I'm not sure this really qualifies as a joint Smokies/AT Hiking post, as we were only on the AT for one mile and it was a mile I've done before, but there were white blazes, so AT Hiking it is. Dara joined me today, and Ben was kind enough to follow us to drop a car at the Big Creek Ranger Station and drive us back to the Cosby Campground where we started our hike. Instead of getting on the evil Low Gap trail up to the junction with the Lower Mt. Cammerer trail, we walked up through the campground to start LMC at its actual beginning, which is about a tenth of a mile from the Low Gap trail junction (otherwise, we would've done that tenth of a mile as an in-and-out because I'm a purist and have to get the whole trail in order for it to "count").
It was a very cold morning (22 degrees at the campground), and there was snow on the trees but not on the ground when we started.
As we climbed, we came across a little more snow on the ground, but the trail was still pretty clear.
The most difficult part of the trail were the creek crossings, of which there were many. The Brown Book describes the Lower Mt. Cammerer trail as walking in and out of the ridges on an upside-down cupcake wrapper, and that's pretty accurate. You would walk out to the outside of a ridge spoke, where there were usually pretty great views (even if they were wintertime views); then you'd walk back in to a path cut in the mountain by years and years of water movement, where you'd have to cross that moving water. Due to all the precipitation over the past couple of weeks, the water was really moving, and some of the rock hops were more precarious than usual. One of them about took me down when I tried to step on a couple of different logs that looked wet but were actually coated in ice. Even at the couple of crossings where there were footbridges, the crossings were more difficult than usual due to the slick conditions.
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| Dara navigates a slick footlog. |
The water crossings had the added downside of being in the colder areas (not that many areas were very warm) because they were tucked in against the north side of the mountain, literally "where the sun don't shine." When we got out to the outside points on the "cupcake wrapper," we often hit little sunny patches that were pretty nice (definitely made it feel warmer than in the 20s).
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| View of Gabes Mountain from the sunny Sutton Ridge overlook |
In fact, at about mile 3, we were just starting what would be a 3-ish-mile climb, and we were in a somewhat prolonged sunny area. We were feeling pretty great temperature-wise and starting to sweat a little bit, so we both removed our jackets. That turned out to be a mistake because it was a long time before we ended up in the sun again, it was still really cold in the shady areas, and we were still gaining elevation. As we continued up the trail, we found more and more snow on the ground.
Eventually, the snow covered the trail, although it wasn't nearly as deep as the snow I slogged through last weekend. There was maybe an inch or two at most, and it was a little bit slick on some of the steeper climbs, but never slick enough that we felt like stopping to put on our microspikes (which I put back in my bag after last week's adventure and probably won't remove until July or so - I've learned my lesson). We also kept getting good wintertime views of other snow-covered ridges when we came to the outsides of the cupcake wrapper folds, and that distracted us from the cold a little bit.
This is the part where the stream crossings got a little more treacherous as well. On this one, I actually used this ice-covered stick as a bit of a balance point as I hopped across on the rocks:
The climb on the Lower Mt. Cammerer trail didn't do much to keep us warm. It's a long climb, but it's pretty gradual for the most part, with only a couple of half-mile-ish sections that get a little steeper. As Dara said, "If you're going to climb, this trail is the way to do it." It would've been very pleasant if it had been over 30 degrees. Ha! As it was, at about mile 7, we broke down and stopped to put our jackets back on. That turned out to be a good plan, as approximately 10 seconds later a cold wind started blowing, and we came upon a winter wonderland-type area where there were ice crystals covering all the trees, bushes, and pretty much everything else. The winter storm must've blown in like a bat out of hell here because all the ice crystals were sticking out sideways from the tree branches. I tried to get a close-up picture, but it doesn't really do it justice. It was really cool-looking.
Possibly even cooler is how it looked "big picture" when you looked at all the ice-covered trees together:
And THEN, oh my goodness, you decide to look up:
This was an excellent lesson in looking at things from all angles when you're out hiking. I have to look down a lot because I'm extremely clumsy and can fall over just about anything in my path, but I do try to remember to stop every once in a while and look around. I probably don't remember to look straight up very often, but obviously I should!
As we came up to the trail junction with the AT, I took one more picture of a winter view that we got on the outside of one of the ridge spokes, and then my phone died, I guess because the freezing temps drained the battery. Usually, it's good for at least 14-15 miles, but apparently not with temps in the 20s. I do carry a charger pack but didn't feel like stopping to hook all that up for a few more miles. Luckily, Dara's phone was still going strong, so she was able to capture photos from the rest of our hike.
Once we got up to the AT, the sun had been hitting the ridge for a little bit, so there was less snow up there.
There was even less snow (and we even started to thaw out a bit) after we turned on the Chestnut Branch trail and headed down the other side of the mountain (the sunny side). I think the temps were in the 40s by the time we got to the bottom, which is what I was expecting for the day based on the weather forecast. I guess you just had to have access to some sunshine to get to that point. 😏 Of course, with more warmth comes more melting, so there was a lot of water crossing the trail and a lot of mud on the way down. In this spot, the trail had actually become a creek bed (we had to cross under this log in the water):
After a mile or so, we got back down to Big Creek, and it was rolling and beautiful.
Then, as a welcome promise that Spring is coming, we saw these crazy jonquils near the end of the trail:
I remember saying a couple of months ago that I'm okay with hiking when the temps are in the 30s but have no desire to hike when it's in the 20s. Since then, I think I've hiked four times with temps in the 20s, at least starting out. As it turns out, I just have a desire to hike, period. 😆 A couple of those times, we started out around 26 or 27 and were climbing, so it didn't feel terribly cold. This week, starting at 22 felt like a huge difference, I suppose also because we weren't really climbing. Of course, last week was in the 30s and 40s and may be the coldest I've ever been because of the snow and fog situation. I'm not sure what lesson I've learned from all of this, except maybe (1) not to limit myself by temperatures; (2) if the forecast looks like an awesome sunny day, consider whether you'll actually be IN that sun or whether the mountain will block you from it; and (3) ALWAYS BRING MICROSPIKES from September to May. 😁
AT miles: 345.5 down; 1844.5 to go (no change, as today's AT mileage was duplicated and I'm not keeping up with my total AT mileage)
Unduplicated Smokies miles: 176.4
Total Smokies miles: 217.3
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