Biking and Hiking and Kayaking: Be Careful Out There

Meandering Michaux, Trail Ticks, Voluminous Views

Carole was driving up to see her mom, so I tagged along for the drive up to PA and we met Carl in Fairview, PA. Carl and I then did a loop hike in the Michaux State Forest near Waynesboro, PA. We started at the Old Forge picnic grounds and hiked the Appalachian Trail up to Chimney Rocks. An awesome view of the valley and Waynesboro Reservoir - would have been awesomer before Hurricane Sandy stripped what was left of the fall foliage. This is a very nice, very uphill hike to about 1940 feet, through pines and around streams for much of the way.

From Chimney Rocks you can head north on the AT and go by the fire tower Carl and I had hiked to, and operated from, previously. However, we made a loop back to the start by taking a blue blazed trail to a fire road that parallels the AT back down hill with some quite steep switchbacks. A few miles downhill and you come to this bridge that crosses the stream to get to the Hermitage cabin, which apparently is used as a staging area for rock climbing folks.

It is a very purty section, but it tricked us into thinking we should cross the bridge to follow the blue trail. However, that led us (after some bushwhacking) into a dead end, so we retraced our steps and went back over the bridge and found the faded blue trail blazes for the rocky trail through more pines and along the burbling creek back to the AT and back to Carl's Jeep at the start.

One souvenier from the hike, probably from the bushwhacking part: the next day I discovered a very large tick happily burrowing into my very large belly. I had to call Carole in for some emergency tick pulling, which always gives her joy.

Boating, Biking, Hiking - plus Fine Dining and Movies - Make Memorable Memorial Day

Well, about the only thing we did to actually honor the actual spirit of Memorial Day was to put the flag up on the porch - but we did get in a lot of quality outdoor time, plus a lot of fine dining. In fact, actual cooking is just a faint memory to Carole right about now.

We started off the weekend Friday night taking a 4 mile walk along the northern end of the College Park bike trail, followed by dinner with Carl at Christopher's in Crofton - crab bruschetta with huge chunks of lump crab, great snapper, salmon and seafood pot pie. The next morning Carole and the Biker Chix (plus Jacqui) went kayaking on Triadelphia Reservoir while I did a 35 mile bike loop on the Rock Creek/ Bethesda Branch trails. I kept up a 18 mph average pace until I ran into a Memorial Day 5k race/fun run that clogged up the trail from the Air Rights complex through the Columbia Country Club with tons of annoying runners. The Biker Chix reunited Saturday, dragging their husbands along to a fine Memorial Day yard party that featured many Latvians with hordes of blond kids - it was like being transported to Salt Lake City for the evening.

Sunday morning the Biker Chix re-reunited and kidnapped Carl as their boy toy for a bike ride along the full College Park/Anacostia trail system. We went down to the end at Anacostia Park, went over the bridge to the Bladensburg Marina, then on the way back went around Lake Artemesia a few times. Under some trees near the Lake, the Biker Chix grabbed their water bottles, made Carl take off his helmet and then started staring at me and humming some kind of Druid chant, so I hopped on my bike and pedalled away at high speeds. Carl has not been seen since.

That night we went with Jim and Jacqui for a great tapas meal at Jaleo in Bethesda, where after a mere two pitchers of Sangria we learned very interesting things about the pre-married lives of those two. Then the four of us were first nighters and saw Woody Allen's "Midnight in Paris" - entertaining, much better than the last 20 or so Woody Allen movies, but I think you have to be an art history major to really appreciate the movie.

 

On Monday, Carole and I took the boat out for a jaunt across the Chesapeake Bay. We got to the marina at about 0930 and it was already 85 degrees and humid - August has come early in the mid-Atlantic. We gassed up and on the way out passed a Coast Guard patrol boat - which is when I realized I hadn't put the new registration sticker on the boat. We did some serious evasive maneuvers and then headed across the Bay to the Bloody Point Lighthouse on the southern end of Kent Island and went a bit further into the Eastern Bay area. It was so hazy you couldn't see very far, but we were only a few miles from the Wades Point Inn we had stayed at last year. The winds were low and the Bay was relatively calm.

On the return we decided to head up the South River and since Memorial Day in Nauticalese translates to "take out your yachts and cabin cruisers and celebrate the unofficial start of summer by throwing up 6 foot high wakes" the South River was way rougher than the Bay - seriously disturbing Carole's horizontal sunbathing/lounging. That boat above is one of the smaller ones that were out.

I also managed to get some radio-nerd action in over the holiday weekend, making a little over 500 contacts in the CQ WW WPX contest. Carole and I then closed out this international dining themed three day weekend with dinner at El Andariego with Jerry and Marie. All in all a great holiday weekend, but keep watching Carl's Facebook page to see if he ever recovers from the Biker Chix spell.

