Temperatures in the 70s, mostly sunny skies — sounds like a weekend to get out and explore in the GetOut! universe. Some options for your adventure consideration:
High 5 @ Hanging Rock, Saturday, beginning at 7 a.m., Hanging Rock State Park, Danbury. Our friends with the Friends of Sauratown Mountains do a great job supporting both Pilot Mountain and Hanging Rock state parks, the west and east endpoints, respectively, of the Sauratown Mountain range. They support the parks in a variety of ways, one of which is by funding some of the smaller park projects that might not otherwise get done. Where do they get their money? you ask. From events like High 5 @ Hanging Rock. The goal of High 5 is to hike all 5 of Hanging Rock’s key high points: Moore’s Knob, Cooks Wall, Hanging Rock, Wolf Rock and House Rock. Complete the circuit and get a patch! There are two rest stops along the route, foot trucks at the finish (get a $5 food truck voucher upon registration). Cost is $40, which, again, will largely go to benefit the parks. Learn more and sign up here.read more
Sunny with highs in the 70s on Saturday, not quite as promising on Sunday, but we’ll see. Sounds like a decent weekend forecast for enjoying the outdoors in any number of ways.
Here are a few:
Spring Hike, Saturday, 1 p.m. Pettigrew State Park, Creswell. Pettigrew State Park, Pettigrew State Park … . We can hear the gears of confusion now. If you haven’t heard of Pettigrew, it’s likely because of its off-the-beaten-path location: it’s south of Creswell, which is west of Columbia, but east of Plymouth, which is just beyond Williamston, which — well, you get the idea. In short, it’s a bulb of land that’s between Albemarle and Pamlico sounds, and it’s got some of the oldest and biggest trees in the state, which you’ll be able to see on this flat-and-easy 5.6-mile hike. Learn more here.read more
Weird weather (Friday snow in the mountains?) precedes a mellow, springlike weekend. A weekend good for so many adventures, from heeding the advice of Edgar Winter and taking a free ride to gazing into the night sky.
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A satellite view of the eastern seaboard at night is startling not so much for the artificial light that illuminates the region, but for the one spot that remains dark: far eastern North Carolina. A blink here and there, but mostly darkness. One night around 11, lying on a gravel road just outside Columbia, we saw the Milky Way with nearly the clarity I’d seen it years earlier camping at 9,000 feet in the Rockies.
Which is why Saturday evening’s Night Skies at Pettigrew State Park program is so appealing. Members of the Tar River Astronomy Club, with telescopes in tow, will be on hand to help decipher the brilliant night sky (with only a quarter moon’s worth of light to contend with).
Logistics: Night Skies at Pettigrew State Park, Saturday, April 8, 7-10 p.m. Columbia. Free, but preregistration is requested, by calling 252.797.4475.
Saturday forecast: Clear skies, event-time temperature around 50, so don a wrap.
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Looking ahead: Flight of the American Woodcock, Saturday, April 29, New River State Park, Laurel Springs. More info here.
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We once heard someone refer to a bike demo as “cheap fun.”
Ha!
To the uninitiated, a bike demo occurs when a local bike shop teams with one of its bike suppliers to bring in a fleet of demo bikes for folks to take a free ride. “Free” my saddle sores! You take one lap on a bike so superior to yours that you can no longer call what you’ve been doing as “riding” and you wind up the day $3,000 poorer. But with a new bike!
Think it can’t happen to you? Then we invite you to check out Galactic Bikes of Greensboro’s Pivot Cycles Bike Demo Saturday at Country Park. Bring your kit, helmet and shoes (and pedals) — and your checkbook, if you dare!
Logistics: Pivot Cycles Demo Day, Saturday, April 8, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m., Country Park, Greensboro. More info here.
Looking ahead: Moonshine Still Hike, Sunday, April 23, Stone Mountain State Park, Roaring Gap. More info here.
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Another good excuse to visit Black Mountain: Saturday’s Black Mountain Greenway Challenge. The Challenge comes in two sizes — 5K and 10K — and celebrates the town’s greenway system with a run to and around Lake Tomahawk.
The Black Mountain News tells us the race is in its 10th year, and that the town’s greenway ”is now part of a much larger system, known as the Fonta Flora State Trail. That trail will one day connect Morganton to Asheville.” Cool!
