Tag Archives: Crowders Mountain State Park

This weekend: Hot with fun

Expand your horizons by watching top surfers at the coast or rise to new heights — by running to the top of Crowder’s Mountain or cycling 100 miles in the mountains and gaining 9,600 feet in the process.

Coast

Action is often the result of inspiration. Look at all the people who got into cycling because of Lance Armstrong’s success, albeit ill-begotten, in the Tour de France. Or the number of folks who flood the local state park on that first fall-like weekend of September. Or the spike in fly fishing after “A River Runs Through It.” Sometimes, watching leads to doing. read more

Do it all on New Year’s Day

Post-hike Russian tea at the Eno River Association New Year's Day Hike

When I first started writing about fitness and the outdoors back in the early 1990s, there were a handful of ways you could welcome the New Year in most communities. There was usually a 5K run, a bike shop sponsored a casual ride, canoe clubs held members-only paddles, there was a hike or two, and some oddball group was jumping into a local lake (and jumping right back out again). You had options for welcoming the new year, but not a lot. read more

‘Tis the season to save your sanity by getting out

Gone for the winter (good news for your hike around Lake Waccamaw).

This weekend, avoid alligators, avoid trails, but don’t avoid the first big weekend of the Southeast ski season.

Coast

Remember the old Peter, Paul & Mary hit, “Where Have All the Reptiles Gone?” No, wait. That wasn’t PP&M in the 1960s. That’s Lake Waccamaw State Park this Sunday at 2 p.m., when a ranger explains why the park’s alligators are no longer on the prowl, why the turtles aren’t out catching some rays … basically why the entire reptile population is laying low. A great opportunity to learn a little something, then take a long (Lakeshore Trail, 5 miles) or short (Sand Ridge Trail, 0.75 mile) hike to look for the reptiles that aren’t supposed to be there. read more

It’s a good weekend to plan ahead

Flesh-eating plants at the coast, the perfect three that vanished in the Piedmont, fall color in the mountains. Take your pick.

Coast

Are we recommending this weekend’s back-to-back Carnivorous Plant Hikes just so we can use a picture of Seymour’s carnivorous creation? read more

Fall starting to light up the Piedmont

The understory (dogwood) is turning at Hemlock Bluffs, the canopy not yet.

Sunday, Marcy and I headed over to Hemlock Bluffs Nature Preserve in Cary after roadside flashes of sourwood red and dogwood peach suggested the fall color show was just getting underway. Roadside trees — stressed by the heat of automotive exhaust — are often the first to show their chromatic hand. When they start to go, we grab the camera and head for woods. read more