Danny Bernstein: Midsummer Walk In DuPont Forest

Danny Bernstein is an experienced hiker, an outdoor enthusiast, and a history lover. To me, she’s also a “partner in crime” for many adventures both local and in faraway places. When we hike together, I can be sure to learn things I would not have discovered on my own. Danny shines an informative and entertaining light on every subject that she undertakes to write about. Her latest contribution to the outdoor world of North Carolina is DuPont Forest: A History, in bookstores beginning September 7. Below is a sample of what awaits:

For a small forest, DuPont State Recreational Forest has countless entrances and six access (parking) areas. This has a lot to do with its history—before, during the DuPont Corporation days and even later. Many trails start from a pull-off outside of the forest with a couple of parking spaces. Since I am walking all the trails in DuPont Forest, I need to know all these entrances.

The DuPont plant was located in Cedar Mountain, close to Brevard, North Carolina, but DuPont Corporation owned land in both Henderson and Transylvania Counties. Guion Farm is the main entrance on the northern side of the forest, which is different from the High Falls area with its three waterfalls and visitor center.

On today’s hike, I turn off the main road—if Staton Road can be called a main road—and take Sky Valley Road. The road passes large homes, horse farms and houses under construction. At the intersection with Old CCC Road, the pavement stops. I pass the barred entrance to Buck Forest Road and then the Guion Farm Access Area. It’s a huge parking lot, perfect for horse trailers and large vehicles. At 8:30 a.m. on a weekend morning, I’m the first one here.

On Tarklin Branch Road, the trail in front of the parking area, it’s a hot summer scene with wide-leafed sunflowers swaying in the breeze. Pipsissewa (Chimaphila maculata), a short plant with thick leaves and drooping white flowers, hides among taller vegetation. Blackberries are still red and not yet ready for eating.

To hike all the trails in DuPont Forest, you have to walk many trails both ways—there and back. Many trails just don’t connect to anything else. Other times, I need to redo a trail I’ve already walked to get to a new trail.

When I hike in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, I use two or three trails in a day. But here, it could be a dozen trails, some both ways. To keep myself sane and on track, I create a spreadsheet of my planned hike. Here’s the spreadsheet for this hike:

Guion Farm Hike

Trail	Miles	Next Turn	Comment
Park at Guion Farm
Guion Farm Connector	0.2	Right on
Tarklin Branch Road	1.0	Right on
Tarklin Branch Road	0.6	Right on	There and back
Sandy Trail	0.5	Right on
Grassy Creek Trail	2.2	Right on	There and back
Sandy Trail	0.1	Right on
Wintergreen Falls Trail	0.2	Right on	There and back
Wintergreen Falls Trail	0.4	Right on
Tarklin Branch Road	0.9	Right on
Shoal Creek Trail	0.4	Left on	There and back
Walk on SR 1128	??	Right on
Farmhouse Trail	1.2	Right on	There and back
Guion Farm Connector	0.2	Left on
Buck Forest Road	0.3	Right on
White Pine Trail	0.5	Right on
Hickory Mountain Road	0.3	Right on
Guion Farm Connector	0.2
Drive north to Guion Trail
Guion Trail	0.4		There and back
Total	9.6
Sky Valley Road continues
I could pick up Flat Rock Trail	1.0		There and back

On Sandy Trail, two mountain bikers come toward me. I move to the right as far as I can.

“Hiker up,” the first one says.

“Are you the last one?” I ask the second cyclist.

“Yep,” he replies. Both parties speak their lines as expected. I wish all cyclists were as knowledgeable as them. Multi-use trails work when we’re all trained. Bikers are supposed to yield to hikers—some say “every single time,” but the reality is that bikers are faster, bigger and have a harder time stopping than I do.

Grassy Creek Trail is new to me. I have to rock hop across the creek. The steppingstones are flat and reasonably close together, but I lose my nerve partway through and just walk through the water. My feet will be wet all day, but I feel safer. Now the trail is rocky and rough.

Rock Hopping On Grassy Creek Trail

Guion Farm was once a farm. It’s now thickly wooded, except for a cleared area around the parking lot. A Hendersonville Heritage article explains:

The DuPont Corp. established a forest management program under the leadership of Charles Paxton. One of the first forest practices was the establishment of 330 acres of white pines on abandoned pastureland in the area known as the Flatwoods or Guion Farm. In 1957 the DuPont Corp. entered into an agreement with Champion Paper to harvest timber from other areas of the property. Many harvested areas were re-planted with white pine.

By the time Paxton retired in 1978, he had planted two million white pines.

Then to Wintergreen Falls, a waterfall that’s considered off the beaten path. Still, when I get there about 11:00 a.m., there are plenty of bikers and one hiker with a dog on a leash. “Thank you for keeping your dog on a leash,” I say.

Wintergreen is named after the wintergreen or teaberry, a ground cover around the falls. The water only drops a modest twenty feet. It attracts fewer people than the three falls on the visitor center side of the forest. To see the falls, you have to scramble up rocks and roots. It’s hidden behind trees and shrubs all the while you’re climbing; you need to have faith that it will be there. Then the shrubbery clears and you’re facing the chute square on.

Wintergreen Falls

I retrace my steps back on Tarklin Branch Road. When I round the corner, I hear a woman’s voice.

“Now wait you guys”—obviously speaking to children tearing up the trail on their bikes. Then there’s a loud “Danny!”

