Backpacking the Great Smoky Mountains

Posted by rmorris on 1. February 2010 08:50

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“Getting to the top is optional. Getting down is mandatory.”
-- Ed Viesturs (No Shortcuts to the Top: Climbing the World's 14 Highest Peaks)

The Great Smoky Mountains National Park sits on the border of Tennessee and North Carolina.  The park is massive at about 500,000 acres, 95% of which is forest.  The park has over 800 miles of maintained trails with elevations ranging from 800 feet to 6,643 feet, including the Appalachian Trail (AT) running right through the park.  This park attracts more visitors annually then any other national park, because it is within a days drive of about 60% of the population of the United States.  This puts about nine million visitors a year in the park.  You would think this would make the park crowded and perhaps parts of the park at certain times of the year are crowded.  But when I was lucky enough to visit last October for a backpacking trip, we saw few people.  I’m guessing that, as with most parks, the majority of people go only at the peak of the season and even then they don’t venture far from the main roads.  

These ancient southern Appalachian mountains are some of the most beautiful in the world.  The park holds a wide diversity of animal and plant life as well as the remains of the mountain culture that was in these lands prior to the park being established.  The plant life creates a blue misty haze accounting for the name “Smoky” mountains.

For my first Smoky Mountain backpacking trip, my brother and I chose a two night hike near Fontana Dam up to Gregory Bald. Since I was flying in and my brother was driving we decided to meet at the airport and spend Friday night at a Bed & Breakfast close to the trail head.  I’m not crazy about the idea of going right from an airplane to the trail head.  This time it turned out to be a smart move staying at an Inn then hiking in the morning – mainly because when I arrived at the airport in North Carolina, my backpack didn’t. It didn’t make it onto the plane with me (probably because I checked-in 5 minutes before the plane was schedule to take off).  Continental Airlines was very good about it and offered to have the backpack delivered to me at my hotel – which they did.  The plane my pack was on was delayed by bad weather, and our B&B was way off the beaten path, but about 4:30 AM – it was delivered.  The B&B we stayed at was The Appalachian Inn in Robbinsville, NC (their web site).  I highly recommend this place! Run by Lance & Elizabeth Butler it was a very pleasant stay and the breakfast was a wonderful start to our hike.

We started our hike at Twentymile ranger station, a small outpost (no ranger there) off Lake Cheoah.  From there we walked up “Twentymile Trail” until it intersected with the “Long Hungry Ridge Trail”.  The walk through this part of the park is close to many steams and rivers, there were several crossings, some by log bridges others were small fords. We stopped at campsite #92 along that trail and had a nice relaxing evening.  Campsite #92 has no shelters, just a few spots to pitch tents and a rock fire pit.  I put my tent up not to far from a small stream that runs through that site and was able to sleep to the very nice sound of the running stream.  The campsites in the GSM park all have bear poles – tall steal flag pole type things with metal cables you can use to hoist up you food bags.  Much more convenient that having to throw up you own cord over a tree.

The next day we woke up to perfect weather and hiked up to Gregory Bald (elevation 4,949 feet).  Unfortunately on this trip I didn’t bring my camera so I’m including this video Trent put out on youtube (Trents youtube site) as well as a couple public domain photos. 

We planned on spending the night at campsite #13 which is just past the bald off the “Gregory Bald Trail” but as we got there in mid-afternoon we discovered the site was closed due to excessive bear activity. So we found ourselves hiking down the “Wolf Ridge Trail” to campsite #95.  This was an extremely nice walk and did include a few close encounters with bears (including a few bear cubs up in trees). 

The next day we walked out of the woods and went over to Fantana Dam (a site worth seeing all on it’s own) and made use of the public showers there.  The AT goes right over Fontana Dam and there are shower facilities there for the thru-hikers. I’m sure the person sitting next to me on the plane back home appreciated this as much as me!

Link to purchase map…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

GSM Map

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Reading to Inspire a Hike

Posted by rmorris on 10. July 2009 11:06

Ever have some trouble getting the kids motivated for a hike?  How about your spouse?  Maybe you are married to someone that has a hard time understanding why you want to wonder around sleeping in the woods for weeks at a time?  Well, I was wondering around Campmor a few weeks ago and stumbled across this children’s book Halfway to the Sky by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley.  It’s written for pre-teens (of which I have two).  It looked interesting so I picked it up.  I read it first (Sometime ago I was under the misguided impression that I could read all the books my kids read – before them to make sure they are OK.  This long ago went by the wayside since my eleven year old daughter reads about twice as fast as me and has five times more time to do it).

