Doe River Gorge

This morning, eleven of us headed to Hampton, Tennessee to hike Doe River Gorge.  The hike is on private property owned by Doe River Gorge Ministries.  It is a five mile out and back hike along an old narrow gauge railroad that was used to haul high grade iron ore from Cranberry, North Carolina until the 1920's.  Now, the owners allow hikers to access the trail during the off season if a release form is signed.  Today the weather was grand and so was the hike.  Both the scenery and the roar of the river made for an enjoyable hike.  An added bonus was some not often seen red trillium.  Nice ones as big as your hand were sprinkled along one section of the trail.  Hats off to the owners to keep this area well maintained yet unspoiled.

Persimmon Ridge

Today the hiking club headed to Jonesborough, Tennessee to do about a 3 mile loop at Persimmon Ridge Park.  Finally, a pretty day after weeks of rain and or cold or snow.  This hike looped around the ball fields and water park and had some ups and downs.  We began by the campground and took Luke's Trail, then Walter's Trail and finally John's trail, to return to the road back to the parking area.  This trail was mainly a wooded trail and dropped down to a stream couple of times.  There were a few wildflowers and the trees hadn't leafed out yet, so we had some views of the area.  The footing was packed earth most of the way and made for fairly easy walking.

Laurel Run Park Guided Wildflower HIke

Finally a break in this horrendously cold, wet spring weather allowed for a few of us to participate in a wildflower hike at Laurel Run Park.  This off the beaten path park is the setting for a spectacular array of wildflowers.  And you don't have to go far to seem them.  You will see them as you drive into the park as they are sprinkled all over the hillside to your right.  Bays Mountain naturalist, Bob, gave us a tour around to examine and photograph the wildflowers.  We saw many species.  We didn't get a lot of traditional hiking in today, but we learned a lot about our native wildflowers.

Virginia Bluebells

Trout Lily

Trillium