Hiking the Highlands
The White Squirrel Hiking Challenge
Editor’s Note: We have long featured our region’s fantastic places and phenomenal hikes in the “Hiking the Highlands” column. What we have less frequently focused on, however, is how some of our favorite places were protected in the first place. Non-profit land trusts are committed to the preservation of our region’s natural heritage and scenic…
Read MorePerusing Kentucky’s Pine Mountain Park
By Joe Tennis High above Pineville, Ky., near the start of the challenging Laurel Cove Trail, an old joke straddles a rock at Pine Mountain State Resort Park. Local lore suggests that the people of Pineville were worried about the menacing-looking boulder coming loose and rolling off Pine Mountain. In the 1930s, shortly after Pine…
Read MorePlant your Feet on the Battleground
By Robert Sutherland Google “Blood Mountain” and you’ll find enough fodder for any armchair traveler. But like any other escape to the outdoors, Blood Mountain cannot be appreciated online. Named for a battle waged nearby between the Cherokee and Creek peoples, Blood Mountain is the highest peak on the Appalachian Trail in Georgia, and the…
Read MoreAnother Nordic Revolution
By Kristian Jackson It’s 5 a.m. and outside the truck, headlights reveal driving snow squalls and drifts as high as the pickup’s hood. Our crawl up Roaring Creek Road near the Toe River of North Carolina comes to a sudden halt in a wall of whiteness. We abandon our attempt to dig out the beast…
Read MoreElk Knob Summit Now Accessible
Story and photos by Molly Moore The Elk Knob Summit Trail begins with a casual amble through canopied woods. The 1.8 mile trail is all uphill, and after rising gently for the first quarter mile, carves a series of switchbacks up the mountainside, eventually meeting an old dirt road at the summit. At the top,…
Read MoreHiking, Biking, Running, and Skiing on West Virginia’s Greenbrier Trail
By Joe Tennis Near a quiet place called Renick, W.Va., though the railroad is long since gone, a crossing sign remains. And so does the former path of the Greenbrier Division of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway, now the Greenbrier River Trail. Stops called Horrock, Beard, Thorny Creek and Stony Bottom line this railroad path,…
Read MoreThe Waterfalls of Appalachia
Here are but six of the hundreds of named and unnamed waterfalls that tumble and twist through our Appalachian mountains. We hope you enjoy! See the state maps in this issue for location indicators. Virginia — Crabtree Falls By Joe Tennis A mere six miles off the Blue Ridge Parkway, near Milepost 27 in Nelson…
Read MoreExplore the highlands of Kentucky
Kentucky’s Pine Mountain Trail By Sam Adams The first impression when entering the southern end of the Highland Section of the Pine Mountain Trail is that it is going to be an easy walk. The trail enters the forest where U.S. 119 crests Kentucky’s second-highest mountain near Whitesburg, and abruptly starts downhill. The word “trail”…
Read MoreFollowing the Foothills Trail
By Jennifer Pharr Davis For this issue, we asked Jennifer Pharr Davis— long-distance hiking queen from Asheville, N.C.— to profile her favorite hike in Appalachia. Davis has hiked more than 9,000 miles, including the Appalachian Trail (twice!), the Pacific Crest Trail, the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu and the 600-mile Bibbulmun Track in Australia. In…
Read MoreThems “The Breaks” – Enjoying the Unknown Beauty of Breaks Interstate Park
Story by Daniel Hawkins Within the coalfields, straddling the border of Southwestern Virginia and Eastern Kentucky, lies a little-known natural wonder of the Appalachian Mountains. Known as the Grand Canyon of the South, Breaks Interstate Park is home to one of the deepest gorges east of the Mississippi. Over millions of years, the Russell Fork…
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