In some parts of the U.S. — the Northeast, the Pacific Coast, the mountain states — hikers live for the summer and its warm days. Not here, where Summer is equated with still air, sticky clothes and sweat-stung eyes. 

But hold on. While some of that may be true, it’s not the full story. Approached the right way summer can be enjoyed just as much as the banner seasons of fall and spring. Just in a different way.

Some thoughts on how to embrace summer on the trail.

First, why?

You like to hike, right? So why not in summer. Here’s what keeps us from taking a summer hiatus.

The green. If you live in a lush, warm environment, you’ll want to appreciate what that means to be enveloped from forest floor to the canopy in a world rich with flora. It’s a world constantly in flux: from the blooms of elderberry, sumac and rattlesnake root in mid June, to the first tinge of fall color in the sweetgums and sourwoods, the woods are worth watching.

The critters. It’s funny how we recoil at the sight of snakes, but rejoice when we cross paths with a box turtle. The latter loves the heat and is on the move come mid-June. You’ll see those snakes out as well, while at dawn and dusk the larger local mammal populations are on the move.

The birdsong. Early morning and evening are when birds, like hikers, are at their best in the woods. 

The quiet. Multiple layers of leaves, you’ll quickly discover on a summer hike, make the best insulation. I regularly hike a trail that’s within 50 yards of an interstate highway. In winter, you can’t escape the ruckus; in summer, you’ve no idea the road is there. There is one delightful exception to the quiet rule … .

The noise of night. We love staying on the trail past dark in summer because that calming quiet of the day quickly gives way to a raucous cacophony come sundown. Are those frogs? Are they crickets? And … my God, what was that? (Likely the Hitchcockian scream of a bobcat.) 

Minimize the heat

Maybe you can’t ignore the heat. But you can minimize its debilitating effects.

Clothes. Wear lightweight clothes, preferably clothes that breath. Button-style fishing and hiking shirts typically have ample vents and mesh that do a good job of keeping you cool by letting you vent body heat. 

Pants. If you’re not a fan of shorts, the good news is there are several relatively inexpensive lightweight nylon pants on the market. Some even come with UPF sunblock protection. The protection that long pants offer can be especially welcome in summer. If you’re on an exposed trail, that protection from the sun is great. If you’re on a trail meandering through tight vegetation, long pants are good protection from poison ivy/oak/sumac and other irritating plants, and from ticks; the little pests can still weasel their way onto your skin, but it’s a harder task.

Drink (a k a hydrate)

Water is important whenever you exercise. It’s especially important in the heat, when you’re sweating more than on a cool day. Two key points when it comes to water.

• Remember to take it. At the bare minimum, take a liter of water. Even if you’re doing a 1/2-mile nature trail, take a liter of water. If you’re going longer, say, between 2 and 5 miles, take two liters of water. If you’re going much beyond that, take two liters as well as a filtering device to get more water along the way. Note: The later only works if you are hiking in an area where the water is devoid of chemical pollution. 
• Make it so you’ll want to drink it. Do you look forward to a nice, tepid glass of water, water warm enough to brew tea? Likely not. If you use water bottles, the night before a summer hike, fill the bottles 3/4 full and toss them in the freezer. In the morning, top off your ice bottle with water. If you use a hydration pack, fill the bladder with as much ice as possible, then fill with cold water. 

How to dress (and undress)

Wet bandana. Soak a bandana in water, drape it around your neck. When you cross a stream, refresh the bandana. It goes a long way toward keeping your body heat regulated.

Cotton … refreshes. Normally, you’re discouraged from hiking in a cotton T-shirt. In cold, even cool weather, your T-shirt gets wet from sweat, you stop to take a break, you catch a chill. On a really hot day when you’ll only be on the trail when it’s hot, that sweat-cooled T serves as a form of air conditioning. Do be sure to have a dry T waiting for you when you get back to the trailhead. 

Take extra socks. Even if you’re only hiking 4-5 miles, take an extra pair of socks. Feet get sweaty in the heat (especially if you’re wearing Gore-Tex shoes), the sweat gets absorbed into the socks. Even if you’re wearing wicking wool socks, there’s only so much wet they can wick. When socks become wet, the friction generated by your moving feet will cause blisters. Change socks before you hear an audible squish coming from your shoes.