Halfway to the Sky is the story of a twelve year old girl, Dani how is going through a tough time.  Her older brother died of muscular dystrophy and her parents are recently divorced.  Dani runs away from home.  So that her parents don’t find her, she plans to hike the Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine.  Her mother figures out where she has gone and catches up to her on her second night.  Dani is able to convince her mom to hike with her for a while.

During their hike, the experience of the trail is a catharsis for Dani and she is able to let go of her anger.  In the process Dani and her mom have bonded together.  When my daughter finished this book I could see she gained both a better understanding of how to deal with grief and anger and a much better understanding of how hiking and backpacking can free a person from the day-to-day ruts we all get stuck in.  It is always hard to put into words and explain to someone why it is we really love hiking.  This book allows the reader to get some insight into what the trail experience is like. 

The book is written for children, but after my daughters good reaction to it, my wife read it also.  Same reaction. I highly recommend it.

 

BTW: The links for the book on this page go to Amazon.com; If you by this $5.99 book via one of these links, this web site gets a 24 cent commission on the sale!  All I need to do is get about 25 people to buy this book and it will pay for the copy i purchase at Campmor!

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Tales from the Trail; Appalachian Trail journals

Posted by rmorris on 25. April 2009 10:04

Spring is finally here in full force, by now those hikers planning on a NOBO (north bound) thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail are well underway.  Some have already reached far into Virginia, others having gotten hurt or discouraged or for other reasons have left the trail.  I’ve developed a habit in recent years of checking in on their progress from time to time by reading their on-line trail journals.  These days with crack-berries and iPhones it is much easier for a hiker to update their journal.   Some hikers have their own web sites, but I tend to just check in with trailjournals.com (http://www.trailjournals.com/index.cfm). 

Just to give a small sampling, I’ve found four hikers ranging in age from 24 to 61 all with their own stories but all with the same passion for hiking the AT.  I’ll start with John, a.k.a. “nice lens” at 61 years old - as he puts it he is “well outside my comfort zone… Like most, I have been preparing and reading journals for over a year. Finally decided I had better get with the program. As I read John’s journal I found myself cheering for him.  At one point early on he was having a lot of trouble with his hip and thought he would quite – I kept hoping he wouldn’t – and he is still hiking.

Next I found a young couple hiking together with their dog; Georganna & Logan (and Corbin the dog).  These two are carrying a GPS device (spot) that transmits their location so you can follow them on a Google map if you like.  So far it sounds like they are really enjoying themselves… “the trail has been a blast...we started on springer mtn. with a bottle of whiskey and beautiful sunset. on the 21st we set out and had beautiful weather for several days! we heard coyotes howling right outside of our tent!”

Then there is “Snuggles” who started off on her solo thru-hike on March 19^th, much to the chagrin of her nervous parents!  She seems to have been born brave and with an amazing zest for adventure.  Here is a snippet from her journal…“but i didn’t make it there before sun down. so i went to look for my head lamp and i couldn’t find it. i didn’t know where Jen (from the store) had put it. i didn’t wanna take everything out in the dark just so i wouldnt leave anything behind. so... i walked in the dark. i could barely see anything, i had to use my hiking poles like a blind person so i could feel where the large rocks were and where it went up and down! i finally started hearing voices so i knew i had to be getting close. then i saw the fire! i just cut through the trees and went straight towards them and they all yelled "snuggles!!! you made it!" at this time it was 8:30pm. i had hiked 6 miles in only two hours. they couldn’t believe it! they helped me put my tent up since the shelter was full and lent me a head lamp to get settled. i wasn’t about to cook dinner at that time so i just ate a snickers bar and pop tart for dinner.”

With people like this along for the walk, no wonder we dream of being on the trail.

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A Backpacker's Pantry; Lessons from a Boy Scout

Posted by rmorris on 23. April 2009 13:23

A Backpacker's Pantry; Lessons from a Boy Scout

Written by Ed Jankins

Daylight was just breaking when my alarm clock went off, it was mostly useless noise as I had been lying in bed half awake for close to an hour, anxious. From my window it looks as if it was drizzling although the forecast was for clearing skies. Now for the tough part, getting my son out of bed.

No worries, the car was packed. The coffee would perk while the breakfast sandwiches heated in the toaster oven.  We were, like all good Boy Scout, Prepared!  But being prepared was no accident, it takes, well it take preparation.

If you are like me you want to get out into a tent as often as possible, and again if you are like me,  your life is pretty busy so planning and preparing for a trip gets put on the back burner.  So how can you make being prepared a lot less preparation?    