Hiking Hereford: Mountain Laurel Mostly Laying Low

The East Coast is doing a Seattle impression - we are in a week long rain every day pattern. However, after heavy rain and thunderstorms moved through Saturday night, Sunday morning dawned cloudy but dry. Since the Kentucky Derby had been held the week before, and next week will be the Maryland Preakness, we knew it was time to hunt the elusive blooming Mountain Laurel, who apparently are big horse racing fans.

The Gunpowder River trails in Hereford goes through lots of Mountain Laurel and as we started the hike a few were in bloom. We generally do a 5.8 mile loop on the Gunpowder South and Panther Branch Trails, and if you go in a clockwise direction you quickly pass a picturesque but small waterfall.

This area of the Gunpowder River is like Club Med for beavers and there are gnawed and falled trees all over the place. We passed a few individual white and pink mountain laurel that had popped into bloom.

However, only about 10% of the bushes were blooming - I guess the rest are waiting until Preakness weekend. About .75 miles into the clockwise loop, there is a canyon wall (well, "canyon" by Maryland standards) that is covered with Mountain Laurel but once again we were not there at the peak - very few had popped.

That was about it for the elusive blooming Mountain Laurel - the rest of the loop was uneventful. With all the rain we've been having, everything is lush and green - maybe this year the deer will have plenty to eat and will stay away from my landscaping...

Water, Water Everywhere on the Appalachian Trail

Carole was holding a bridal shower for her friend Christine's daughter Elizabeth at our house, so I told Carl we needed to do one of those far away hikes so I could maximize my time away from home. We decided to do a two car hike, doing a nine mile section of the Appalachian Trail from Quirack Mountain to Wolfsville - a section we hadn't done in several years. There is one water crossing, between Raven Rock Road and Wolfsville that I was concerned about due to all the recent rain, but after we dropped Carl's car off at the Wolfsville Road trail head, the stream levels didn't seem all that high.

We drove past the BRACed (closed down) Fort Ritchie, where nothing seems to ever change, over to Pen Mar then up the hill to High Rock or Mt. Quirack. The weather forecast had been for temperatures in the 70s with a chance of rain late in the evening, but the skies were darkening and it was only about 55 degrees when we got on the AT.

It almost immediately started to rain, but at first just very lightly.  Being the seasoned hikers we are, we of course had not planned for anything but a dry warm day - neither of us had coats on and I was just wearing shorts and a t-shirt. Quickly we began to see evidence of the heavy rains of the week before - the trail got muddy, then turned into a pond.

The Appalachian Swamp Trail

We kept going and the further south we got the harder it began to rain. We kept thinking it would slack off, but it never did. As we neared Raven Rocks, we faced a decision: man up, keep going and potentially hike another 6 miles in increasingly heavy, cold rain, or wimp out, turn around and just do a 5-6 mile out and back. Being manly men, we were secure in our manlihoodness and turned around and headed back, before our hairdos frizzed up too much.

The montain laurel haven't bloomed yet but whatever this pink bush was had bloomed in full force. We retraced our steps and continued our never-ending discussion on whether the children of non-citizens should (a) Not be allowed to get in-state tution at Maryland colleges (Carl) or (b) should be allowed (John), since all the Swedish immigrants (including many Olsons) who got off the boat in the 1920's did so. Ask Rickie.

High Rock used to be an active hang glider launch area, but now it appears to mainly be a graffiti target for bored Washington County teenagers who seem to buy fru-fru pastel-colored spray paint and leave behind deep thoughts, like "Party On!!." I guess all the teenage creativity energy goes onto Facebook these days.

We got back to my car, took a detour route (due to 550 still being closed due to flood damage) and went back to Carl's car at Wolfsville Road - where it was raining quite hard, justifying our wussiness in turning around.

 

Fleeing Foliage, Voluminous Views

"At least now I can see the stars" - incredibly positive person after a tornado ripped the roof away.

The fall foliage is gone in Maryland but that has opened up some gorgeous views. On a cool, crisp Sunday morning we did the Maryland Heights loop from Harpers Ferry. Basically, you hike two miles straight up, gaining about 1300 feet in elevation, hike a level mile and a half through the remains of the gun emplacements put up there in the 1700's and then hike two miles straight down.

The air was so clear that from the top we had a great view of Sugarloaf Mountain, a good 15 miles away. 

While we were tramping up and down Maryland Heights, every few minutes we heard the woo woo of train whistles and could often look down and see mile-long freight trains heading up and down the valley. When we got back to my truck, the Capitol Limited Amtrak train from Chicago to Washington DC was just pulling in to the station. A lot of parents were putting their college kids onto the train back to DC - for $11 a much cheaper way than driving them back to school!

