The first summerlike weather of the year has descended, but don’t let that keep you cooped up this weekend. Beat the heat with a coastal retreat, by doing the vampire thing and coming out at night, or hitting the high — particularly high — country.
Monday — never an easy time for the outdoors enthusiast. After a weekend of adventure, returning to the humdrum work-a-day world can make one melancholy. To help ease the transition, every Monday we feature a 90 Second Escape — essentially, a 90-second video of a place you’d probably rather be: a trail, a park, a greenway, a lake … anywhere as long as it’s not under a fluorescent bulb.
I thought we had lost the trail but in fact we were smack dab on course. The Haw River Trail was intended, it turns out to meander through the Glencoe neighborhood of restored mill homes.
Yet another attraction of this 70-mile work-in-progress that runs from Haw River State Park above Greensboro to its namesake river’s exciting conclusion — especially after a good rain — in Jordan Lake. In addition to showing off the natural beauty along — and in — the Haw — the trail is intended to showcase, and in the process help preserve, the remarkable human history that has evolved along the river. (Check out yesterday’s 90 Second Escape along the Haw for a video perspective.)
Monday — never an easy time for the outdoors enthusiast. After a weekend of adventure, returning to the humdrum work-a-day world can make one melancholy. To help ease the transition, every Monday we feature a 90 Second Escape — essentially, a 90-second video of a place you’d probably rather be: a trail, a park, a greenway, a lake … anywhere as long as it’s not under a fluorescent bulb.
When I wrote “Backpacking North Carolina” and “100 Classic Hikes in North Carolina,” I focused on loop trips and hikes whenever possible. The reason? Simple: Shuttles are a pain.
For the traditional shuttle you need two cars; you can’t do a point-to-point solo. If there are just two of you, you both have to drive. That’s not only a waste of gas, it eliminates catch-up time on the drive (not that you won’t be talking on the trail). Setting up a shuttle also eats into valuable hiking time. And what if something happens to the shuttle car or driver? In November, four of us were hiking the Mountains-to-Sea Trail west of Mount Pisgah. As the trail crossed the Blue Ridge Parkway, one of our party suddenly decided he was through. He flagged a passing car and before we knew it he disappeared down the road — to his/our shuttle car at trails’ end. Now what?