Sara Landry

It’s Sara Landry with her son, Zac, and his friend. Landry is the executive director of Friends of DuPont. We talk about the upcoming DuPont Forest master plan—or, to be more exact, future funding for the future master plan. The forest has been growing with donations of small parcels of land here and there, which have been gratefully accepted. But now the forest needs to have a plan to integrate these new pieces.

The last few trails are a mystery. I can’t find them on the ground as easily as I did on the map. “Don’t confuse the map with the territory,” one of my teachers used to say. I don’t exactly know what the context was, but the sentiment is correct.

I deviate from my carefully constructed spreadsheet and find Shoal Creek Trail last. It’s a dark, shady trail where mushrooms have popped up. I walk Shoal Creek Trail as well as Farmhouse Trail and head back to my car. The whole hike is 9.6 miles in about four and a half hours, including lunch. That was the easy part. But my day isn’t done.

I drive up Sky Valley Road to look for Flat Rock Trail, as my notes state, but the road gets rougher and rougher. I worry about getting stuck on the road, and I can’t find the trailhead. I’ll have to leave it for another visit. So far, I’ve walked fifty-four distinct miles out of the one hundred miles in the forest. Plenty more to go.

This is an adapted extract from DuPont Forest: A History written by Danny Bernstein and published by The History Press. The book is available at Park Road Books in Charlotte and online.

Frozen at Dupont State Forest

Frozen At Dupont State Forest – 1/6/18 – 9 miles

What could be better than four frozen lakes and three icy waterfalls on a teeth-chattering arctic day?  Add a covered bridge and one of my favorite hiking partners for an exceptionally rewarding hiking experience.

Carolina Mountain Club hikes every Saturday, so I signed up for the first one of 2018 to kick off an active new year. They start early, so I traveled on Friday to my friend Danny Bernstein’s home for a long overdue sleepover visit, enjoying dinner and dessert and a long stroll in West Asheville.

The weather forecast was for bitter cold and the club’s hike venue was changed to a lower elevation to hopefully gain a couple of degrees.  Dupont State Forest is always a favorite and we were intrigued to see what impact the sustained sub-freezing temperatures had rendered upon its water features. 

Sub-freezing gained a new context for me:  six degrees as we drove alongside the French Broad River, noticing ice chunks clinging to its banks.  We joined hikers at a group meeting place, then set up a short shuttle from Dupont’s visitor center. My car’s interior reached a merely chilly comfort zone as we arrived at the Lake Imaging parking lot. 

I didn’t have a map of Dupont so it was imperative to keep up with the group today.  Dupont’s maze of trails and tricky intersections can confuse a hiker any day even with a map, and today we walked on a dozen (more?) trails. Since the hike location had changed just the day before, the exact route hadn’t been scouted and the hike leader frequently consulted the map for turns.  Fortunately, she and other group members were very familiar with Dupont and kept us on track.  My usual practice is to carry a map and understand the route, so this letting go of control and responsibility was uncomfortable for me.

Tightly rolled rhododendron leaves confirmed that it was C-O-L-D

We had a frigid start as expected but warmed up quickly.  My fingers were the last body parts to “thaw” and I was reluctant to take off gloves for photos.  The sky was clear, no wind, and the trails were dry. We noted Lake Imaging’s frozen surface but no one volunteered to test its thickness.  See the blurred reflection of the trees.

We walked along Lake Imaging Road to Grassy Creek Falls Trail. Grassy Creek Falls is a long sliding cascade that looks inviting in the summer but bone-chilling today. 

From the falls we worked our way along several trails (Chestnut Oak Road, Joanna Road, Pitch Pine Trail, Three Lakes Trail) to reach the edge of Lake Dense.  We stopped for lunch at the picnic shelter by a small dock. A muffled groaning emanated from beneath the ice as it cracked and shifted, sounding like a moaning cow in a distant pasture.

Mountain bikers having fun parking a bike on the ice just because they could

Even sitting in the strong sun during lunch could not stave off the chill and we started off again with frozen fingers and noses.  We continued on Three Lakes Trail past Lake Alford, which was tiny (a half-acre) and underwhelming.  I wonder what it looks like when it’s not frozen? 

 

 

Just a glimpse of a small cove of Lake Julia, the third on the Three Lakes Trail

Conservation Road to Buck Forest Road to Covered Bridge Trail, only half a mile of walking but woe to the hiker who doesn’t know the intersections.  Covered bridges are romantic and charming, aren’t they?  This one spans a tranquil vantage point of Little River that belies the massive waterfalls downstream.

 

  

We descended along High Falls Trail with its dramatic view of High Falls, spectacular on any given day, now alternating surreal strands of ice and flowing water. Some of us took River Bend Trail to get closer to the base of the falls.  Traversing the large ice rocks was risky but compelling – we may never see this again!

  

We continued on High Falls Trail as it followed Little River downstream. The temperature had warmed up to freezing and more people were venturing out. [Triple Falls and High Falls are easily accessible from the Hooker Falls parking area.] Triple Falls, as dramatic as High Falls, was also partially frozen.  We walked out onto the expansive rock face at the bottom of Second Falls.  Water was still flowing down the center but the largest part of the pool was frozen. 

Triple Falls from top to bottom:

 

 

Takeaway from today’s hike:  Don’t let the cold keep you inside.  Get the right gear to be warm in bitter cold temperatures and go explore a winter wonderland!

Learn more about Dupont State Forest at the Friends of Dupont Forest website.

“What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold of winter to give it sweetness?” ~John Steinbeck