A NEW TWIST
I’ve
hiked to Green Knob, in the Black Mountains of North Carolina, many times over
the years. I like the destination,
because it’s a good workout with a nice payoff at the end. The fire tower on the summit offers a 360
degree view of the Black Mountains and Craggy Mountains. This provides an ample reward for the effort
required to reach it.
I
always hike to Green Knob from either Curtis Creek Campground, outside of Old
Fort, or Black Mountain Campground, at the base of Mount Mitchell. Since I did the hike from the Black Mountain
Campground last spring, I decided to go up from Curtis Creek last
Thursday. My hiking friend Bob agreed to
join me, as he was looking to get a good workout before an upcoming backpacking
trip. We planned to hike the standard
route, but with a possible variation on our return.
I
was a little late meeting Bob that morning.
I had just left the house when I realized that I’d forgotten my
boots. How could I forget my boots? I doubled-back to the house, and discovered
they weren’t in their usual place in the garage. That was odd, so I spent a few minutes
looking around for them in the dark.
That wasn’t effective, so I grabbed my pair of lightweight dayhiking boots. I’m
not crazy about them, but I figured they would do for the hike we had
planned. Unfortunately, missing boots
would be an ongoing theme.
I
was almost completely free of work obligations on Thursday. The only catch was that I was supposed to
participate in a brief conference call at 10am.
The timing of this was inconvenient, as the hike to Green Knob is long
and demanding. I didn’t want to start
our hike at 11am. We reached the Curtis
Creek campground at 9:30, and I had no cell signal there. This wasn’t a surprise, but I figured I might
be able to make the call if we could reach Snooks
Nose Ridge by 10am. We hit the ground
running, tackling the initial steep climb from the campground without
hesitation. Bob lagged behind a little
bit, as he was carrying his full pack in preparation for his upcoming
trip. I wasn’t nearly that motivated
this morning, although I was toting 5 quarts of water, largely for the benefit
of Boone. I knew we wouldn’t see much in
the way of water sources along our route.
I
reached the crest of the ridge just before 10AM. This was much more promising than the valley
below. However, I decided to try to
improve my chances by following the ridge south from the gap. Unfortunately the former trail here is now
covered in fallen trees. As a result, I
didn’t reach the knob immediately to the south before 10. Despite this, my phone showed that I had 3
bars! Unfortunately, if you have Verizon
you know that the number of bars has nothing to do with the potential to make
an actual call. I made several attempts,
but couldn’t get through. Can you hear
me now? No.
I
gave up on that and returned to the gap to meet Bob. He had really enjoyed the exceptionally steep
climb out of the valley. At this point,
the steepest climbing was behind us, but we still had a long way to go.
Before
we left the gap, I made a note of an old road descending the far side of the
ridge. It was blazed orange, and
appeared to be well traveled. For our
return hike, I was contemplating trying an alternate route through the valley
to the west. I knew there was a trail
there, although it’s not on the map. I
thought that the road we were looking at might connect with that trail, forming
a loop. However, this was only
speculation. The only way to find out
would be to give it a try.
We
resumed the climb up the ridge. Most of
the climb was steady, although there were some incredibly steep stretches along
here, too. Snooks
Nose Ridge isn’t a trail that fools around with a lot of switchbacks. Luckily for us, it wasn’t a terribly hot
morning. Heavy clouds blocked out the
sun, although ample humidity still had us sweating by the time we reached the
first overlooks.
We
enjoyed some nice views from the cliffs, despite the haze and clouds. After a long break there to water the dog we
resumed the hike. The climbing
continued, until we finally peaked out on Laurel Knob. At this point we had climbed 2500’ from the
valley, but we still had more than 700’ to go.
Laurel
Knob featured more views as well as blooming Mountain Laurel, Azaleas, and
Rhododendron. The more we climbed, the more Rhododendron blooms we saw. I was surprised to see so many in bloom this early in the season.
We
dropped down to a minor gap, and noted a trail descending west towards Laurel
Log Branch. This path was also blazed
orange, which only added to my suspicion that it would connect with the old
road we’d seen earlier.
From
there, we climbed again, towards the Blue Ridge Parkway. Along the way we spotted some Painted
Trillium and Pink Lady Slippers, along with more blooming shrubs. We also passed the only other hiker we’d see
all day. He had started his hike from
the Parkway, and was descending Snooks Nose Ridge to
Curtis Creek. From there he planned to
use trails in the Mackey Mountain Area to reach a trailhead farther up Curtis
Creek Road. He had left a car at that
trailhead, and ridden a motorcycle up the Parkway to the Snooks
Nose Ridge Trailhead. That’s a pretty good
strategy for a solo hiker to run a shuttle!
The
sounds of cars, trucks, and motorcycles alerted us that we were nearing the
Parkway. This brought mixed
emotions. The good news was that we were
making progress on our hike.
