is an old sign upon which had been carved into the now badly weathered wood: Springer Mountain - 6.9 miles.

Already totally trail-worn from the day's hike thus far because the topography here is exhaustingly different from the flat woodlands, those that are inland from the Texas Gulf Coast where my many years of backpacking originated for me. Neither had any of my previous hikes in those flat forests of Texas provided me with the awe-inspiring beauty as Amicalola Falls had done for me earlier this morning.

There is snow on the ground now but the forest remains extremely wet and the trail bemired. About midday, my foot slips on an ice covered rock and this misstep brings me ever too close to a bath in the frigid mud. The trail takes me upward higher and higher onto this snow enshrouded mountain.

With each step higher on the mountain, the colder it becomes. All too soon the air temperature drops to below freezing with the mist and wind biting at the small amount of skin exposed on my face; it remains below freezing for the remainder of this day.

Upwards into the clouds, the fog, the ice and the snow does this climb continue for nine miles up and over seven progressively higher peaks to reach the summit of Springer Mountain for the beginning of my hike on the AT and finally, here it is, the bronze plaque upon which had been inscribed: Spring Mountain - southern terminus, Appalachian Trail. A foot path for those who seek fellowship with the wilderness.