The Skyway Loop Trail on the Pinhoti Trail

Mark Dutton, a new friend from Jasper, and I left Friday afternoon for a three day backpack trip off the Pinhoti Trail to an area known as the Skyway Loop.  The loop starts for us at the Turnipseed Camp parking lot on Highway 281 just below the Cheaha State Park.  From there it is a 4 mile hike to Lake Chinnabee joining the Skyway Trail for another 6 miles.  This trail then intersects with the Pinhoti Trail at Adams Gap.  The toughest section of the trail is the 5 miles up the Pinhoti Trail utilizing the Stairway to Heaven and joining the Chinnabee Silent Trail back down to the parking lot.  The total distance hiked for me wound up being about 19 miles but Mark took about a 3.5 mile side hike to make his distance about 22.5 miles.

We met Dick Echols in Leeds who wanted to join us for the first night camp.   Dick would be joining the Sierra Club hike from the Cheaha Shelter on the Chinnabee Silent Trail to Adams Gap.  Mark and I would hike with the group until we found a good place to spend the second night out.

After a great lunch in Oxford at Billys Bar-B-Que the three of us made our way to the trail head to begin our trip.  The first day was really just a short jaunt to the Cheaha Shelter to spend the night.  There were no cars in the parking lot so I felt we would have the shelter to ourselves.  Not long into the hike we hit Cheaha Falls a wonderful area below the Cheaha Shelter.   A short walk up the hill would bring us to the shelter but I was wrong about being there by ourselves.  There were approximately 20 college students and 2 teachers at the shelter.  The students were from Faulkner College in Montgomery and were finishing up on the backpacking class.  They were very pleasant and seemed to enjoy the company of Curbie the Wonderdog.

I am posting a picture below taken by Mark Dutton of Dick Echols, Curbie and myself at the Cheaha Shelter.  Mark is a wonderful photographer and was using a Canon G-12 digital camera which I am in love with.  I am sure Mark does not mind me posting this image as I am giving him proper credit.

After a restless night sleeping in the shelter with the students talking around the campfire we were joined by the Sierra Club hiking group to continue our trip.  Jay Hudson, the very capable leader of the group, was not feeling well and would not get better during the day.  We hiked over to Lake Chinnabee through Devils Den Falls, a popular local attraction and swimming hole.  Some kayakers were taking advantage of the high water to run down the creek.

After lunch at the Lake Chinnabee campgrounds we headed up the Skyway Trail to Adams Gap.  The weather was great with blue skies and a little breeze.  The trail was mostly uphill and through some rolling hills. We met a couple of hikers and their Brittany Spaniel who did not want to play with Curbie.  Late in the afternoon we arrived at a beautiful campsite on Hubbard Creek about 2 miles from Adams Gap.  Mark and I made camp by the creek while the group headed on to Adams Gap and a finish of the day hike.

This spot wound up being a great place to spend the night.  The creek ran over some shoals near the site and gurgled all night.  I set up my hammock and slept very well until about 4:30 when Curbie growled at some sort of creature lurking by our campsite.  After a breakfast of Pop-Tart we were off and hiking down the trail.

Soon we were at the Adams Gap junction with the Pinhoti Trail.  The weather was beginning to warm up but there was a nice breeze.  Up the Pinhoti we went.  This section of the trail is best known for an area known as the Stairway to Heaven.  This takes you up to a wonderful overlook of the valley below but is one rocky and difficult portion.  I am not where I need to be fitness wise and it took a toll on me.  I was too tired to take a decent picture from up top so I am going to use the one that Mark took.

From there we headed over to the junction of the Chinnabee Silent Trail, the Odum Scout Trail and the Pinhoti Trail.  The trail down to the car on the Chinnabee Silent Trail is one rocky road.  It was really hard on the feet and knees and I was already pretty spent.  After somewhat of a struggle we reached the car and it was a welcome sight.  The only bad part of the hike is that it was on Sunday and a  beer could not be bought.  So after a stop at the Park Headquarters and a Diet Coke we headed to Wendys in Oxford for a great chicken sandwich.

Up to My Knees in Cold Water

Last weekend I went up to the Sipsey Wilderness with the Sierra Club for a day hike down Eagle Creek, Little Ugly Creek and then looping back up Horsepen Creek. The weather had been very rainy the two days before raising the water levels all across the wilderness. The timing for the trip could not have been more perfect. Of course, the only problem was that the warm weather never arrived and the temperature stayed in the 40's all day long.

We started out off Cranal Road at the beginning of Eagle Creek. There was a trail to follow for a while bringing us past a very nice campsite at the bend of the creek. A couple of guys were camping there for the night as evidenced by the smoke from their campfire.

Down from the campsite was our first waterfall of the day, "Eagle Creek Falls". This is one of the most beautiful off trail falls in the wilderness. Some of the rest areas in the Alabama interstate system display Eagle Creek Falls. The lead photo in this article shows the falls from down the trail. The below photo is a closer up view.