In the meantime, we can think of few places we’d rather run than in Black Mountain (especially in a race in which the Pisgah Brewing Company is an active participant).
Logistics: Black Mountain Greenway Challenge, Saturday, April 8, 2 p.m., Black Mountain. $35 for the 5K, $40 for the 10K. More info and register here.
Looking ahead: 3rd Annual Gateway to the Smokies Half Marathon, Saturday, May 6, Paynesville. More info here.
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Those are our thoughts on the weekend. Find more options at the sources listed below.
Coast
CapeFearCoast.com
Comprehensive calendar for the Cape Fear/Wilmington/southern N.C. coast searchable by date and event name.
Coastal Guide
Comprehensive calendar including nature programs from a variety of coastal conservation and research agencies that offer nature programs. Covers the entire coast.
Crystal Cost Tourism Authority
Comprehensive calendar focusing on the Crystal Coast. Good source for programs offered by N.C. Coastal Federation, Cape Lookout National Park, N.C. National Estuarine Research Reserve and other costal conservation and research agencies that offer nature programs.
NCCoast.com
Comprehensive calendar including programs for the Outer Banks and Crystal Coast.
North Carolina Coast Host
Comprehensive calendar for the entire coast that lets you search for events by day, by region, by county, by city or by event (based on key word).
This Week Magazine
Primary focus is the Crystal Coast (North Carolina’s coastal midsection).
Tundra swans over Lake Phelps (photo courtesy N.C. State Parks)
North Carolina is forecast to be rainy in the east, sunny in the west. Either way, we’ve found plenty of incentive to get out this weekend.
Coast
Normally, we don’t get excited about hundreds of thousands of temporary visitors settling in for the season at the coast. But when the season is winter and the visitors are tundra swans, snow geese and assorted ducks, it’s a different story.
Come to Pettigrew State Park Saturday on check out the array of waterfowl overwintering on the park’s Lake Phelps and 500 surrounding acres of pocosin habitat. A ranger will explain who’s who and discuss what it is about this area that makes for such an alluring winter home.
Logistics: Saturday, Feb. 8, 9 a.m. Pettigrew State Park, Creswell. For more info, call 252.797.4475.
Saturday forecast: High of 49, 90 percent chance of rain. In short, good birding weather.
Piedmont
You’re hiking a trail when suddenly you come across a vague disturbance in the terrain. It’s man-made, that much is obvious. An old roadbed, perhaps. Or a long abandoned rail line. It’s a common occurrence on hikes in this part of the country, where our parks and forests are often reclaimed from remnants of a cultivated past. Where did it come from? you wonder. And where did it go?
Often, such questions are left unanswered. But not this Saturday at Occoneechee State Natural Area in Hillsborough, where a ranger will lead an exploration of the old Occoneechee Railroad, which once hauled rock taken from a long-abandoned — but once very active; just look at the resulting gash in the mountain — quarry. Another perk of The Search for the Occoneeche Railroad? Much of it is off trail.
The Davidson River area of the Pisgah National Forest outside of Brevard is rich in great hiking. Thus, it’s never a surprise to be surprised by a hike.
Take the case of the Coontree-Bennett Gap-Pressley Cove Lollipop hike planned for Sunday by the Carolina Mountain Club. This 8.4-miler begins off US 276 and heads east, passing, among other sights, an old farming community that once existed between Pressley Cove and Maxwell Cove. A good day of moderate to challenging hiking in classic Pisgah terrain.
Logistics: Sunday, Feb. 9, 9 a.m. US 276 north of Brevard. Contact hike leader Bob Hysko at 828.243.3630 or rhysko@yahoo.com or more information and to reserve as spot.
Those are our thoughts on the weekend. Find more options at the sources listed below.
Coast
CapeFearCoast.com
Comprehensive calendar for the Cape Fear/Wilmington/southern N.C. coast searchable by date and event name.
Coastal Guide
Comprehensive calendar including nature programs from a variety of costal conservation and research agencies that offer nature programs. Covers the entire coast.