Air out your feet on breaks. Even if you’re just taking a 5-minute snack break, sit down and liberate your feet from your shoes and socks. Drape your socks over a branch to dry, let your hot, sweaty feet have a moment to cool. 

Maybe you can’t beat a spring or fall day on the trail. But summer does have something to offer.

Give it a chance.

* * * 

More tips

This is an abbreviated version of our GetHiking! Guide to Summer Hiking. For the full guide, which includes information on the best times to hike and the best places to hike, go here.

Hike with us!

Can’t find anyone to hike with in the heat? You can hike with us!

• GetHiking! Wednesday Night Hikes, May 25 – July 27. One of the best times to hike in summer? In the evening, as the day begins to cool. Our 10-week series hikes every Wednesday evening from 6:30 until 8, covering 3-4 miles on a different trail each week. Learn more and sign up here.
• GetHiking! Friday Morning Hikes, June 3 – July 22.  Another one of the best times to hike in summer? In the morning, before the day has a chance to heat up. Our 8-week series hikes every Friday morning at 8 a.m., covering 3-4 miles on a different trail each week. Learn more and sign up here.
• GetHiking! Summer Hike Series, June – August. Five Tuesday evening hikes and three Sunday morning hikes, all on different trails in the Triangle. Learn more and sign up here.

The post Guide to Summer Hiking (and why you should!) appeared first on GetGoing NC!.

Not hardly.

Not when you live in part of the country where you can experience a rare coastal forest escape, hike on the country’s most iconic trail, and explore a high country oasis all while enjoying the cold embrace of the season, minus the threat. Sure, it can get cold and there can be snow. But not to the extent you need extreme weather gear to survive. Rather, winter here offers a stark beauty that can be enjoyed in solitude. And if you really don’t like the “cold,” but can tolerate cool, winter backpacking at the coast offers an experience you can’t have any other time of year.

This winter, GetBackpacking! offers three trips that capture the best of what backpacking has to offer during a season too often associated with hibernation, not exploration. Two are classics that we’ve done the past several years, one is new to our GetBackpacking! program.

January

Neusiok Trail, Croatan National Forest, Havelock 

• 21 miles
• 2 nights

The 21-mile Neusiok Trail takes you backpacking where most people least expect to go backpacking: a coastal swamp, But it’s more than just that. For our hike, we start late Friday afternoon and hike 2 miles to camp. It’s a hike at dusk, where the sun sets over the expansive Newport River, dipping below the horizon about the time we turn inland to camp. Day 2 takes us through coastal woods so dense the only clearing is the wide-foot-wide  path that slices through bay thickets and a variety of bushes before opening into pine savannah. On a cold, sunny winter’s day it doesn’t get much better. Day 3 begins the same, then morph’s for 5 miles into rolling terrain and woods more reminiscent of the Piedmont before concluding with a mile-long run along the mile-wide Neuse River, which at this point more resembles the Pamlico Sound it will shortly feed into.

Dates: January 28-30 

Learn more and register here.

February

Appalachian Trail between Max Patch and Hot Springs

• 21 miles
• 2 nights

Part of the thrill of this 21-mile trek — and the reason we do it every February — is that you never know what to expect. Three years ago, the forecast, at one point, called for up to 20 inches of snow and temperatures dropping to 7 degrees (we postponed that one). Another year, the temperature hit 70 degrees and, I swear to Colin Fletcher, we saw spring beauties popping up at 4,500 feet. We begin Friday afternoon taking a shuttle from Hot Springs to Max Patch; we soak up the view, then hike 2 miles to camp for the night. Saturday is 11 miles of AT delight, hiking mostly through classic Southern Appalachian hardwood forest, passing through a couple of gaps, hiking over 4,692-foot Bluff Mountain, then dropping into Garenflo Gap, to camp. The 7-mile hike out on Sunday ascends Lamp Knob, then mellows out, for the most part, with a descent into Hot Springs — where a variety of burger options awaits.

Dates: February 25-27 

Learn more and register here.

