Welcome to Old Dan Walking!

Smoky Scout and her friends and family, getting ready to walk the Sugarlands

To skip the chatter and go right to the pics of this walk, click the link below:
Old Sugarlands Trail (Opens in new window)

3.9 mile shuttle hike on the Old Sugarlands Trail, plus a 1 mile side trip to the Sugarlands Cemetary - April 11, 2009

My Easter-eve walk on the Old Sugarlands Trail would be a special treat. On this day one of the good people that inspired me to keep walking and also start writing about it, Smoky Scout (a.k.a Sharon McCarthy), would become member #251 of the “Smokies 900″ club. The Smokies 900 is an informal club of hikers that have completed every inch of the roughly 800 official miles of trails in the Great Smoky Mountain National Park. Smoky Scout’s challenge to complete all the trails was unique in that she vowed to hike the entire distance in one year for the benefit of the Girl Scouts of America. With seasonal and other road closures, logisitics of car shuttling, issues with the legendary Smoky mountain weather, illness, family or personal commitments, not to mention the difficulty of many of the trails themselves, it would be quite a feat for a retired East-Tennessee area local to complete all the trails in one year. Smoky Scout was neither. She would have to accomplish this goal not just with muscle and stamina, but also with an extraordinary feat of planning and flexibility. Balancing her job and family, the loss of her father, and traveling the three plus hours from Charlotte every outing, Sharon was able to get it done by maximizing every trip and most often hiking 14 to 17 miles on back-to-back-to-back-to-back days. Old Dan is usually toast after one 10 mile day. Impressive…

I had enjoyed following Smoky Scout along on her journey over the past year through her entertaining website. Today she had invited her family and several nice folks that have helped her accomplish her goal throughout the year. While I was not one of those people, she was gracious enough to invite me along as well. I was looking forward to meeting Smoky Scout and her hiking buds because I felt as if I already knew them from all the blogs. The forest was alive big-time on the trip over the mountain from Cherokee due to the pounding spring deluge of the past days. The cascades, creeks and streams were bursting, flowers were abundant, and the wildlife was active. I saw several wild turkey in different flocks and a large group of elk grazing. The greening up of the mountains in Spring is really something to see. After meeting Sharon, her family, and all of her hiking companions at the Sugarlands Visitor Center, we shuttled over to Cherokee Orchard Road in Gatlinburg for the start of this Saturday morning walk. The Old Sugarlands Trail starts just off Cherokee Orchard Road, and travels 3.9 miles through the site of the large former community of Sugarlands and two 1930’s CCC camps.

Yellow trillium

After some group and Smoky Scout individual pictures at the trail sign we made our way down the gravel road that is Old Sugarlands Trail. Sharon had joked that she felt like we were papparazzi with all the cameras flashing at her by the sign. Wildflowers, mostly violets and yellow trillium, were really starting to put on a show along the sides of the trail as we made our way across a creek and over the first of only a few minor uphills on the trail. I learned from Smoky Scout’s hiking buddy Judy that the foliage that looked like little umbrellas sprouting all over the place were mayapple. Judy explained that they flower in May, and I enjoyed talking to her about her recent creek crossing incident on a hike with Smoky Scout. Judy is an AT thru-hiker, and is planning on doing it again soon. Nobody in this serious crowd of hikers, which included a couple of multi-900 hikers and several folks well on the way to 900, had any trouble whatsoever easily trudging up the first hill.

I noticed almost immediately that with all the chatter going on as we walked along this group made some serious speed. Smoky Scout was like a Mom at wedding reception, circulating through the crowd making sure she talked with everybody. I enjoyed talking for a while with hiking book author Danny Bernstein, who had just celebrated another book launch. (Hiker-to-Hiker) Before today’s walk I picked up a copy of Danny’s first book, which she signed for me. I also talked a while with her husband Lenny, who after this weekend would be just 140 miles away from his Smokies 900 goal. After a while Smoky Scout and Danny joked that the way this crowd was chatting away we would miss the Statue of Liberty if we walked two feet from it.

I began to notice some rock piles beside the trail and soon stopped to investigate. Off to the right side of the trail were the remains of an old stone structure, and an old wash tub sat closeby on a pile of rocks. My quick excursion meant the crowd had left me in the dust, so I walked solo for a while. I finally caught the group as they had stopped to investigate an old dam, and remains of a CCC camp and dump site.

We soon reached a side trail that lead to Sugarlands Cemetary. The group decided we take the trip to investigate. I have no idea how far the side trail was, but my guess is about 0.5 mile. We sooned reached the cemetary, which sat peacefully on a hilltop as is typical for cemetaries in the Park.

The Sugarlands Cemetary

In this cemetary were names that many people that frequently visit nearby Gatlinburg would recognize, such as the Ogle and Reagan. Also a name that many worldwide would recognize, Parton. These were ancestors of one of the most famous Smoky residents, Dolly Parton. Like all Smoky cemetaries, there were graves of many young children and those that died at birth.

Imagine the loss the Reagan family endured on this day

After the cemetary visit we tagged up with group that had split to explore another area, and off everybody went. I had just started working on a quick snack so I stayed while everybody else went on. Although my break was short, I would not see the fast moving group for the remaining two miles of the trail. As Smoky Scout often said on her hiking website, they had “miles to cover”.

After connecting back up with the main trail I began to walk beside the loud and very picturesque West Prong of the Little Pigeon River. I gradually moved uphill and paralleled the river as the character of the trail changed to more of a trail and less of a road. Near the end of the trail was an impressive 70-foot tall rock wall, the remains of an old quarry used by the Tennessee highway department to build some of the first roads in the area. Soon the end of the trail was in sight, and there was the crowd gathered celebrating Smoky Scout’s official completion of all 800 official Smokies miles.

Sharon celebrates a great accomplishment with her family

One of Smoky Scout’s hiking buds was at the trailhead waiting with champagne. Scout’s husband Jim decided it was a good time for a Formula One moment, spraying Smoky Scout victory lane style. It was fun standing beside the bustling highway and enjoying the celebration. After singing happy birthday to Sharon and toasting her big moment, we made our way back to the Visitor Center to pick up cars and shuttle everybody back to the trail start. I said goodbye at that point and headed back to Cherokee to pick up the family for the drive back to Irmo. It was a pleasure and a real treat to be there and witness the big moment when Smoky Scout completed her goal. Congratulations Sharon!

For pics of this walk, click the link below:
Old Sugarlands Trail (Opens in new window)

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 12th, 2009 at 12:55 pm and is filed under 2009 Hikes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.