The next week it was time to hike the Great Falls of the Potomac from the Virginia side. Yet another cold day with crystal clear blue skies. The five mile loops takes you along the Difficult Run canyon (canyon by East Coast standards, anyway) and then along the rim of the rock cliffs that line the Potomac at the Fall line. Looking downstream its hard to believe you are just a stone's throw from the Washington Monument.

Hiking Catoctin But No Sign of Sarkozy

Carl has decreed that biking season is over, it is now officially hiking season. To kick off the season, we headed north to Cunningham Falls State Park and did the 6 mile Wolf Rock/Chimney Rock loop, which has lots of climbing. We didn't have all that much choice - the western half of the trail system was shut down because apparently President Bush and French President Sarkozy were meeting at Camp David. We never did catch a glimpse of Sarkozy's hot new wife, though.

When we got up there a car had a "MeetUp" sign taped to its open trunk - looks like the local Internet MeetUp hiking group had chosen the same location. It had been very windy the night before, knocking all of the red leaves off the trees so the only colors breaking up the green were yellow.

We did the hike in a counterclockwise direction, the opposite of the usual route. This puts most of the climbing in the first half of the hike and on the way up we passed this unusual structure. Looks like someone was building a jail out of some saplings and a small natural trail. Perhaps some pre-production planning for the next Blair With Project? 

We ran into the Meetup Group on Wolf Rock but kept going. Six miles later we were back at the visitor center and then made a quick stop at Pryor Orchards for some fine Braeburn apples.

Closing Out the Hiking Season

Carl has decreed it is finally the official end of the hiking season, as determined by two things: (1) The temperature is high enough to meet Carl's threshold for cycling; and (2) we have hiked just about every trail within 90 miles of the Baltimore/Washington area at least once and many of them twice. Unfortunately, the weather gods didn't hear about this, so this past Sunday was cold and rainy and we hiked Sugarloaf Mountain again this weekend, doing the Peak Views trail in a total fogout - the views were nothing but grey.

So, to close the hiking season out, a few pictures:

Entrance to an old chromium mine at Soldier's Delight.

 

 

Scenic outhouse at Cunningham Falls State Park.

 

 

Carl going uphill at Cunningham Falls.

Lofty Loudon Heights Hike Begats Brisk Bluster

Continuing on our quest to only do one car hikes, Carl and I revisited a favorite: a loop that starts at Harper's Ferry National Park in West Virginia. We started at the parking lot at the entrance off of Rt 340 and dutifully paid the $6 self service parking fee. The forecast was for a severe wind warning, with gusts of up to 79 mph trumpeted. But we are men, real men - neither wind, nor rain nor looming locusts would deter us, unless Starbucks was closed.

This hike starts out on the Appalachian trail, heading south out of Harper's Ferry on the Appalachian trail, which first crosses the Shenandoah River on the Rt. 340 bridge and then climbs directly up Loudon Heights. We were sheltered on the climb but once we crested the ridge the red flag wind conditions kicked in for a bit:

That's me, doing the penguin dance and proving that it did turn out to be a windy day!

There is then a very pleasant section along the Loudon Heights ridge with periodic viewpoints of the Potomac River and Harper's Ferry below. This is followed by a steep set of switchbacks to get back down to river level, with barbed wire encrusted signs encouraging you to stay on the switchbacks. I have no idea what the barbed wire is for - maybe bears have been eating the signs? If you hike this area frequently, you know the real reason to stay on the trail is to avoid the rampant poison ivy.

The most annoying part of this hike has been that once you reach river level you have a 1 mile walk on the shoulder of 340 but there is now a blue-blazed trail that cuts that in half by taking a scrubby detour through the wooded section next to the grubby parking lot where the kettle korn vendors hang out in warmer days. From there it is an easier hike over yet another Rt. 340 bridge over to the Sandy Hook side and then a scramble downhill to the C&O Canal. The winds really began to howl at this point, as they seemed to funnel down the river valley and really get ferocious. A freight train came through just before we reached the railroad bridge for yet another bridge walk. A quick stroll through Harper's Ferry and we were back at my truck.

A very nice 7 mile loop, Googleatronic map below and some more trip details here where average winds of 21 mph were reported.

Probing Patapsco's Paths, Preserving Petroleum

It is interesting how $3/gallon gas makes you think. Back in the 70s, when the Arab oil embargo gave us the first taste of $1/gallon gas (the equivalent of $3 today), the US lowered the highway speed limit, passed strong fuel economy standards and started building loads of bicycle paths to promote alternatives to driving. This time as the price of gas has doubled the US government seems to pretty much be just fiddling, so we have to take things into our own hands. Since hiking the Appalachian Trail usually involves close to 200 miles of roundtrip driving (with two cars if we want to avoid out and back hikes), Carl and I have been focusing on longer loop hikes in the Patapsco River watershed that cut down on the driving and that carbon footprint.

