| June 03, 2005 |
| Leaving War
Spur, 654.3 miles from Springer Mountain, at 9:15am.
Criss-crossing first thing this morning, the trail is rocky and dust
covered. We are now hiking Mountain Lake Wilderness area and in the
Jefferson National Forest. The rail is smooth, dust covered,
roots and we're able to make some descent time because it is flat in
this area. Lot of hard woods, open woods, lots of grasses,
kind of a swampy area. We stopped to register at Johnson's
Creek Crossing, Guiles County VA. |
| On the north side of
the creek the trail starts up the mountain gradually. The
trail is still good, it's an open pine wood forest, with a lot
shrubs underneath, blueberries, laurel, just now starting to bloom. |
Last night where we stayed there was a young girl there by the name
of Epps with a malamute husky and she growled at Simon when he came
up to her. Then Simon wouldn't have anything to do with her
the rest of the night. He really kept his distance and
wouldn't sleep near her in the shelter. He kept off by
himself. I think she could have been a little on the
aggressive side. |
| This area is
very steep, we've come through some rock piles in the trail. I
can tell we're nearing the top because we are getting into the slate
gravel path and some large boulders along side the trail. I'm
climbing nothing but rock piles, hardly any place to put your foot
in the trail. The poles get stuck in between the rocks and the
roots, you take a step, then you have to back up to try and get them
out. Very difficult to hike in. |
| Going straight
up an old logging road that has a lot boulders in it. We're
hiking the ridge top. Big huge boulders on both sides, a
little up hill, but right now in this area it's flat for boulder
hopping. On a clear day you could probably see clear off into
the distance, but today is hazy from the rain. |
| I've
been going a good ways off the mountain now, but right beside of me
a lot of laurel, some of higher than my head in a very dust covered
trail. |
| None of the
young kids are hiking in a good tennis shoe, which they do have a
good arch support. The draw back is that they get wet and I
don't see they can keep from turning their ankles in these places
where you can hardly step down without putting your foot on stones.
I've also seen people hiking in sandals, and flip-flops! |
| Got into Laurel
Creek Shelter and had our lunch. Heading now on towards Sarver
Hollow Shelter. Hopefully we'll be able to get in six miles in
5 or 6 hours before it's gets dark. Just crossed laurel Creek,
there was a pretty little falls there. |
| There goes VJ
again flying on top of my head, "I'm down here EJ, by Laurel Creek
and under these tall pines. I'm hard to spot". |
| We came into
an open field where there's is a lot blackberries in bloom.
This will make somebody a good bunch of blackberry jelly. Over
to the left was beautiful barn with a long type hay loft. It
looks like they're living in it until they get their house done that
they are building on a beautiful knoll. The mountains now are
really hazy. |
| Just crossed
42 and guess what? Another style we had to cross over.
This is defiantly a farming community, lots of cows, lots of
horses and a community church that was on the road below the style. |
| Breaking out
into the country side is defiantly a welcome change from the
woodlands. A lot of wild roses, shrubs and cedar trees. Just
passed an old log barn, probably the remains of some old homestead.
Back into a damp woods area, lots of ferns and pine moss on the
ground and your regular cushion mosses along the edge of the trail.
It looks really pretty. The spurs are just starting to form on
the moss. |
| We had an
accident coming over those big boulders. Spirit fell and went
down on her cheek bone and her pack was on her head, she couldn't
get back up by herself. We finally got her up and she was
bruised and bleeding. We got the bleeding stopped. She
alright!. |
| Climbing
straight up through the woodland, the trail has been muddy and
smooth for most of the way until we got to the top of the ravine.
Then we started switch backs which is taking us through the rock
pile now, so it's going to slow us down. It appears that we
are getting very close to the top, we've got big boulders on the
right side of us that look like their are ridge line rocks like in
Hocking Hills. Pines and mosses growing on top of them.
We are finally on top of this hill. It took us 1 hour and 20
minutes to go 1.3 miles. |
| The ridge line
has been very smooth hiking. There's a nice little rock karen
build underneath this tower. That's the first one we've seen
in a couple of weeks. Karens in Canada were built by the
Indians along the major scenic highways mean, ' God's spirit keep
you safe and enjoy your trip". |
| Going into Sarver
Hollow Shelter. |
|
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