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Mountain Hikingby Harold Sears
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Sassafras and Pilot Mountains
It was November. Jennifer and I climbed fairly steeply and watched the creek tumble towards us. There were rushing, bouldery flows and falls. We passed a fork in the stream and then a fork in the road. To the left, a track passed over a long abandoned bridge with supports of fitted rock and a bed of widely spaced logs. The proper route turned right, but I wondered what I’d find to the left — across the bridge and down that path, into the woods, squeezing among the saplings that are taking over a road that is no longer used. I dug out a 1946 topographic map. I found the state Fish Rearing Station and no hatchery then at the John Rock site of the present facility. The road and trail we were now walking on were both there, the fork in the creek, but no bridge or side road. Here was a mystery. The rockwork looked serious and permanent, like the monument welcoming visitors to the national forest back at the highway. This was not something thrown up for a brief period of logging. I thought, I must explore that route some day, see what I can do with map and compass. Human efforts are less permanent than they seem. All through these forests, there are old intersections that hint at activity, important activity, in times past. Much work went into the grading, in preparation for traffic to and fro. It was a bit of a frustration to encounter so many unmarked and unmapped tracks: rail bed, road, and path. Today, we stitch together lengths of these old ways in order to get to the top of the ridge, but where might those other paths have taken us? It is a bit like an old business suit being cut down to fit a boy and then used to make part of a quilt or rug, and finally dissolved to go into a ream of fine, rag, writing paper. But the person composing a thank-you note for the thoughtful birthday gift has no feel for the dignified gentleman who once wore those fibers. I did have a feeling of much activity, much commerce, in this quiet corner of North Carolina. Just a bit farther up the trail, we passed a broad ledge of rock making up the opposite bank of the stream. It stretched 70 feet long and 15 feet high, the top edge sloping gently up and then dipping into a hollow through which the water flowed and droped down a steep sliding rock to the bed at the base of the ledge. Mossy boulders and massive logs have lain in that tumbling flow for many, many years. We climbed past big slabs of rock and sheets of water, some smooth and dark and some rough and white, fall after fall, some narrow and twisty and others broad — little pools, and big swimming holes. About noon, we reached the remains of an old railroad bridge. Heavy beams spanned a small creek bed. I think it was Cornelius Vanderbilt who ran his narrow gauge trains into these valleys and hauled the timber out. How many decades has this bridge rested here, collecting its heavy blanket of moss? I remember passing by twenty years ago. Monte Stanford pulled yet another chicken leg out of his pack and gnawed away. There has been little change, at least in that bridge. I like the way that human disturbance gradually mellows until it lies comfortably in the natural scene. What used to be a gash and a wound, enveloped in noise and smoke, is now a subdued bit of nostalgia, a fond historical memory. We passed a half dozen bear hunters and their radio-collared dogs. Three of the dogs followed us. The hunters called, and we stepped to the side and stood quietly, but they wouldn’t obey. We finally walked on, and the dogs raced up and down the trail past us. We came to a spring trickling across the trail and one dog lying with its belly in the water, lapping and basking in the cool. After lunch, we crossed over Daniel Ridge Creek and then Shuck Ridge Creek. The trail got steeper, narrow and clinging to the side of the valley, rocky and rough with roots. I slipped on wet leaves, fell on one side, and rolled on down the slope. I didn’t feel that I presented quite the image of an experienced hiker and mountain man. We slowly climbed up a steep, narrow valley. The sun was hot, but cool air poured over us in the shade. Up over a rise and onto crumbly mica deposits. I remembered climbing up here with the kids in their rock-collecting period, and I had to tell the story of Colin and our trip to Wisconsin. We found a park and a mountain to climb, and on the way up, Colin found a big rock, kind of sulfur-yellow with crystalline pockets where bubbles had formed in the magma. He could barely lift it, but he thought it was really neat. We climbed to the top and then headed down again. Colin moved out in front and we only caught him at the car, where he proudly stood over his rock. “Can we take it, Dad?” Now, we were, all four of us, in our subcompact Toyota Tercel, packed in tight, but we found a little room in the trunk. That was many years ago, but the rock still sits on Grandma’s back patio. She must have exclaimed over it when we finally got to Boulder, and Colin grandly made her the present. Mid-afternoon, we reached Farlow Gap and climbed up Sassafras Mt. That was a slow climb. We saw the top just through those laurel branches. No, that was a shoulder. Then through there, false alarm again, and so on, up and up. It wasn’t steep, but it was persistent. In the distance, the ridge to the south was absolutely steel blue. The day was going. We walked down to Deep Gap and stood at the base of Pilot Mountain. We weren’t going to climb it that day. We strode off down a forest road that looped around the mountain, picked up the trail on the other side, and dropped down to the road at Gloucester Gap. We got back to the car just about dark. Seven years later, in May, I came back — alone this time. Especially when viewed from Colorado (my present home), this land back east is well clothed in green. When you live in the east, you don’t particularly notice, but there is kelly and emerald, red-greens and yellow-greens, glossy and dull, smooth and rippled, and ridged and veined. A little lingerie shows in places, occasionally some skin, and rarely the bones. The ferns and moss, the two most primitive plant groups, might be thought of as the underthings. Of course, the soil is the skin, and the rock is the bones. There are great rocky monoliths scattered among the folds of land, the angle of an elbow protruding here, the line of a rib there: Looking Glass Rock, John Rock, the ledges of Cedar Rock Mountain — all the more special for their rarity within the smooth rolling swells of green. On a quiet summer’s day, there is the soft sigh of the breeze and a slow creak of one branch rubbing against another, much like the rustling of clothes as the body moves through the day. Trickling streams flow within the skin and over the bones, carrying nutrients, nourishing the rich bottomlands at some expense to the ridges and peaks. The sun is the heart, pumping the circulation up to the top to flow down again. In Colorado, the skin and bones hang out everywhere.
