Carolina Mountain Club

Hike - Save trails - Make friends

December 7, 2007

Hunting Season

Nov. 19 to Dec. 8 (Deer Season)
Dec. 10 to Jan. 1 (Bear and Boar)

Merry Christmas and a Happy Hiking New Year!

Next eNews will come out Jan. 4, 2008.

Hiking News | CMC Calendar

Please Read This! (Last time in the eNews)

ATC to Offer Free Memberships to CMC Members

As an A.T. maintaining club, CMC is a member of the Appalachian Trail Conservancy (ATC). Many CMC members also are individual members of ATC. To introduce itself, ATC will give free one-year memberships to CMC members who are not already ATC members. However, CMC will need to provide the names and addresses of its members who are not already members of ATC. We will not be sending phone numbers or e-mail addresses to ATC, and ATC will not share this information with anyone else. ATC will give us the names of their members who live in Western North Carolina but who are not CMC members. We will send these people information about CMC and an invitation to join our Club.

CMC promises its members that it will not share their personal information with third parties. Since as a Club we are members of ATC, and this offer will benefit both CMC members and the Club as a whole, the Council felt we should make an exception. However, if you have an objection to having your name and address shared with ATC, please let Lenny Bernstein know by e-mail (lsberns@worldnet.att.net) or letter (488 Kimberly Ave., Asheville, NC 28804) by Jan. 15, 2008. No phone calls please. We will remove the name of any member who objects from the list we send ATC. Lenny Bernstein.

If you're not a member of CMC, think about joining the club. CMC is becoming the biggest bargain around. You'll get a gift card from Diamond Brand Outdoors and, if you join before January 15, 2008, you'll get a free Appalachian Trail Conservancy membership. How can you miss?

What's Happening in the Next Four Weeks

GPS Discussion Group

There is a new forum area on the Club forum list for the GPSr users among us. If you are not a forum member go to the Club website and in the left column click on the "Forum" link under News. Once you are on the Forum page, click on "Register". It may take a day or so for your registration to take effect, but you will be emailed when it does.

I hope we can deal with a number of issues, problems and solutions that seem to accompany a GPS unit. Log on and read the welcome message! Dave Wetmore

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Holiday Open House at Oconaluftee in the Smokies

Date: December 15, 2007
Time: 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM
Location: Mountain Farm Museum adjacent to Oconaluftee Visitor Center

Celebrate the season at the Oconaluftee Visitor Center and Mountain Farm Museum. Enjoy holiday music, traditional holiday decorations, historic toys, and demonstrations of mountain crafts such as corn husk doll making, broom making and more. For more information, call the Oconaluftee Visitor Center at (828) 497-1904

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Meet your New President

Becky Smucker

Looking at this picture always takes my breath away. Becky and I were on the Naturaland Trust Trail in Upstate South Carolina. When I crossed Matthew Creek on these parallel cables, I was not smiling.

How did you join CMC?
“My first hiking experience here was an overnight trip up to LeConte Lodge with Asheville Parks and Recreation. One of the leaders told me about CMC. Now I hike regularly on weekends. It’s important to me as R&R and exercise.”

Read the whole interview.

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Other Important News

Organize Charlotte Area CMC Hikers' Carpool

If you want to carpool from Charlotte area to Asheville for CMC all day Saturday and Sunday hikes, contact me at vtncfeet@yahoo.com. Debbie Green

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Membership Committee Survey for New Members. Will You Participate?

CMC’s Membership Committee has designed a survey that aims to get new members’ opinions and ideas on CMC hikes, social events, trail maintenance and other activities. We’ll use your ideas to help shape the club’s future plans and policies.

Ashok Kudva, Tish Desjardins and Jean Gard plan to call members who’ve been in the club for about six months. We’ll contact you by phone and ask for about five minutes of your time to conduct this survey. If we don’t reach you and leave a message, we ask you to please return our call. If phone bills are a problem, don’t worry, once you call us, we’ll get your number and call you right back.

Advance thanks for your participation. Ashok, Chair.

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Conservation

Smokies Turns 75 in 2009!

The Great Smoky Mountains National Park turns 75 in 2009 - it was established in 1934. The Park is planning a year-long celebration and working with partners and neighboring communities to organize and coordinate activities and events surrounding this milestone.

