As summer and its 90-degree temperatures near, hiking midday can be one sweaty undertaking. That leaves the evenings and early mornings, when temperatures in the 70s seem downright fall-like. Today, we revisit a piece from May 6, 2011, that expounds upon the delights — and challenges — of the early morning hike.
Start your weekend Friday evening in the Piedmont, learn how the woods once helped paint their own portraits at Elk Knob State Park, “sneak” into 10 nature programs at the coast. So much to do this weekend, and great weather in which to do it.
Coast
Today, a slideshow.
At the end of May, I helped my daughter move from North Carolina to Salt Lake City for her first job. Along the way, we managed to work in a hike or four. All were spontaneous, there was no planning. These were pretty much of the, ‘Hey! We’re in the Ozarks! Let’s pull over and hike” variety. Roadside hikes that were pretty dang awesome.
On Sunday, I saw a Facebook post from a hiker visiting Damascus, Va., for Trail Days, the annual event celebrating the first wave of Appalachian Trail thru-hikers traipsing through town. It reminded me of what a delight it is to hike among thru-hikers and hear about their experiences. Back in April of 2010, I happened upon a wave of thru-hikers, along with a bit of paternal trail magic, in the Standing Indian area of western North Carolina. So I headed into the Wayback Machine to revisit this magical encounter.
We head into the wayback machine again to revisit the timely topic of trail etiquette. The following first appeared here on March 19, 2010. It reappears today, with minor revisions.
Sunday, I was running the bike and bridle trail at Umstead when I came upon a sizable obstacle: a phalanx of hikers bearing backpacks spanned the width of the trail, spilling over onto the shoulders. The trail is quiet generous, a converted fire road that should be capable of handling boatloads of trail users without conflict. Provided those trail users are cognizant of other trail users. Which brings us to today’s topic: