A little over 2 years ago, the hubs and I were married in front of our friends and family and nature in Waynesville, NC. Waynesville is an adorable small town just outside our favorite town, Asheville. Since then, we've returned to Asheville often. Last year on our anniversary, we spent the weekend retracing our steps. For our adventure that year, we went ziplining with these guys, http://www.navitat.com/asheville/ so much fun. Can't wait to go again!
This year, our anniversary fell on a Wednesday or some crap like that so we didn't get to do anything adventurous on our actual anniversary. Instead, we cooked dinner together, ate at the table with a bottle of wine (our favorite Pinot Noir that we served at the wedding) and played an epic game of chess instead of watching TV and zoning out. All in all I think we had a successful anniversary. But we still planned to return to Asheville.
The weekend before last (28th to 30th of Sept) we packed the MINI with our backpacks, the dogs and their packs and headed off to uncharted territory, STIZ backpacking. Luckily a few months prior to this experience, we bought a truck from a nice guy named Chip who just so happened to plan and guide backpacking trips in the NC Mountains. We picked his brain for good loops to start on, what to pack and for reassurance that we weren't nuts. He told us about Shining Rock, a mountain that is topped with HUGE outcroppings of Quartz, told us about Mountain House freeze dried meals and confirmed that we were slightly nuts, but not because we wanted to go backpacking. Chip recommended we hike up Shining Rock Trail and back down Old Butt Knob. But because we think we're bad ass, we decided to hike up Old Butt Knob and down Shining Rock Trail. Yep....
Our awesomely giving friends, Anthony and Lorena lent us their guest bedroom on Friday night. We stayed up until 2 am killing 3 bottles of wine and laughing at Anthony's pictures from the 80's. He's a good sport. Somehow, and I blame this on Steven (because I can), we slept in until 12pm. We never sleep that long. Even after the Slip and Bleed when we were far more intoxicated. I guess we needed it. This did put us in a pickle though, we wanted to start climbing by 1pm. So yeah...that wasn't going to happen. A mad dash to shower and fill our water bladders ensued. Then a slower dash to get breakfast and wait for the most anticipated grilled cheese I've ever had (which ended up mediocre at best).
Finally, around 2pm we were heading towards Brevard and towards the Shining Rock Wilderness. This is when I realized that I don't remember packing the water purification tablets...crap. Quick detour to the local REI. This ended up being handy because we needed clarification on how to find Old Butt Knob anyways. The nice guy behind the counter pointed to the parking lot and the main trail and said "You'll walk along this trail for a while, it'll be mostly flat and then when you see a trail to your right that goes straight up, that's Old Butt Knob. Nothing is marked out there and there's a bunch of fake trails." At this point Steven was becoming discouraged...and green...pretty sure his Tuna Sandwich was tainted.
By the time we reached the trail head, Steven needed a moment to collect himself. The super tight winding road didn't help him. Around 3:30pm, we were on our way. I wore the damn GoPro the entire way up and never turned it on....
The dogs were loaded down with 2 meals worth of food and 2 liters of water (not each). Steven and I both had a little over 20 lbs on our backs. It is me or does the combination of my HUGE Keen hiking boots (they look huge but they're really not) and my HUGE pack (it is huge...) make me look Hobbit-like?
We followed Shining Rock Trail for a while until we saw a trail to the right then went straight up. We were on Old Butt Knob, we were sure of it.
That looks straight up, right? It felt like it was straight up...
We bumped into a couple other groups hiking the same trail. One couple had two dogs with them. One of which was very fond of mounting Masi and Gunnar. After the 3rd attempt of the owners trying to stop the dogs by gently saying "Oh, No, Stop..." and grabbing the dog by the neck but not really moving it, I was fed up and smacked it across the head the next time it tried to mount Masi. The dog left ours alone after that. Come to think of it...so did the people. Whoops. The other group was 3 guys from South Carolina who had planned to hike 20 miles that weekend but had become lost on a fake trail. All 7 of us thought for sure we were on Old Butt Knob trail. It turns out, we were all wrong.
You see, Old Butt Knob was a ridge line hike. You see this,
That's Shining Rock Creek. That was beside us the whole time. Creeks don't flow on ridge lines... Which meant we had accidentally followed Chips advice anyways. We were on Shining Rock Trail heading towards Shining Rock. The trail twisted and turned and at one point we were certain we had lost it or were on a fake trail but then it would clear up again. Finally, after hours and hours of climbing and being sure the summit was just around the corner, we made it. Well at least we made it to where everyone camps. It took us a loop up and back down the trail to find a suitable camping location under a HUGE pine with some awesomely soft ground. We were nearly set up when the group of 3 guys showed up. There weren't many camping sites left and we were happy to have the company, so we invited them to set up in our area.
The sun set quickly and a cloud rolled over the mountain top. It made for an eerie yet beautiful scene. We spent the night sitting by the fire with the 3 guys from the trail and the 2 guys from the site next to ours. Eventually the clouds parted and the whole area lit up with a full moon. It was pretty amazing. I've camped plenty before in campgrounds that seem so remote. But I've never camped in an area that was so perfectly quiet. Even still I slept like crap. Every time Rhea moved, her scratchy pads made tons of noise. I finally put ear plugs in and was out.
The next morning we enjoyed some re-hydrated freeze dried omelets and our Starbucks VIAs in the warm sun. Who ever said roughing-it can't include good coffee?! If they did, they lied.
After packing up and refilling our water from the Shining Rock Creek (which had gone from a rushing river to an iiitttyy bittty trickle way up in the mountain), we went for the summit. Oh what a summit it was. Big, huge boulders of quartz shining in the morning sun. It was...it was wow.
I am particularly fond of the look I'm giving Steven in this photo.
I think we were looking at the dogs in this picture and not the person taking the photos. There was a cliff edge behind us, we didn't want them falling off.
Packs are not flattering...
I love my fuzzy mountains.
Then we started the hike down on Old Butt Knob. It started off so nice. It runs the ridge between two mountains (one of which is Old Butt Knob). The dogs were doing great on their second day with the packs. We let Gunnar have the day off and gave him a lighter load and made Rhea carry the water this time.
Periodically there'd be views like this. The leaves were so vibrant already.
Then it started getting steep. This is me down the trail from Steven. I'm maybe 4 steps away from him. (again..packs are not flattering....)
This is the flip side of that photo. Steven up the hill from me.
Our mountain goats were fine.
The terrain became so steep, I like to describe it as a staircase of boulders. I'm so glad we didn't hike UP this the previous day. Near the middle of the way down, we started hearing vehicle traffic and Shining Rock Creek periodically. We stopped at an outcropping to rest, water the dogs and eat a snack. At the point we had run into the 3 guys from SC again.
We decided it was a good opportunity to strap the GoPro to my chest again. We kinda stopped taking photos for a while so please feel free to view the video to see what the rest of the trail was like. Oh and just to whet your whistle, I do about bust my ass on video. Enjoy.
We made it down by 3 or 4pm. We were spent, the dogs were spent, my legs were shaking... Oh and I forgot to mention this. At some point the night before, a tab had fallen off my pack and made my pack sit WAY low on my hips. It was restricting and painful. I was so glad to take that bugger off.
She may seem alert but she's exhausted...I swear.
We took a short detour into Asheville for a quick bite and a beer at Asheville Pizza and Brewery then headed east.
Another successful Asheville Anniversary I think.
Liz DiNatale