I came to the old bridge abutments that had intrigued me years ago. The bed of logs was completely gone now. I climbed down into the little ravine, up the other side, and struck off down what seemed to be an old railroad cut. There was some old iron pipe and a bit of long-rusty steel cable. Once upon a time, I’d been in this region with a friend, a history professor at the college where we both taught. We came upon an old railroad brake shoe, a solid mass of iron, sculpted first by man and then by years of rain, soil, and freeze. It was rough, pitted, and brown. The bit of local history excited Jim, but it was a heavy bit. He couldn’t imagine hauling it along and resigned himself to leaving it. I quietly slipped it into my pack and gave it to him later. He left the school years after. I wonder if he carried that bit of memorabilia along. The unmapped cut I walked today continued only one-half mile and then stopped at the bank of Daniel Ridge Creek, where it joined Shuck Ridge Creek and formed the Davidson River. I spent half an hour clambering about the streambeds and the ridges in between, up banks and through rhododendron thickets, but there was no sign of a continuation. I wondered if the train simply went this far, loaded its logs, and then backed down again to a main line.
I came to Shuck Ridge Creek and crossed just above a slender, almost vertical falls with a broad pool at its base. Not far ahead, I would climb out of the valleys and onto drier ridges and mountain tops, but the hike to this point had certainly been one of tumbling streams, white water, sliding rocks, and falls — steep among rocks and logs, a tumbling jumble of splash and roar. I passed the old mica mine where shiny sheets of the translucent mineral still littered the ground and finally climbed to Farlow Gap, high above the Davidson River valley. Periodically, there were broad views out to the east, ridge upon ridge of soft, hazy green. This landscape appears deceptively gentle from high above, like rumpled bedclothes, but up close it is steep and stony. The trail twists and climbs in long, rough, trudging ways. It is not at all soft on the ground. Last time, we had gone over Sassafras Knob, so this time, I walked around its peak. From Deep Gap, I climbed the switchbacks up and up the flanks of Pilot Mountain. In places, sections of deeply rusted iron pipe were exposed. Apparently, the old lookout tower had once had running water. There was Painted Trillium and dogwood in bloom. On top, I surprised three ravens, who might have been sunning themselves.
Once, in another place, a pair of hikers churned past me, and I heard one say, “It’s worth the effort to get to the top.” I thought, “each step is worth the effort.” There are new sights, sounds, and smells at every step and every turn in the trail. I’m in no rush. Of course, I want to get to the top, but I don’t want to miss all that comes before.
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I wanted to do some different things this time out. Near the old fish hatchery site, the road continued up clearly, but I turned left and followed a trail that hugged Davidson River, perhaps a fisherman’s trail working its way upstream. It was narrow. There was some stepping over branches and fallen logs. But the creek was right at hand, clean and hidden. I didn’t feel I was sharing this section with anyone else. The trail seemed to peter out at about the point where the forest road above narrowed down to trail-width. I climbed up a bank and rejoined the mapped trail.
I returned to the mapped trail and resumed my climb. I crossed the headwaters of Fork River and then Daniel Ridge Creek. In the low areas, the rhododendron was dense with big strappy leaves in dark, dark green. Mountain Laurel sported pink and white buds and blooms. There was the steady background of birdcall and song. There was the dry slither of a snake through dead leaves.