Crystal Cost Tourism Authority
Comprehensive calendar focusing on the Crystal Coast. Good source for programs offered by N.C. Coastal Federation, Cape Lookout National Park, N.C. National Estuarine Research Reserve and other costal conservation and research agencies that offer nature programs.
NCCoast.com
Comprehensive calendar including programs for the Outer Banks and Crystal Coast.
North Carolina Coast Host
Comprehensive calendar for the entire coast that lets you search for events by day, by region, by county, by city or by event (based on key word).
Tundra swans over Pettigrew State Park. photo courtesy NC State Parks
If you’ve got good rain gear, you’re in for a great weekend. One of this week’s picks even comes with coffee!
Coast
Tis the season to check out the bird life at the coast, where waterfowl from various points north are congregating to spend the winter. With the skies so full of feathers, wouldn’t it be nice to know who’s who? Learn to identify the year-round residents and snowbirds at Saturday’s Coffee with the Birds at Pettigrew State Park. A cup of coffee and a knowledgeable birder — what better company for a Saturday morning in early December?
Logistics: Saturday, Dec. 7, 9 a.m., Pettigrew State Park, Columbia. More info: 252.797.4475
Saturday forecast: High of 56, rather high (90 percent) chance of rain.
Piedmont
If you’re a hiker, and especially if you’re a fan of long hikes, you’ll appreciate Sunday’s grand opening of the 4-mile stretch of trail linking the Uwharrie National Recreation Trail with the Birkhead Mountain Trail in the Uwharrie National Forest. It may only be 4 miles, but it’s four miles that creates a continuous trail of 40 miles.
Sunday’s grand opening will commence from new Joe Moffitt Trailhead on Thayer Road. The festivities begin at 1 p.m., the hiking at 2. Joe Moffitt, btw, was a Boy Scout leader and was instrumental in helping blaze and build the original Uwharrie Trail in the 1970s. Parts of that trail survived, parts did not. The trail today recreates much of that original 50-mile trail.
Logistics: Sunday, Dec. 8, 1 p.m., Ophir Community Center, 2683 Flint Hill Road, Troy.
If you like a bracing winter hike then brace yourself for Sunday’s Carolina Mountain Club assault on the Appalachian Trail between Lemon Gap and Garenflo Gap. With temperatures forecast around 40 and a 70 percent chance of rain, it’s the ideal mountain hike for the person with the right stuff (mainly, good rain gear). This 7.4-mile hike climbs 700 feet to the Walnut Mountain Shelter, drops 600 feet to Kale Gap, travels open forests before an ascent up Bluff Mountain and a descent to Garenflo Gap.
Logistics: Sunday, Dec. 8, 8 a.m. meeting in Asheville to carpool to the trailhead. More info: Jim Reel at 828.443.2532 or jimr57@yahoo.com.
Sunday forecast: High of 42 with a 70 percent chance of rain.
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Those are our thoughts on the weekend. Find more options at the sources listed below.
Coast
CapeFearCoast.com
Comprehensive calendar for the Cape Fear/Wilmington/southern N.C. coast searchable by date and event name.
Coastal Guide
Comprehensive calendar including nature programs from a variety of costal conservation and research agencies that offer nature programs. Covers the entire coast.
Crystal Cost Tourism Authority
Comprehensive calendar focusing on the Crystal Coast. Good source for programs offered by N.C. Coastal Federation, Cape Lookout National Park, N.C. National Estuarine Research Reserve and other costal conservation and research agencies that offer nature programs.
NCCoast.com
Comprehensive calendar including programs for the Outer Banks and Crystal Coast.
North Carolina Coast Host
Comprehensive calendar for the entire coast that lets you search for events by day, by region, by county, by city or by event (based on key word).
This Week Magazine
Primary focus is the Crystal Coast (North Carolina’s coastal midsection).
Mountains
Asheville Citizen-Times
From the main page, click on “Outdoors,” then WNC Outdoors calendar.
Blue Ridge Outdoors
Searchable calendar lets you extend your reach to events throughout the mid-Atlantic and Southeast (or you can just limit it to North Carolina). Also lets you search a boatload of categories, ranging from Hiking, Mountain Biking and Climbing to Trail Running, Triathlon and Road Walking.
The Mountain Times
From the main page, click on “Calendars,” then Main Events.