We continued our trek down Eagle Creek crossing back and forth across the creek. As I mentioned the temperature was in the mid 40's and the creek was high and the water cold. At first I tried to keep my boots dry but after a while I gave up. When the terrain got tough I would just wade down the creek rather than try to walk the muddy ridge side.

There were a couple of feeder creeks that came into Eagle Creek and a short hike revealed some unknown water falls. One I decided to name in honor of my Louisiana heritage "Bengal Falls". I am sure my Alabama friends will love that. Below is a photo of Bengal Falls.

As we headed down stream we ran into the merger of Little Ugly Creek and Eagle Creek. The map seems to name the merger as Little Ugly Creek as it flows on into the Sipsey River. We walked up Little Ugly Creek or in my case waded to one of the most wonderful places in the Sipsey. Little Ugly Falls and Deer Skull Falls are next to each other on Little Ugly Creek. This is in an area with steep canyon walls and tons on Hemlock Trees. What a great place. The first photo is Little Ugly Falls and the second photo is Deer Skull Falls.

We explored above these falls to find another wonderful waterfall called upper Deer Skull Falls. It was a little bit of a climb and a creek crossing but it was worth the effort.

After a lunch break at the falls we headed down Little Ugly Creek toward another feeder creek called Hemlock Creek. A short distance up the creek we found this little beauty called Hemlock Falls.

A little further down the terrain began to change and began to flatten out and actually became a little marshy except for one little place that was a waterfall named for the ferns that grow in the spring around this area. This little waterfall was called Fernglade Falls and is pictured below.

Shortly after leaving Fernglade we ran into the Sipsy River and was it high. We turned right and went down the river about a quarter mile and turned up Horsepen Creek. This turned out to be the most difficult walking of the entire trip. I spent a lot of time wading this portion of the trek. It was quite an amazing sight though. A lot of boulders, moss and fauna all up, down and in the creek.

We eventually came to a very lovely waterfall called Horsepen Falls which would be our last waterfall of the day. There was a wonderful campsite above the falls with some nice benches people have made utilizing the available rocks in the area.

The exit out of the wilderness was about a half mile of dead fall and an uphill of briers. But the road was a welcome sight and meant some warmth from wading the cold creeks all day. This was a great day full of eye candy and new knowledge of the Sipsey.

Today I head to a different part of the state and more waterfalls. Mark Dutton, an attorney from Jasper, and I are heading to Mount Cheaha and the Skyway Loop. We will hike in on the Chinnabee Silent Trail to a shelter with a wonderful view of the Talledaga National Forest. Below the shelter is the Cheaha Falls. We will spend the night there and will meet up with the Sierra Club hikers in the morning. We will continue the Silent Trail (so named by the Boy Scout Troop of deaf scouts who helped develop the trail) to Lake Chinnabee and then the Skyway Trail over to Adams Gap.

It should be a great weekend and I will report on the trip next week.

OMG---HTML and CSS

I think that I must have too much time on my hands.  I am striving to learn html and css to better understand how to do my blog and possibly my own website.  The older you get the more difficult it is to learn something new but I am going to give it a go.

If anyone has any tips please let me know.

The Field Lab and such other nonsense

I mentioned in an earlier post that John Wells, a New York photographer, had exited his busy world of high-fashion photography to move to Terlinqua, Texas and live off the grid. The New York Times recently sent a writer and photographer down to do a piece on John and his lifestyle. The article can be found at the following link.http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/10/garden/10texas.html

John lives one of those lives that I would love to live but would never have the nerve nor the recklessness to live, but I really like to think about it. I am perfectly happy living my life as it is, but there is a certain romance and nostalgia to live out in the old, wild west living on nothing but your wits. Any way it is always a good start to my day.

John has a very small cast of characters and places that are interspersed into his daily blog. Belinda, an adopted long horn cow meanders in and out of his daily life. Belinda has become a small time favorite face book page and coffee mugs can be ordered from John with her likeness on the cup. Floppy is a burro that hangs out at the field lab and usually is in to some sort of mischief. John operates a live web cam of the field lab at his website and Floppy is always knocking it over.

Some friends of John are two western cowboy singers Brent Lovelady and William Rich, better known in west Texas as the Bent Lovehandles. They recently released their first album called "Sacred Order of the Lonely Hearts" which can be purchased from iTunes for $9.98. Brent and William play at local establishments in and around Big Bend National Park and can be seen at the Starlight Theater, a favorite haunt of John and many Big Benders who frequent the area. Brent actually created a YouTube video of a song he wrote and performed at the Field Lab.



John seems to enjoy his notoriety and seems to enjoy entertaining visitors a the field lab.  So if you are in the area and would like to enjoy the company of a true individual, give John a call.

