Appalachian Trail 2017

Day 63, Reservoir Road to Seeley-Woodworth Shelter

Monday, June 12, 2017

The Appalachian Trail has many stories to tell.

Hikers can speak to us of their trials and their adventures. The people who help hikers and maintain the trail have stories of why they give back.

Nature can tell us about the ebb and flow of life, and of the challenges of survival. From geology we can learn about the history of the earth we walk upon.

And some of the most fascinating stories are told by the artifacts left behind by people who lived here before there was a trail.

As I walked along the trail today, all of these storytellers spoke to me.

Monday, June 12, 2017

Weather	Hot and humid, with high temperatures in the upper 80s
Trail Conditions	Well-maintained, two long climbs
Today's Miles	20.8 miles
Trip Miles	820.7 miles

When I awoke this morning, I found my food bag was still hanging from the footbridge. Stick’s was there too.

It’s not that this was surprising. I knew there was little to no chance a bear would cross the bridge, find our food bags dangling below from ropes, and manage to hoist them up.

Nevertheless, an uncomfortable feeling lingered until I pulled the bags up from where they hung.

There was no reason to feel that way, not even slightly. If I had felt real doubt I wouldn’t have hung my food there.

Still, I was glad to find it untouched.

This was a noteworthy day. Immediately after starting to hike at 7 a.m., Stick and I crossed the bridge over the Pedlar River and passed another milestone of the trail.

In this case, the milestone was written in little stones, marking the spot 800 miles from where I started in Georgia.

The trail continued on a smooth and easy pathway, with a few slight ups and downs.

It then followed the contour of a reservoir that is formed by a small dam on the river.

The trail remained easy to walk, with the elevation rising only about 300 feet over the next five miles.

When the trail dropped down to Brown Mountain Creek, the descent wasn’t challenging.

Then after crossing a footbridge the trail followed the creek for the next two miles.

The forest here was thickly overgrown. Vines and shrubs covered the forest floor, hiding the last remnants of a community.

If it weren’t for a couple of spots where a bench and marker were provided, it might have been easy to miss the relics of a sharecropper community which had been located here.

The community was started by former slave Moses Richeson in 1868. He rented cabins here to other former slaves.

The residents were sharecroppers who farmed corn, wheat and tobacco. To pay their rent, they had to give the owner proceeds from a quarter of their crop. If they wanted to rent a mule or ox team, that cost another one-fourth of their crop.

Then, when it was time to mill their corn the sharecroppers had to pay one-eighth of the grain to pay the mill owner.

The sharecroppers and their descendants lived here along Brown Mountain Creek until 1920 when the land was purchased by the U.S. Forest Service.

Stone ruins of a gristmill and foundations of log homes still exist, but it's difficult to see them from the trail this time of year.

While walking through this section of the trail I met four thru-hikers.

Pictured from left to right, Pack, Rocket, She Hulk, and Crazy Pants have been hiking together for much of the trail.

In fact, Rocket, She Hulk, and Crazy Pants met on the day they started from Georgia.

Leaving Brown Mountain Creek, the trail began to make a big climb. For the next four miles it went up 2,500 feet to the top of Bald Mountain.

Along the way, the climb was broken where the trail crossed U.S. 60.

As I reached the road I saw several hikers gathered at a parking lot. This has normally been a tip-off that trail magic can be found, and that was again the case.

A section hiker was there sharing a supply of Gatorade and chips.

The sky had been hazy this morning, but was clearing now and getting much hotter. I rested in the shade a few minutes, then resumed the climb of Bald Mountain. At times the climb was steep.

A rocky outcrop at the top of Bald Mountain called Bald Knob offered a view of the valley.

After that big climb, the trail dropped 600 feet before making another 600-foot climb to Cole Mountain.

This summit featured a half-mile-long grassy meadow and several large patches of brightly-blooming downy phlox.

The meadow offered more long views before beginning yet another 600-foot descent.

At the bottom of this one the trail crossed another meadow at the colorfully-named Hog Camp Gap.

It was of no surprise when the trail began to climb again, but this time it went up only 400 feet.

As the trail entered the forest there was a fence and thick bushes, with several flowers of the morning glory family.

A trail maintainer named Logan was working nearby, clearing the trail with a large weed whacker. He told me he was with the Natural Bridge Appalachian Trail Club. Funds for his weed whacker were provided by the Appalachian Trail Conservancy.

Though it was hot, I was enjoying the hike. Listening to a podcast helped the day and miles go faster.

At the top of Tar Jacket Ridge was another open view. This meadow featured tall cow parsnips.

The trail made another 600-foot drop before a series of much shorter ups and downs.

At the top of one of these short rises I noticed a hiker stopped near the side of the trail. As I approached, I barely heard a noise that sounded to me like cicadas, though I didn’t think that’s what caused it. It was just loud enough to hear with my ear buds on and the podcast playing.

When I reached the hiker, he asked, “Did you hear that? Was that a rattlesnake?”

I told him I thought I heard something, but wasn’t sure what it was because I was listening to a podcast. I didn’t think it was a rattlesnake, though.

The hiker told me his name was Brook, but he wasn’t very talkative, so I continued on.

At the bottom of that hill was an open spot at the junction with Lovingston Spring Trail. I stopped here to eat a snack.

While I was stopped, Brook arrived.

“That was a rattlesnake!” he said with a serious yet awed look on his face.

He then showed me video of the snake he shot on his phone. It was a large snake.

I decided that I should try to be a little more alert to my surroundings as I walk while listening to a podcast.

The long and hot day was beginning to wear on me. Just as I was taking notice of that feeling, a day hiker came up the trail from the opposite direction and offered me a cold Gatorade. It could not have come at a better moment.

The trail began to get easier after that, which was also a relief.

About a mile before reaching Seeley-Woodworth Shelter, where I would be stopping for the night, I passed under a tree that was bent over in a sweeping arch. Perhaps it was because I knew Stick was from the St. Louis area, but the tree reminded me of that city’s arch.

When I saw Stick at the shelter I asked him if he noticed the tree. “Do you mean the one that looked like the St. Louis arch?” he asked.

Surprisingly, Stick and I were the only campers there. There was plenty of flat spots, so we had a lot more room to spread out compared to last night.

The planter lives off the sweat of the sharecropper brow
Just how the sharecropper lives, the planter care not how.
The sharecropper raises all the planter can eat,
And then gets tramped down under his feet.

The sharecropper raises all the planter can wear
While he and his family have to go bare.
The sharecropper works, toils and sweats
The planter brings him out in debt.

From "The Planter and the Sharecropper” by John L. Handcox

This trail report was published on March 8, 2018