1. Throw it out, you know that sleeping bag from 1983 that is still OK,  and someone might be able to use, give it to Goodwill so someone can use it.   Rule: if you haven’t used it in 5 years, guess what?

2.  Make up a box with all the essentials you need for a two or three day backpacking trip, nothing more. Tent, backpack, stove and fuel, cooking and eating gear, water purification, water bottles, head lamps, stuff sacks, sleeping pads, rain gear, everything except your sleeping bags and batteries.

3. Make up a box with all the stuff you use just for car camping but nothing else. Big two burner stove, wash basin, big lantern, ax, big tent.

4. Label the outside of you boxes and bins with an index card that has an accurate inventory if what is inside. 

5. Separate your sleeping bags by season, keep the ones not in use hanging in the closet (not stuffed) or loosely folded into a plastic containers clearly labeled.

6. Organize what you put inside your storage containers, use a small cheep plastic tool box to keep all your small stuff in it, head lamps, extra batteries, flint/steel, matches, carabineers, tent spikes. 

7. Keep a separate stocked supply of zip lock bags and food containers, don’t rely on your house hold supply.

8. Keep a separate container for specialty equipment like crampons,  mosquito  netting, water shoes, stuff you don’t need on each trip.

9. Keep your backpacking clothing separate from your day to day and don’t wear it for anything but your outdoor fun, you look silly in wool socks and boots at work anyway.

10. Keep a stocked supply of  “personals” baby wipes (unscented), Purel,  camp soap, matches, bug spray, all the exhaustible supplies.

11. Buy a good battery tester.

12. When you return from your trip, leave some time to recover but also time to clean and repack your gear so it is ready to go again.

13. Keep a pad and pen near your storage area and make a list of what you need to buy and notes of what didn’t work and what did on the last trip, like the food that was good (and not), like you might want to get like better tent spikes.

14. Always have extra camp fuel stocked away.

15. Don’t be afraid to use a few moth balls or big red cedar blocks in your containers that might be susceptible to rodents and bugs, the smell will go away.  

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Pochuck Quagmire; AT from High Point NJ to Route 94

Posted by rmorris on 12. April 2009 13:34

The first backpacking trip of the season is always exciting.  Living in the Northeast and not being a winter camper (I have a deep aversion to cold), I hadn’t been out backpacking since November.  So on the last weekend in March I set out for a short trip on the Appalachian Trail. 

The weather forecast a few days before was for rain and cold, dropping to the low thirties at night.  But by Friday the forecast for the temperature was much warmer and the chance of rain dropped to 50 percent.  We left from the ranger station at High Point, New Jersey headed to route 94 near the New York border. This would be a two day hike of about 21 miles or so.  For one of the people in our small band, this would complete his last section of the AT in New Jersey. 

Just before leaving I took a quick look at the map and was pleasantly surprised to see the route we had chosen was almost all down hill! (except for a sharp climb up Pochuck mountain).  Having done only a handful of hikes and some running over the past winter, this was a bit of a relief.  

The trail here starts out quite rocky, with some stretches of basketball size rocks, but after a few miles that fades into a very pleasant gradual decent in the woods.  The trail is a comfortable and peaceful walk in the woods for a long ways.  For a time the trail is on an abandoned railroad grade, we found old coal from the trains actually still scattered about. The trail passes through many farmlands along stone walls and pastures an interesting change from hiking in the woods.

As we approach Pochuck Mountain, the AT runs through the Wallkill River National Wildlife Refuge.  This was an unexpected treat.  We found here very large turtles, many muskrats and an abundance of beautiful red-winged black birds. This is an area well worth returning too.  We then passed through Pochuck Swamp.  Here the New Jersey Trail Conference and the Appalachian Trail Conservancy have constructed nearly a mile of boardwalk and bridge the enabled us to pass through the swamp without getting our feet wet!

We spent the night near the AT Pochuck Shelter.  A group of boy scouts had reached the shelter before us.  We were still able to setup our tents an hour or two before the rain started.  The boy scouts were generally quiet except for a 7 am singing wake-up song.  On a rainy morning we had planned to sleep in a bit.  But since we were up, we skipped breakfast, packed up and set out on the 7 mile hike out.  The rain soon stopped and we found ourselves enjoying a nice morning walk out of the woods.  Overall, a great start to this years upcoming backpacking trips.

 

Section Trivia:

• The way the trail is oriented along the NY/NJ border, the “northern end” of the section is actually compass south of the “southern end”.
• High Point is the highest elevation in NJ 1,803 feet.
• Wallkill River National Wildlife Refuge is the only federal wildlife refuge on the AT.
• Some of the exposed rock on Pochuck Mountain is over a billion years old.

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