RATtreks

Trail Maintenance Trip – 7-13-2011

I haven`t been back to my section of trail on the Appalachian Trail since the early Spring walk-through in March of this year and it was now time to cut the annual growth. My friend Doug Corkhill was also planning a trip to his section which joins mine so he once again graciously volunteered to pick us (my son Tyler and myself) up at Spivey Gap to ride with him to the summit of Big Bald. This allows us to walk one way from top down enabling us to have more time to work on the entire section and eliminating the super steep climb from Spivey Gap to Little Bald and then having to walk it all back ! Doug arrived at Spivey Gap around 9am and by 10 am we were on Big Bald. It took longer than usual as we were not able to access the back entrance and had to go around. It was a beautiful morning on Big Bald and the clouds were lifting as we made our way North towards Little Bald.

Big Bald Mountain

The first thing we came across was the ‘bird people’. This has been going on for several years here and it is the Southern Appalachian Raptor Research Big Bald Banding Station. (Try saying that 3 times real fast !) It is funded by grants and designated by the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Commission and the National Audubon Society. They are a non profit organization and you can support them with a donation or volunteering your time. (www.bigbaldbanding.org). They monitor many different types of birds that use the Big Bald habitat as a stopover to rest and refuel during their long journey from the boreal forests of Canada to Central and South America.

Sign just before the banding station

Butterfly resting on a walkie talkie belonging to the 'bird people'

We knew that Doug was behind us somewhere with a push-mower that he was going to experiment with for cutting the long grassy stretch of trail from Big Bald to the tree line which he hoped would be much quicker than using a weed-eater. This turned out to be true however, the ‘bird people’ stopped him and demanded he turn it off to prevent scaring the birds off so he had no choice but to take it back to the truck and use the weed-eater. This took so much extra time that he was unable to finish the entire section to Little Bald and he was unable to get back again this season so the hikers had to deal with high weeds there this year. I am sure the birds would have rather flown around than be snared in the many nets there and then handled !

Tyler looking towards Little Bald

View towards Roan Mtn.

View into North Carolina

The Rhodo`s were in full bloom as were many other flowing plants. I always love walking the ridge-line out to Little Bald. There are many gnarley trees to be found there. The only hard part is climbing the last hill to the summit.

Rhododendren blooming

Rhododendren Bloom

Tiger Lilly

We made it the 1.7 miles out to Little Bald in time for lunch on the summit rocks there. I couldn’t help but notice the likens on the rocks were the same color as my sweat rag !

rag on rocks

After lunch our work would begin cutting the heavy growth that is always on the upper part of Little Bald. It is a steep, narrow, side-hill trail that is exposed to sunlight and grows taller and thicker than the other parts of the section. It took several hours to make our way down to the new upper relocation which is also one of the worst parts of my section. We were pretty tired by the time we got to the AT rock where took a long rest break before making out way on down to Whistling Gap. The weeds were not very bad after that all the way to Spivey so there was little to cut which was good because we had little energy left to cut anything by the time we reached High Rocks.

View from TN side of Little Bald summit with No Business Knob and Temple Hill in the distance

Weeds on Little Bald before cutting

Tyler whacking weeds (being careful to leave the ferns)

RAT and his mighty weed whacker

We did manage to muster up enough energy to climb the steps to the top of the rocks for another much needed rest break before continuing on down to Spivey. There was a letterbox hidden in the rocks on top. This was left by a lady in Higgins Creek as I have spoke with her before after finding one here many years ago.  (Letter boxing is the old school way of Geo-caching)

Tyler on top of High Rocks

Long way down !

We took the short cut around the overgrown backside of High Rocks to cut off some distance and the climbing of all those steps that are on the actual trail. It took another hour or more to slowly make our way down off the mountain making it to the car just before dark.There was lots of cool looking fungi growing but I was not able to get any decent photos of them.

Fungi seen along the way

It was a great day to be on the mountain and the annual growth cutting was now done. I made it home in time for a hot bath, a meal and login to work for an 8 hr shift. I hope to make it back sometime this Fall to clear out water-bars and paint some white blazes.

Cool flowering plant

Scenery near Spivey Gap