The first area we tried was starting from the town of Oella, between the Avalon and Hollofield areas of Patapsco State Park. Oella is a cool old mill town that has all you really need in life: a non-Starbucks coffee shop, the Trolley Line paved rail trail (only two miles long), lots of old stone houses, views of the Patapsco River, and a lot of paths through the woods and along the river. Plus it is a short walk to historic (tm) Ellicott City  with all kinds of other stuff to do and see.

We parked on the western side of the river and hiked along the river heading upstream for short bit until the terrain forced us up to the railroad tracks. In about 2.5 miles you reach the trails coming down from the Hollofield area and you reach Union Dam and the tunnel that goes through the ridge that Rt. 40 goes over. The Union Dam was built to supply water to the mills at Oella, and we would take advantage of this on the way back. I've walked through the tunnel years ago, but it is actually an active rail line and being older and more responsible we hiked around the tunnel along the river. There was still lots of snow on the ground and a good deal of ice in the shade.

At about the 4 mile mark, after having to get off the tracks to let a freight train go by, we reached Daniels and the old metal bridge that took us over the river and onto a path that headed back downstream now on the opposite side of the river. This path is not maintained but is fairly easy to follow - there were a lot of blowdowns and thistles to navigate through or around. As we hiked on that side of the river, two more looong freight trains went by on the tracks - a busy day for the old main line. This section is not tremendously scenic, but once we got back to Rt. 40 and the Union Dam it began to get interesting. Back in the day, the dam diverted water down a 2 mile long race (essentially a canal) to power the mills at Oella. To make this work they had to build a berm or wall to hold the water and the top of that berm is still mostly intact and is used as a hiking and mountain biking path. To your right is the river, to you left are the wooded hills - really scenic.

As you near Oella, you pass a number of footbridges that connect to trails that lead uphill. The Millrace trail ends in the yard of a beautiful house and you take a foot bridge to a short path around the house. Another quarter of a mile and you reach the old mill, which is now slowly being turned into condominiums. From there it is about a 1/2 mile walk on the road back to Old Frederick Road and that coffee shop/bakery. Many old stone houses, intermingled with newer architectural styles - an interesting area to walk through even if you never get on the trail. You can actually put together a four mile road loop by going up the Trolley Line rail trail and then circling back on the roads through Oella.

Ended up as about a 9 mile round trip, Googleatized map below:

This past week we tried to put together some loop trails downstream from Oella at Ilchester.  First we tried starting at a unmaintained trail that ends at River Road. It basically follows the clearing made for a fiber optic line, but it runs smack into private property at a cattle farm. Without trespassing through the cow pies there was no way to get from there into the Patapsco park trail system. So, we circled back and went downstream a bit to Ilchester, where is now a footbridge that crosses the Patapsco, enabling a loop hike from Ilchester over the footbridge, up the paved trail to the swinging bridge, then back on the southern side of the river where River Road was wiped out by Hurricane Agnes back in 1972. About a 2.5 mile loop, not tremendously exciting but a nice tour de bridges. The ruins of the old St. Mary's school used to be at the top of the hill where you come out, but it is gone now. Some photos:

Just Another Patapsco Hike

An odd juxtaposition: I spent the week in Las Vegas at a company offsite (as usual accomplishing the squadoosh typical of off-sites) and returned to snow and ice in Maryland. I hate Las Vegas - it is probably the worst possible city (well, Orlando is close) for a business trip. Back in the day (pre-laptops, pre-Blackberries) there used to be downtime on business trips, but now they are pretty much "fly at the last minute, work, fly back as soon as possible" so the major features I look for in hotels are fast Internet connectivity and a good (and free) health club - and hotels in Vegas have neither. One neat thing - on the way back, my flight was delayed and the Las Vegas airport has a fitness club - for $10 I killed an hour working out instead of killing an hour enriching Starbucks' bottom line.

So, last weekend Carl and I decided to hike the northern side of the Avalon area of Patapsco State Park, revisiting the scene of the crime. We'd had about 5 inches of snow earlier in the week and there was still a few inches covering any shaded area. That seemed to attract the mountain bikers, as there were scads of them about. The river level is up quite a bit, maybe we are slowly pulling out of drought territory.

From the Park 'n Ride we hiked the Soapstone Branch Trail down to the Patapsco River, then about 2 miles on the paved hiker/biker trail upstream to the Buzzards Rock trail back up the ridge. Three or four miles on the Santee Branch trail brought us back to the Soapstone Branch Trail, with some nice ups and downs but no killer climbs. Not much wildlife out - a bunch of deer resting up between making assaults on suburban landscaping and that was about it. A total of about 8.5 miles

Googleicious map of the hike below and more statistics here: