A Cumberland Trail Hike

My first hiking priority is to either help individual attain requirements for admittance to The 900 Miler Association of the GSMNP or to enable me to complete my Geezer Map (i.e., complete 900 Miler Association requirements after reaching age 75). Because no one needed my help today I decided to do a hike outside of the GSMNP that was organized by Gary Niebart and Mike Miller (the latter two were most instrumental in "firing my interest" in completing the requirements for The 900-Miler Association). Mike and Gary have proposed a series of Cumberland Trail hikes; it is my understanding that the completed sections are in State Parks.

I arrived at the Flying J service station on I-40 West ~0800. Somewhat to my surprise ~30 hikers were going to do this "Out of the GSMNP" hike near Dayton TN; I expected far less since this hike required a rather long drive. In part because I drove ~150 miles last week so that two hikers could complete the AT from Davenport Gap to Mt. Cammerer, I willingly accepted a ride with Jim and Nancy Carmin for what appeared to be a similar long drive.

We began our hike ~0930; in addition to Nancy and Jim, those in our "group" included Marita Vornehm, Debra Barton and Judy Collins. Judy was every bit as responsible as Mike and Gary in helping me complete my requirements for membership in The 900-Miler Association (Judy completed her requirements for the latter shortly after Gary and Mike and she invited me to go with her on hikes that required exceptional amounts of logistics). Although we had stayed in touch, I had not hiked with her since she completed her last hike for The 900-Miler Association in 2006. Judy has an "articular cartilage deficiency" in one knee for which the only final solution is a TKR.

Because no one in our group had a map, it was a rather unique hike. The first picture (you'll need to double click it to really see) presents Nancy leading, followed by Debra, Marita, Judy and then Jim.



We worked our way to a summit and intended to cross a stream; however, after I went a few feet and found that moss on solid rock was very slippery and that water level would exceed boot height for a few feet of the crossing, we retreated and had lunch. The next picture is one of several unique bridges that we crossed; if you enlarge the picture you'll see one of our group just getting off the bridge and two further ahead on one of many unique rock formations that we traversed and/or saw.



Shortly after this we met many others of our group who had taken a different trail initially; we decided to go where they had gone and came across the falls seen in the third picture.



We then worked our way back to the trail that we had initially taken; we eventually again passed the entrance to an old coal mine and/or a furnace used to make coke.



The hike that my group did today was perhaps only ~10 miles. The rock formations seen were very unique as were some of the stone walls, vistas, and a trestle for a bridge that did not appear to be going anywhere; much of this probably related to tree cutting (much done by Bowater) and its coal mine era. Although I am glad that I went on this hike, I am not sure how many of the Cumberland Trail hikes that I will make. I like hikes where the distance driven is more proportional to the length of the hike.

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