That’s one of the many joys of backpacking: once you’re on the trail, you don’t have to leave. Stay a night, or two or three.

If you’re already a backpacker, we’ve got some great trips planned for fall. Some are ideal for folks new to backpacking (Intro to Linville Gorge, the Neusiok Trail), some are for more experienced backpackers (Joyce Kilmer/Citico Creek Wilderness). Then there’s the Appalachian Trail trip from Carvers Gap to 19E, a trip that should be on every backpacker’s resume.

If you’re not a backpacker, there’s no better time to start, and no better people to start with than us. If you’re intrigued by the notion of backpacking but need to dip a toe in before committing, we have our new Overnight Sampler. If you’re pretty sure backpacking is for you, check out our comprehensive Intro to Backpacking class.

Either way, fall’s the time to backpack. We hope to see you on the trail. For additional information on each event, click on the link below.

Intro to Backpacking, September session. Our comprehensive learn-to-backpack program includes a two-hour session on gear and how to pack a backpack; a six-hour session at Morrow Mountain State Park where be go over everything from setting up camp to cooking to hanging food, to breaking down camp; and, finally, a weekend graduation trip to South Mountains State Park.

GetBackpacking! Overnight Sampler, Sept. 15-16, Eno River State Park, Durham; Oct. 20-21, Raven Rock State Park, Lillington. You like the idea of backpacking, but you aren’t ready to make a full-on commitment — you’d like to take a test-drive first. That’s what our Overnight Sampler is all about: we provide the key backpacking gear and food, you get to see what it’s like to hike in a full pack and camp in the backcountry overnight.

GetBackpacking! AT from Carvers Gap to 19E, Burnsville. Sept. 21-23. A two-night, three-day 14-mile trip that may be the most scenically spectacular run of trail in North Carolina. We start at Carvers Gap and top Jane and Round balds right off the bat, meander through forests of mountain ash, then encounter more stunning views from atop Little Hump and Hump mountains.

GetBackpacking! Intro to Linville Gorge, northwest of Morganton, Oct. 5-7. Linville Gorge can provide a rewarding (and intense) immersion into backpacking. But on this trip, we’ll take a more relaxed approach, setting up basecamp on Shortoff Mountain, then day packing into the gorge.

Joyce Kilmer/Citico Creek Wilderness, Oct. 25-29, adjoining wilderness areas in North Carolina and Tennessee near Robbinsville. Its remote location and ruggedness helped spare this area from extensive logging, making it an easy choice for Wilderness designation. Participants will play a role in the actual planning of this trip, at a two-hour planning meeting a week before the trip.  

Neusiok Trail, Croatan National Forest, New Bern, Nov. 30-Dec. 2. Late fall is the time to hike the coastal Croatan National Forest. Pesky flying things and slithering denizens of the dirt are kept at bay by the cool weather, and the fall color continues to linger along this 21-mile trail that starts all coastal but delivers some surprising twists at the end. 

Happy trails,

Joe

More info

Class: Intro to Backpacking

Class: GetBackpacking! Overnight Sampler (September)

Class: GetBackpacking! Overnight Sampler, (October)

Trip: Appalachian Trail from Carvers Gap to 19E

Trip: Intro to Linville Gorge

Trip: Joyce Kilmer/Citico Creek Wilderness

Trip: Neusiok Trail

For more information on our fall 2018 programs in general, go here.

The post With backpacking, there’s no reason to leave the trail appeared first on GetGoing NC!.

It’s one of our favorite things to hear, because it means we’re meeting one of our key goals: leading you into the unknown. Sure, we hike a lot of trails more than once, and for good reason: they’re worth it. Our Charlotte group goes to South Mountains State Park regularly, our Charlottesville crew loves the Jones Run/Doyles River Circuit in the Shenandoah National Park. And with 120 miles of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail running through the Triangle, I’ve lead a goodly number of hikes on the statewide path along the Eno River and the south shore of Falls Lake. 

But it’s the new discoveries most hikers really love.

“Show of hands,” I said at the beginning of a recent hike at the Shallow Ford Natural Area north of Burlington: “How many of you have hiked here before?” 

None of the eight hikers raised a hand.

Ditto a recent after-work hike at the two-year-old Brumley Nature Preserve in Chapel Hill, at Little River Regional Park on the Durham/Orange county line, and on the Great Blue Heron Loop Trail at Haw River State Park’s Iron Ore Belt Access area. Some of these gems are new, some simply off the beaten path. We’re constantly on the lookout for both.

This week, we thought we would highlight a few upcoming adventures to places that may be new to you.

• Confluence Natural Area, day hike, Hillsborough, July 22. The Eno River Association is one of those land trusts whose work frequently flies under the radar. If you’ve hiked in Eno River State Park, or at Little River Regional Park, you’ve likely hiked on land preserved by the ERA. They typically buy land in the Eno watershed, then, eventually, turn it over to North Carolina State Parks. This spring, though, the ERA opened the 200-acre Confluence Natural Area, its first preserve open to the public, where we’ll explore 2-miles of newly blazed trail.

• Standing Indian Recreation Area, hiking/camping weekend, Nantahala National Forest, Aug. 24-26. Standing Indian was new to me when I scouted it in 2009. I was finalizing which trips to include in my book “Backpacking North Carolina” and noticed this big network of trails west of Franklin. It seemed worth a chance — and it was. On this trip, the main hike is an 11-mile loop consisting of a mellow climb up Kimsey Creek to the Appalachian Trail at Deep Gap, then hiking north to 5,498-foot Standing Indian and back to camp on the Lower Ridge Trail. We’ll do a shorter hike Sunday.
• Curtis Creek, hiking/camping weekend, Pisgah National Forest, Sept. 28-30. The Curtis Creek area of the Pisgah outside Old Fort is hardly new: in fact, it’s the oldest tract in the Pisgah National Forest, dating back more than a century. It’s also not new in that it’s home to some of the oldest old growth in the Pisgah. We’ll explore here and in the nearby Montreat Wilderness area with a climb up 5,592-foot Graybeard Mountain.
• Joyce Kilmer-Slickrock/Citico Creek Wilderness, four-day backpack trip, Nantahala and Cherokee National Forests, Oct. 25-29. This is the mountain land that time forgot. Too rugged and remote to draw much interest from logging concerns, the area was a natural for inclusion as a designated Wilderness Area. The area may be popular with locals — what locals there are — but it’s largely untouched by us outsiders.
• Nags Head Woods Preserve, hiking/camping weekend, Outer Banks, Nov. 2-4. Usually, when you head to the Outer Banks, your thoughts are on the beach, not the trail. Yet there’s some stunning hiking to be done, none more so than through the maritime forest at The Nature Conservancy’s thousand-acre Nags Head Woods Preserve. Five miles of trail explores everything from dense woods to the sound. That’s Saturday; on Sunday, we’ll do another five miles amid some of the oldest trees in North Carolina, in Pettigrew State Park.

Interested in expanding your adventure horizons? Find more information on each adventure in the links below and join us.

Happy trails,

Joe

Explore!

Learn more about the new places we’ll be exploring by clicking on the links below.

• Confluence Natural Area
• Standing Indian
• Curtis Creek
• Joyce Kilmer-Slicrock/Citico Creek Wilderness
• Nags Head Woods

The post Finding new places for you to explore appeared first on GetGoing NC!.