Adventures in Pisgah: Taking the Easy Way Out

I want to go to work in the morning. I'm ready for a normal work week. Working so much that I don't have time to play in the woods sounds good at this point. Maybe a short ride or two after work, maybe take the dog to the city park instead of up to the top of Cold Mountain to drink a beer. Maybe...

Thanksgiving Day and as soon as they opened up the gates at Jones Gap State Park me and Duma were there to meet Jonathon and his dad for some Thanksgiving fun. We did Jonathon's Hospital Rock to Rainbow Falls route and it kicked ass.

As soon as Duma spotted Buddy he knew it was on:

And on it was:

But what is going on here?

I knew there were some technical roped moves that would be a challenge to get Duma past. This isn't one of them:

But this is:

Luckily none of them were over eight feet high so we were able to carry all 95 pounds of Duma down them.

It was a tough hike and Jonathon did a great job of putting the route together. Perfect for Thanksgiving.

Friday came and that meant the Turkey Tiki Time Trial. I'm not sure what the 5th T is supposed to be.

I crashed on my first lap and then again on my second lap and left like a sore loser. It was too much fun, the sort of fun that only the Extreme Tomato can provide.

Saturday morning I had a work meeting that put me tantalizing close to Dupont. So, I took the bike and decided to do some exploring. I planned to go to the top of Stone Mountain as well as the Pinnacle for the first time. First I made a quick stop at Wintergreen Falls:

Then as I worked my way to Rocky Ridge I met a couple of Canadain guys who were having a hard time finding singletrack. They had ridden Clawhammer > Black > Buckwheat > Bennett the day before and loved it so I figured they were my type of guys and offered to show them around. It wasn't long before I stumbled into some other friends and we had a full on group ride going:

I bailed early and met up with Terri for a little dog walk on the Mountains to Sea trail:

I had planned to do a big ride with Jonathon on Sunday but at the last minute he chickened out of the big climb and I couldn't decide if I wanted to ride or hike. After a lot of consideration the dog won and we went out for a little Sunday stroll. Only one place to go:

We started from Black Balsam and went up the Art Loeb Spur. We made it to Ivestor Gap in an hour flat and had already bagged two 6000' peaks - Black Balsam Knob and Tennent Mountain.

This is supposedly the easy way to Cold Mountain but it is several miles longer than the other routes so I knew we had to hurry. Straight past Shining Rock:

After Stairs Mountain the Art Loeb crosses through The Narrows which is a knife edge ridgeline that quite simply kicks ass. This is what hiking is all about. Jones Gap is fun, but This Is It.

On the final push up to Cold Mtn. it started to storm and then stopped. I was relieved because I had a beer to drink:

I know my way around Shining Rock well enough that I don't need a map but I pulled it out at the top to align the sites:

It took us over three hours to make it that far and I was hoping to make it back faster. Of course we had to go back up the Narrows and all the way across the Shining Rock Ledge. Eight miles easy. I decided to take Old Butt Knob to Ivestor and skip the Art Loeb over Grassy Cove Top, Tennent and Black Balsam to save some elevation but the trail was rocky and wet and no faster than the Art Loeb. It threatened to storm again and then turned to sleet and then snow and then sunshine!

The 'easy way' to Cold Mountain took six and half hours (with a 15 minute break to enjoy a beer at the top). My topo program shows it as a 17 mile hike with a modest 4500' gain.