virginia hikes: McAfee Knob, September 24 & October 29, 2017

October 16, 2020.Reading time 17 minutes.

This report was reposted on October 17, 2020 to include a video, new photos, and updated formatting.

McAfee Knob is among the most popular hikes in southwest Virginia and said to be the most photographed place on the Appalachian Trail with its own wikipedia page. The popular nature of the hike is a reason I avoid this hike typically and head over to Tinker’s Cliff unless I am doing a sunrise hike. When Keith visited last year, I had planned to write about our sunrise hike and even took a GPS track on it. However, that hike was completely in the fog.

About 1 year to the day, Keith visited us again so we gave sunrise another shot. As you can see, it was quite a nice success. Given we hiked mostly in the dark, I headed up there again to take some updated pictures of the trail for this report a month later during the peak foliage season. With Amtrak restarting train service to Roanoke from D.C the week I’m publishing this post, hopefully this will be just in time for you to plan a southwest VA getaway.

virginia hikes: Little Rocky Row via the AT, June 3 2018

June 9, 2019.Reading time 10 minutes.

This was a hike we did about a year ago and I’m finally getting around to writing it up. It also breaks up my work on the larger trip reports that I’m still grinding through. We hiked a section on the Appalachian Trail for a view of the James River. It had been raining quite heavily that week and we eager to head outside during a break in the rain on a Sunday afternoon.

virginia hikes: North Mountain & Pete’s Cave, April 27 2019

May 30, 2019.Reading time 9 minutes.

Getting started can be the most difficult part about anything. Whether it is me getting these entries out there or getting back on the trail after a long layoff due to injury or other circumstances. It doesn’t necessarily have to be the hardest or most perfect, you just have to get going. On a beautiful Saturday, Katherine joined me to get back on the trail as North Mountain & Pete’s Cave between Lexington and Covington, VA next to I-64 was the perfect combination of reward and ease.

virginia hikes: Roaring Run, April 7 2019

May 28, 2019.Reading time 6 minutes.

After finishing the Hoop Hole loop, I still had some day light. And unlike Hoop Hole, Roaring Run was a hike I had wanted to do, but could never justify driving out there for such a short hike. So this was a good opportunity for me to take a look at the well liked falls of Roaring Run.

virginia hikes: Hoop Hole, April 7 2019

May 27, 2019.Reading time 12 minutes.

Spring had arrived when I headed up to hike Hoop Hole. Flowers were in full bloom at lower elevations around Roanoke, so I decided to go for a hike one Sunday afternoon to see the bloomage on the mountains. Since I was by myself that day, I also was looking to explore something new. Hoop Hole is a well known local hike, but it was one that never really sounded that interesting to me before. Having put it off all these years, it did serve my explore mentality.

virginia hikes: Devil’s Marbleyard via Belfast Trail, November 4 2018

November 15, 2018.Reading time 12 minutes.

The fall foliage hiking season seems to be getting shorter and shorter each of the last couple of years. This year it was nearly all green one week, peaked for one week, and gone the next. During the beautiful and fleeting peak weekend this year, Whitney and Matthew joined me for a hike and scramble up Devil’s Marbleyard. For future updated foliage report for in SW VA, check out Virginia Department of Forestry Report.

This report is supplemented by pictures of my past hikes.

virginia hikes: Terrapin Mountain & Reed Creek loop, October 21 2018

October 23, 2018.Reading time 11 minutes.

It’s nearing that time of the year again, fall foliage season along the Appalachian Mountains. I was eager to head out to see how the colors were coming along. Based on this initial hike, it seems like 2018 is another year of delayed foliage (Virginia Department of Forestry Report).

maryland hikes: Catoctin Mountain Park & Cunningham Falls loop, March 10 2018

March 15, 2018.Reading time 12 minutes.

Maryland? Yes, this is a hike report about a local Maryland hike as we start to transition to the D.C. area.

virginia hikes: Wilson Mountain Trail & Sprouts Run Trail Loop, March 4 2018

March 8, 2018.Reading time 15 minutes.

One aspect of my hike and trip reports is that I keep my personal ratings of the hikes, mostly for myself as part of the reflection process. Well, my whole purpose of this blog serves as an outlet for reflection, but the need to quantify the experience serves as a nice short cut for me to sum up the experiences and compare them for future planning. So my rating system developed meticulously with the rating representing an exact meaning. Of Course, just reading a definition of a rating can be hard to nail down the exact meaning and examples are always nice. So I present to you the perfect example of a 2 rating in views category, the little known Wilson Mountain Trail & Sprout Run Trail Loop.

Note to self, I really should change “views” to “experience”.

virginia hikes: Dragon’s Tooth, February 21 2018

March 6, 2018.Reading time 17 minutes.

Dragon’s Tooth is one of the 3 peaks of the Roanoke triple crown (Roanoke Appalachian Trail Club) along with McAfee Knob and Tinker Cliffs. It is characterized by the outcrop “tooth” like rock just off the peak of Cove Mountain that can be scrambled upon for a 360 view. It is also known as the most technical of the 3 with a short section of scrambling on the Appalachian Trail near the peak.

There are actually 4 ways from 3 different trailhead that you can used to access Dragon’s Tooth. The most popular and easiest is an in and out from the Dragon’s Tooth Parking Lot on the Dragon’s Tooth Trail that turns southbound on the Appalachian Trail (AT) at Lost Spectacles Gap. This is also my recommend return route for all other starts. Out of the same Dragon’s Tooth parking lot, the spur Boy Scout Trail splits shortly after the trailhead and connects with the AT quickly before continuing southbound. The other ways are starting on the AT at main trailhead parking lots (Trout Creek trailhead on Miller Cove Road VA-620 to head northbound or McAfee Knob Parking lot on Catawba Valley Drive VA-311 to head southbound).

While I hiked this on an overly warm, 78 degree Fahrenheit, February weekday recently for sunset, this is one of those local hikes that I’ve done multiple times in the past since it’s so close. My preferred route and what I hiked last time is to head up the Boy Scout Trail and returning on the Dragon’s Tooth Trail after summiting. However, I hiked down in the dark on my last trip since I was catching sunset. Rather than describing the exact hike of my most recent hike exclusively, I’ll cover the most popular and easiest way up first and then I’ll follow up with the alternatives using pictures taken across the years.

trip report: Norway – Bødo & Lofoten Islands, August 2017

February 13, 2018.Reading time 56 minutes.

Over the past few year, we’ve had our delays and plans go awry. But it always seemed we were able to figure out new plans and were able to achieve what we wanted to do. So we were due to run out of luck at some point and the norse gods were happy to be the ones to bring all my plans crashing down and then some.

trip report: Ireland & Northern Ireland, June 2017

November 30, 2017.Reading time 73 minutes.

Meg is Irish, so Ireland is one place in the world she was set on visiting. She had never been and the cliffs of Ireland demanded that she sat on them.

travel 2 walk

Tag: mountains