March

Mount Rogers, Mount Rogers National Recreation Area, Virginia

• 20 miles (basecamp backpack)
• 2 nights

The Mount Rogers area of southwest Virginia is one of the most scenic and popular backpacking destinations in the Southeast. It includes the two highest points in Virginia and open terrain akin to what you might expect out West. If you’re a backpacker and it’s not on your bucket list, it should be. On this trip we hike in a mile or so east from Elk Garden off Whitetop Road and set up basecamp. Saturday, we don daypacks for a 12.5-mile hike on the Appalachian Trail into the heart of Mount Rogers (including summiting the 5,772-foot peak, returning on the Virginia Horse Trail. Sunday, we hike to 5,525-foot Whitetop for more great views.

Dates: March 11-13 

Learn more and register here.

* * *

Thru-hikes on shorter trails in 2022

Also on tap for 2022, we will lead four thru-hikes on the state’s shorter long trails. They are:

• Neusiok Trail, Croatan National Forest, 21 miles. Jan. 28-30 (see above)
• N.C. Bartram Trail, Nantahala National Forest, 50 miles (approx), summer, date tbd.
• Art Loeb Trail, Pisgah National Forest, 31 miles, fall, date tbd.
• Foothills Trail, North Carolina/South Carolina line, 77 miles, date tbd.

We will have details on the last three hikes soon. In addition, we will offer a winter/spring training program pertinent to these trips but also appropriate for anyone who plans to have an ambitious summer and fall of backpacking. Maybe you’re planning your own long hike, maybe you’re planning a trip out west. Our program will help get you where you need to be by the end of spring. Details coming shortly on this program, as well. 

The post GetBackpacking! Winter 2022 appeared first on GetGoing NC!.

The maps were pure magic, with their 40-foot interval topo lines easing away from one another to reveal more hospitable routes of passage, squenching up to show steep terrain beyond my skill — or interest — level. Wavy blue lines showed sources of water, blue ovals potential fishing spots. Oh, and those concentric circles! We especially coveted the concentric circles leading to a summit. It was all about the summit, back in the day.

Lest you misunderstand, my romanticizing is not a call for a return to the past. 

Topo maps were also unruly — about 22 inches by 27 inches — and rarely did the trip you sought fit onto one map. Typically, you’d have to piece together two or three maps to put together a decent weekend backpack trip. Today, any number of online topo maps let you create a seamless map for your adventure.

One of the big advantages, though, to the old way was that Inevitably, while I was working this awkward puzzle, one of the store people would sidle up and start asking questions about the maps I was inspecting.  

Ever hiked this area before? 

You do know what the lines being close together means, right? 

You in better shape than you look?

Eventually, though, this hazing would yield a trip that, thanks to this found expertise, would work out pretty well. So well, that on subsequent visits to the shop I’d seek the same guy’s counsel. Eventually, you’d become something resembling friends. (Although I don’t recall every being asked to tag along on one of his trips)

Today, the process for launching an adventure is different. Gone are those topo dispensaries where a befuddled looking soul could, without even asking, elicit advice. Today? Today we have YouTube.

There’s a lot of everything on YouTube, from 40-year-old Saturday Night Live skits to dancing pigs to how to make a cute crop top out of a t-shirt. (The latter I got by simply typing “How To” into the search — it was one of the first options to come up.) 

And, there are also a lot of aspiring Jimmy Chins and Craig Fosters armed with an iPhone12 and a GoPro eager to tell the stories of their adventures. Some are of the — this is what me and my bros did this weekend — variety. Others seem to feel an obligation of this social media age to document every move they make. 

But then you find a true gem. Someone who genuinely wants to share their passion for the outdoors and their love for discovering new places. People interested in giving you a true sense of a trail — yes, the highlights, but also a sense of what you’ll spend most of your time seeing. They’re more interested in the places they’re exploring than in themselves, they respect the viewer’s time, and in the end, they simply appreciate a good adventure.

So today when I go searching for new places to explore, I start with some of the YouTube shooters I’ve come to appreciate most. Folks who’ve earned my trust and won’t lead me astray.