Everyday life

No hiking this weekend and that is a shame (maybe I go out Sunday and get in a short day hike).  I am working on a new piece of business (I actually do work for a living.  Yes. it is true) and they want to have a conference call at 10 am on a Saturday morning.

So now it looks like I will get out next weekend and do some hiking in the Bankhead National Forest with the Sierra Club group.  Yes, I joined the Sierra Club.  I used to be a member when I was in Louisiana but it lapsed over time.  So I am back to being a tree hugger.  Not really but I am concerned about the environment and I want to preserve the wilderness areas, national forests and public lands for future use.

I enjoyed the Sierra Club meeting night before last.  Jay Hudson's presentation was very informative and insightful.  He basically talked about the diversity of plant and animal life in Alabama and how quickly that diversity is beginning to diminish.  Alabama has the lowest amount of public lands as a percentage of total land in the US.  That means the availability of parks, wildernesses and national forests in Alabama is very limited.  If we only had a median share what a boost to tourism that would be.  Unfortunately our politicians are too short sighted to see that.

The explorer has a leak in the radiator and I need to get that fixed in the next week or so.  I need the ability to be mobile without leaving Karen without a car so the time is now.

Just thought I would throw in a picture of the basin in Big Bend National Park.  I am ready to go back.

If you have not checked out The Field Lab blog I encourage you to.  I think it is self assuming on my part that I am writing like I am talking to someone.  I just assume at a point in time someone will actually come and read about my little corner of the world.

I have been busy with life

I have been negligent in my duties to my blog for the last couple of weeks.  I have not been hiking or camping since my ill-fated trip on the Pinhoti, but I have not given up my passion, just life getting in the way.  Nothing earth shattering or newsworthy, just moving furniture, bad weather and some light yard work.

Tonight I will attend my first meeting of the Cahaba River Sierra Club meeting at the Hoover Library.  Jay Hudson, a volunteer leader of my hiking club and a true naturalist, is giving a presentation on the fauna of the Alabama woods and forests.  I am not a big joiner and certainly do not consider myself much of an activist but I like Jay and want to hear what he has to present.  I certainly want to see our wilderness and forest areas preserved and given the state of the economy it may be left up to us to make sure that happens.

I will file a report tomorrow and let everyone know how the meeting went.

PS.  I have discovered a blog that I find truly interesting.  I know you will not be surprised that it is about the Big Bend area.  A gentleman by the name of John Wells, a former fashion photographer from New York, sold everything he had, purchased 60 acres outside of the gates of Big Bend, and built a one room house off the grid.
John blogs everyday about his adventures of living alone, living off the grid and truly living by his own wits.  You can find him at http://thefieldlab.blogspot.com/

He was recently visited and written about by the New York Times.

The Odyssey of paying AARP dues for 13 years

We all have heard the terms "the new 40's" or "the new 50's" and the like.  In a lot of ways these terms are accurate and reflect the changes in lifestyles, technology and medical advances.  But from time to time you come to face with reality that you are getting older and you have to try harder to stay ahead of Father Time.

I came face to face with this reality a couple of weekends ago when hiking on the Pinhoti Trail just north of Mt. Cheaha.  As I related in an earlier post I was stricken with a case of heat exhaustion on a warm but not necessarily hot day in Alabama.  Surely something must have been wrong with me to have such a hard time.  Certainly it could not have been anything that I did or did not do on that day to cause me such stress.

Well, off to see Dr. Rene to find out what malady has stricken my body.  Surely all my arteries must have been blocked or I had malaria or some esoteric jungle disease.  Dr. Rene took the mandatory blood samples and then sent me off to see the cardiologist and a nuclear stress test disguised in the name of cardiolite stress test.  Thursday morning I showed up at this fancy health club on Highway 119 operated by St. Vincent's Hospital.  There were three other people taking the test that morning and they were all older and fatter than I.  I am of course rationalizing that some mistake had been made putting me with such an unhealthy group.

When my turn came after being prepped with some sort of radioactive isotope, I hopped up on the treadmill and performed for the technician.  She gave me the same comment that most nurses and doctors give me-"Did you know that your heart rate is low?"  Every medical person since my early teens have made the same comment.  "Yes, I do know that and should I be concerned?"

Well, the test went very well and I was told that I am in very good physical shape and my heart and plumbing is doing well.  It was obvious that they are not "Dr. House" who surely would have diagnosed me with some sort of dengue fever or a bite of the African Tse-Tse fly.

But since this did not happen I guess I will face the real issue and that is I am getting older and must put in more work that my younger counterparts just to be able to have a comparable result as they.  So the effort must be continual or I will digress into not being able to do what I want to do.  Even though the 60's are now the new 50's, I have concluded that to be general statement and not a complete truth.  We baby boomers are going to have to continue to work harder to accomplish what we used to be able to do in our sleep.