The major events include a weekend celebration in the Park's three main districts June 13-15 and a re-enactment of the Park's dedication by Franklin D. Roosevelt at NewFound Gap on September 2.

Yes, we're talking 2009 but that's how long it takes to plan these things. I will be going to a community partner planning meeting next month and will report back. Danny.

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Heard on the Ground

To all volunteers, trail maintainers, and ridge-runners of the Carolina Mountain Club

I just wanted to extend my deep appreciation for all the hard work that you have done to maintain the AT.
As I hiked through the different states, I was in awe at how such a beautiful trail is maintained by all
volunteers. Without you, my hike would have been extremely difficult if not impossible.

Your hard work and effort does not go unrecognized. Many hikers discussed their gratitude while in a
shelter along the AT in regard to the countless volunteers who make this trail possible.

Again, Thank you, Thank you, Thank you for your wonderful effort! I just wanted to let you know that
it certainly does not go unrecognized ... even if you do not receive notes stating so!

A happy and content thru hiker of '07- Belinda Gruszka
Boo-Boo, Cleveland, OH
www.trailjournals.com/boo-boo

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Bear Cables funded by ATC

The North Carolina Appalachian Trail License Plate Grant Program, in a second round of 2007 grants, awarded $5,222 to the Carolina Mountain Club to purchase tools and supplies to install eleven bear-cable food-storage systems at ten existing shelter sites managed by the club. Grant guidelines and application forms for the 2008 A.T. license plate grant program are now on ATC's Web site, at www.appalachiantrail.org/nclicenseplate. The deadline for 2008 grant applications is Friday, February 29, 2008.

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Adopt a Section of the Appalachian Trail

Lemon Gap to Bluff Mtn. including Walnut Mtn. Shelter, 3.9 miles
If you're interested, email Don Walton.

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Adopt a Section of the MST

Doubletop to Old Bald Access 1.1 miles
Devil’s Courthouse Jct. to FS 816 2.4 miles
Commissary Hill to Higgins Bald 1.8 miles

If you're interested, email Don Walton.

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Maintenance Reports created by Don Walton

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Heard on the Trail

Yes, that is my clan. When young men started emigrating from Moffett Wells Scotland to survive the clan wars, they changed their spelling of Moffett to keep up with their own family branch here in America. There are at least 24 spellings of Mafet, Moffett, Mauphet, etc. My family migrated from Philadelphia to Goldsboro to Old Fort to Black Mountaint to Swannanoa to Oteen-where my great grandfather (William MacRae Moffitt) homesteaded next to the Swannanoa River at exit 55. Moffitt Road is about eighty yards west of Subway.
Danny

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The Small Print

CMC Policy for publishing obituaries:

With the increasing size of the club and the limited space we have available, obituaries will not be published unless the deceased is extremely well known among most of the active club members. An obituary will be considered only if someone submits the obituary to the eNews editor ready to print; content should be limited to the deceased individual's CMC activities. It will not be repeated in Let's Go because of space considerations and the timeliness of publication, appearing only once a quarter. The Council may override this policy. – CMC Communications Committee

The eNews comes out on Fridays. So ... The next issue will come out on Friday, January 4 . This will allow the Sunday and Saturday hike leaders a little more time to send in their report; Wednesday hike reports for the hike just before the eNews comes out will be published in the next eNews.

So send me your hiking news, hike and maintenance reports by Wednesday evening at 9 P.M. before the newsletter comes out, that is, by Wednesday evening January 2, 2007 to Danny Bernstein danny@hikertohiker.com. Include your email address at the end of your story. Thank you.

       The CMC Calendar is meant to answer the perennial question "When is this happening again?" It is also meant to prevent conflicts between competing CMC events. Please check it often.

How to join the Carolina Mountain Club
1. Go to www.carolinamtnclub.org
2. Click on “How to Join” (upper-left on web page)
3. Print out the “CMC Application Form”
4. Fill it Out, write a check for your dues and ...5. Mail to CMC, PO Box 68, Asheville NC 28802

       For CMC members only - Send all address and email changes to Jean Gard at jeangard@charter.net. If you are a non-member subscriber, you need to go back into "subscribe" and change it there yourself.

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