Today on the GetHiking! Southeast Podcast I review four of my favorite YouTube shooters who appreciate a good adventure in the Southeastern United States. Some spend all of their time here. Some explore elsewhere, but it’s apparent they have a fondness for the wilds of the Southeast. And I’m not simply reviewing them. I’m on a mission: I’m out to find a new place to lead a trip later this year — maybe a backpack trip, maybe a basecamp hiking trip. For each channel I mention a key find in their oeuvre. Then, at the end I’ll announce the most appealing new venue and our destination for the fall. 

The four channels, along with a brief description:

• Zach’s Mild Adventures. Zach files trip reports with the hiking website Hiking Upward; he has 123 up so far, most of which are accompanied by the videos Zach has posted. Watch the video, get a sense of an adventure, then find all the pertinent details for taking a trip at Hiking Upward.
• Sintax77. This Delaware-based adventurer explores up and down the East Coast, but spends a considerable amount of time in the Southeast. He provided the inspiration for our to-be-announced fall trip, to the Big Fork National Recreation Area in Tennessee/Kentucky.
• The Outdoor Gear Review. Based in North Carolina, this prolific channel — 1,414 videos as of press time — does both gear reviews and chronicles adventures, often in the same video.
• Hiking with Braids. A great source of video information for exploring in Tennessee.

Learn more about these channels and why we like them on today’s GetHiking! Southeast podcast, Our Favorite YouTube channels that cover the Southeast.

The post Our top YouTube channels covering the Southeast appeared first on GetGoing NC!.

More seasonal temps descend this weekend. It will still be nice for a hike at the coast, and you’ll be able to hit the slopes in the mountains. Meanwhile, in the Piedmont, you can take it inside for a chance to try a cool sport associated with the cold.

Coast

You stand on shore, you look out to any number of islands and think, “I wonder what’s out there?”

Saturday is your chance to find out, when a park ranger from Hammocks Beach State Park takes a boatload of folks from the mainland over to Huggins Island for a couple hours of exploring. “You will get a chance to see and explore one of the Atlantic coast’s better-preserved earthwork fortifications and how it played a role in the American Civil War. We will look at the different groups of people that have utilized the island over the years- including the Native Americans and early European colonists- and talk about their role in shaping the island.”

Sounds like a hike worth driving a spell for.

Logistics: Huggins Island History Hike, Saturday, Jan. 28, 10 a.m., Hammocks Beach State Park, Swansboro. Free, but space is limited and reservations are required, by calling 910.326.4881. More info here.

Saturday forecast: Sunny, high of 54.

* * *

Looking ahead: Polar Plunge, 5K and 1-mile Fun Run, Kure Beach Pier, Kure Beach, Feb. 11. More info here.

Piedmont

Directions on how to dress for an event sometimes seem bizarre and silly. Sadly, they are typically based on experience. With that in mind, here’s how the folks at Triangle Curling suggest you dress for their two-hour Try Curling session:

• “No raised heels or flip flops.
• “Pants that offer easy movement are important as you will be required to stretch and get into positions that tight pants and jeans are not necessarily appropriate for.”

All of which will help you enjoy the sport of really cold places that much more when you give it a try Saturday morning at their Durham Curling Center.

Logistics: Try Curling, Saturday, Jan. 28, 10 a.m., Triangle Curling Center, 2310 So Hi Dr., Durham. $25. More info here.

Saturday forecast: It’s inside.

* * *

Looking ahead: Astronomy Program at Pilot Mountain State Park, Pinnacle, Feb. 18, 6-10 p.m. More info here.

Mountains

According to he Asheville Citizen-Times Outdoors section, “WNC ski areas that closed for an extended time due to some of the highest average January temperatures on record are set to reopen Jan. 27.”

That’s Friday, btw.

Figure out which lift line you’ll be in when the ropes drop by checking out the latest Southeast ski conditions at SkiSoutheast.com.

Weekend forecast: Overnight lows in the low 20s (perfect for snowmaking), daytime highs in the mid-30s (perfect for skiing), with snow moving in Sunday afternoon.

* * *

Looking ahead: Underground Railroad Hike, Feb. 5, Mount Jefferson State Natural Area, West Jefferson. More info here.

* * *

Those are our thoughts on the weekend. Find more options at the sources listed below. 

Coast

The post This weekend: Winter returns  appeared first on GetGoing NC!.