Unfortunately, the noise was quite an intrusion on the quiet and
solitude we had enjoyed all morning. It
was a surprisingly busy day on the Parkway, given that it was a Thursday with
marginal weather.
We
walked north up the Parkway a short distance and picked up the signed trail to
Green Knob. This trail features lots of
switchbacks, but I was starting to run out of gas. It was well past lunch time, and I definitely
should’ve had a snack somewhere along the way.
We
reached the tower a bit before 1:30. We
went to the top for lunch, and for the first time I was able to coax Boone up
the steps. It was a challenge, as he
stopped halfway up on his first several attempts. Finally he made it the whole way. I was delighted to see him overcome his
phobia of stairs!
The
view from the tower was a bit disappointing.
The weather forecast had been promising, but the skies were hazy and
cloudy. The Black Mountains were completely
lost in the clouds, and the views in other directions weren’t much better. That’s the problem with the Black Mountains –
even in “good” weather you might not see much.
Aside from the clouds, there was a chilly breeze blowing across Green Knob. Between the chill and the constant noise from
the Parkway below, we didn’t linger long.
That was ok though, as we still had a long hike back.
We
followed the same route back to the gap north of Laurel Knob. There, in the spirit of adventure, we decided
to try the orange blazed trail heading down into the headwaters of Laurel Log
Branch. At the very least, it offered
the chance to see something new. Who
knew what we’d find down there? This
trail isn’t on any map or in any guidebook that I know of. In terms of navigation, this route didn’t
make a lot of sense. It would take us
down the valley west of Snooks Nose Ridge. Our car was in the valley east of Snooks Nose Ridge.
Still, I had a good feeling that we would run into that connecting road
that was also blazed orange somewhere along the way. If not, we could always follow Laurel Log
Branch down to Newberry Creek Road. From
Newberry Creek Road we could road walk back to Curtis Creek Campground. It would be a long detour, but we’d get there
eventually.
The
hike along Laurel Log Branch was fun.
Initially we descended very steeply to the creek’s headwaters. Then we continued downstream, following the
splashing brook. We rock hopped the
creek 5 times, with each crossing getting more challenging as the stream
grew. Early on we passed a couple of
sliding cascades that were interesting.
The first featured a narrow sluiceway, and the second was nearly steep
enough to be considered a waterfall. We passed
below some imposing cliffs, as well as towering Hemlocks. Unfortunately the Hemlocks in this gorge have
already succumbed to the blight.
After
some distance we reached a junction. The
correct trail was blocked by a fallen tree, and I nearly missed it. Luckily I spotted a faint orange blaze, and
we continued downstream. A bit later we made
our fourth creek crossing, where we found a sign announcing that we were near “fish
testing site #1”. We continued
downstream, but we didn’t see any
old roads, orange blazed or not, heading up the ridge to the east. Finally we came out on Newberry Creek
Road. Newberry Creek Road passes through
private property with houses at its lower end, but up here it is a gated,
somewhat overgrown forest road. We followed
it downstream, now along Newberry Creek.
We passed a number of campsites, but didn’t see signs of other
people. It appears that this area is
quite popular for hunting and fishing, though not well known in the hiking
community.
We
eventually reached the gate and a small parking area. I leashed the dog here, as I knew we’d be
passing houses shortly. After another
mile or so we finally spotted the orange blazed road heading up to our
left. At this point we saw no advantage
to going over the mountain to get back to our car. Instead we continued following the road. We reached Curtis Creek Road a bit
later. From there, we walked another
mile or so back to the campground. We
reached Bob’s car at 5:30, 8 hours after we’d started. It’d been a fun hike, with the challenging
workout we had both wanted.
We
now know that it is possible to make a loop with Snooks
Nose Ridge and the trail along Laurel Log Branch. The next time I do this hike, I plan to park
at the gate on Newberry Creek Road. I’ll
hike up Newberry Creek and Laurel Log Branch, and then follow the ridge to
Green Knob. On my return I’ll stay on
the ridge, and then drop down the old road to return to Newberry Creek. From that point, I’ll just have to walk up
Newberry Creek Road a mile or so to my car.
The
next morning I tore the garage apart looking for my boots. They didn’t turn up. I have no idea how I lost them. My best guess is that I left them at a
trailhead after a hike. I’ve been known
to leave valuable things in trailhead parking lots – right Jack? Unfortunately I’m not even sure when I last
had them. I know I wore them on my backpacking
trip with Johnny to the Thompson River back on May 2nd. I might have worn them on my Doughton Park dayhike on May 10th – or I might’ve
worn my dayhikers. Hmmm. It looks like I’ll be wearing those dayhikers
for the near future. Montrail
is no longer making the model of backpacking boots I used to wear. Luckily, I did find them on closeout at www.campmor.com. Now I’m hoping they’ll arrive before my
backpacking trip over Memorial day weekend!
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