My dear Appalachian Trail friend, Mudsmeller and her Mr. spent the last two weeks trying out snow birding from their Minnesota home to my neck of the woods. What fun we have had partaking in our favorite pastime; hiking, enjoying the vibrant live music scene, exploring local art, and sampling the many local craft beers along with some delicious eats! For our last hike before she headed home, I proposed hiking one of my favorites that took us from Hwy 215 along and across Flat Laurel Creek, up Sam Knob Trail and across the Sam Knob meadow to the Black Balsam Knob Trailhead. We climbed the switchbacks up to the Art Loeb Trail and followed it and the Mountains to the Sea Trail back to my vehicle for a total of 8.75 miles. My hiking group has named this route the 23 Feature Hike and someone, somewhere has a list of each interesting feature but we didn’t keep track today. We were joined by our friend, Spreadsheet for a picture-perfect day of hiking!
Although the recent snow was mostly gone from the lower elevations, it became immediately apparent that we needed to don our micro spikes as the trail was a frozen sheet of ice. Off the bat we had a sketchy crossing of Bubbly Spring Branch which is usually a fairly easy balancing act on a log, but today was a frozen, slippery mess. We were able to negotiate the crossing without getting wet and continued on, though our pace was much slower than usual due to the icy conditions.
The usually impressive Wildcat Falls was an impressive sheet of ice today!
Great views towards the Smokies as we climbed up to Black Balsam!
It was extremely windy up high, so we continued on down to lower elevation and a sunny protected spot for lunch!
We continued on Art Loeb and MTS Trails and took a nice long break on a ledge looking south! Nice clear views today of this beautiful panorama! We could even see Lake Jocassee in the far distance.
What a fantastic hike with great friends!!! We stopped on the way home to admire the ice walls on Hwy 215 before enjoying the requisite post hike beverages at the Forks of the River Taproom at Headwaters Outfitters! Hold on to your hats, friends while you wait to see where our next adventure takes us in the very near future!
Bravo! A nice read as always. Thanks for letting me tag along.! It’s been a great week and a perfect touch of what it would be like to live and move and hike in this beautiful area.