Five new epic trips for 2012

01.26.2012

January is a good month for daydreaming — and planning.

Daydreaming can be a guilty indulgence, especially if you’ve got a pile of work you should be doing instead. But channel that daydreaming into planning and you turn from slacker into industrious go-getter. Someone who knows no mental downtime, who's constantly engaged and on the go. And someone destined to have some great adventures in the months ahead.

At least that’s how I justified a recent workday afternoon when I wiped a pile of work off my desk and got out the maps. The result? Five adventures I haven’t done, but will by the end of 2012.

1. Snowbird Mountains. Last February I was on Rod Broadbelt’s annual 22-mile hike at Umstead State Park when I found myself paired with a woman 10 years my senior who had only recently discovered the joys of hiking. Well, mostly joys. For while she spoke fondly of hikes in the Smokies, Shining Rock and throughout the Pisgah National Forest, her tone turned when it came to one guided hike she’d been talked into: the Snowbird Mountains west of Robbinsville. “It was a mess,” she declared. “It was overgrown, impossible to follow the trail.”

I made a mental note to add the Snowbirds to my list of must-hikes. Granted, I love a well-maintained, easy-to-follow trail. But every once in a while I yearn to get off the well-groomed path and explore, really explore. Apparently, I discovered later, I had made a mental note to visit the Snowbirds years earlier because at the very bottom of my map drawer I found a crisp, starchy Forest Service map of this remote area that became part of the Nantahala National Forest in 1943. Under the heading “Backcountry Trails,” the map begins: “Pathfinding is an integral part of the backcountry experience. ... You will experience the challenge of traveling through these mountains similar to that which confronted the earliest pioneers and settlers.”

The area’s mystique was hightened in a tantalizing passage pertaining to one George Mason, who in 1908 got the idea of establishing a 1,600-acre wild game hunting preserve in the area for the wealthy. Animals began arriving in 1912, among them buffalo, Russian wild boar, Colorado mule deer, native and Russian brown bear and wild turkeys. “Within a few years many of the animals had escaped from the impoundments ... .”

37 miles of hard-to-find trails, the chance for an encounter with a Russian brown bear that wandered off the reservation years ago, a map desperately in need of crumpling — reasons all why the Snowbirds tops my list of 2012 adventures.

Resources: Sherpa Guides, map: "Snowbird Area Trail Map: Nantahala National Forest," USDA Forest Service, 20-foot countours.

2. A new area of the Great Smoky Mountains. I don’t get to the Smokies nearly as often as I’d like, and when I do go I tend to hit the same old stupendous jaw-droppingly-gorgeous spots: Cataloochee, Mount Sterling, Deep Creek, Shuckstack, the Lakeshore Trail, Clingman’s Dome — in winter only, of course. Not this year. This year, I vow to explore an area I’ve yet to set foot in. Maybe the Cades Cove area, maybe in through Davenport Gap. With more than 850 miles covering 800 square miles and elevations ranging from just over 875 feet to 6,643 feet, it’s hard to go wrong in the Smokies. (But if you’d like to help me go as right as possible, I’d love to hear your suggestions.)

Resources: National Park Service; maps: Trails Illustrated "Cades Cove-Elkmont/Great Smoky Mountains National Park," 1:40,000; Trails Illustrated "Clingman's Dome/Cataloochee/Great Smoky Mountains National Park," 1:40:000.

3. West flank of the Black Mountains. Look at a map of Mount Mitchell and the Black Mountains and you see a curious thing. The east flank of the Black Mountain range is teeming with trails: Mount Mitchell, Colbert Ridge, Woody Ridge, the Buncombe Horse Range Ridge trails among them. West of the crest? Nothing. It might seem odd to lust after an area with no trails, but I’ve often stood atop Big Tom or the observation platform atop Mount Mitchell and wondered: “What’s down there?” My curiosity is driven in part by the realization that the west flank is more along the lines of what Elisha Mitchell encountered during his tireless efforts between 1835 and 1857 to accurately measure the height of the mountain that would eventually bear his name. (The falls where he fell to his death are on the west flank of the mountain.)

Only two unpaved roads — one out of the town of Pensacola, one out of Murchison — penetrate the west flank, so some of this expedition may be on mountain bike. To the south is a trail network extending from Walker Ridge to Craggy Gardens. It’ll all be part of the adventure.

Resources: Mount Mitchell State Park; Maps: "South Toe River, Mount Mitchell & Big Ivy Trail Maps," USDA Forest Service, 1:24,000, 20-foot contours, "Linville Gorge, Mount Mitchell: Pisgah National Forest," Trails Illustrated, 1:65,000, 50-foot contours.

4. Black Mountain Crest Trail in winter. I’ve hiked the Black Mountain Crest Trail, which runs 11.3 miles from Mount Mitchell north down to Bowlens Creek, but I’ve never hiked it in winter. Tried once, a dozen years ago, camping at the base of the mountain near the Black Mountain Campground and taking the 5.5-mile Mount Mitchell Trail (vertical gain: nearly 3,600 feet). Got about a half mile from the top and was thwarted by snow, ice and waning daylight.

This time, I plan to do two things differently. One, I'll invest $50 in some Yaktrax. And two, I’m going to backpack 3.2 miles up the trail, set up base camp in a sweet camping area protected by pines, then spend a day reaching the top and exploring the crest. Probably within the next month.

Resources: Mount Mitchell State Park; Maps: "South Toe River, Mount Mitchell & Big Ivy Trail Maps," USDA Forest Service, 1:24,000, 20-foot contours, "Linville Gorge, Mount Mitchell: Pisgah National Forest," Trails Illustrated, 1:65,000, 50-foot contours.

5. Appalachian Trail: US 19E to Damascus, Va. Last month, on a 50-mile backpack trip on the North Carolina Bartram Trail, my hiking companion Chris David more than once mentioned what he considered the most scenic stretch of the Appalachian Trail: the 73 miles  from US 19E north to Damascus, Va. “The views ... “ he kept starting to say, his words falling victim to derailing visions of hikes past.

The stretch picks up just north of where my current favorite section of the AT, the 13 miles from Carver’s Gap north to 19E, ends. Chris claims this 73 miles is even better, relentlessly so, with views .... .

Well, with views I guess I’ll just have to discover myself.

Resources: Appalachian Trail Conservancy, ATC Trail Guide for Tennessee-North Carolina.

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Look for trip reports on these five epics throughout 2012 here at nchikes.com.u226wy


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