This route has been described as "A super-sampler of the southern half of Linville Gorge, this 3-day backpack showcases some of the best sweeping cliff-top views and raging waterfalls that the "Grand Canyon of the East" has to offer."
Here is the route. We did most of it, but didn't do the summit of Table Rock Mountain. In total we hiked approximately 20 miles.
http://www.trimbleoutdoors.com/ViewTrip/379572
While writing this trip report, I just discovered that this loop includes part of the Mountains to Sea Trail (MST) which when completed will journey some 1000 miles from Clingman's Dome in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park to Jockey's Ridge State Park on the outer banks. If the rest of it is this dramatic and inspiring, it is a trail to consider for future adventures.
We began from the Wolf Pit Road. With this being my first backpacking in North Carolina, I was very excited!
We headed north and soon found big views.
Near Shortoff Mountain we had the most expansive views of the entire loop.
It is easy to understand why Linville Gorge is called the "Grand Canyon of the East".
Josh and Andrew became tired as we were climbing up the Chimneys.
We set up camp near the Table Rock Parking lot. There was another couple in the area nearby, but other than them, it was just us. Going in March meant that we had cool temperatures and did not have to hassle with permits.
We cooked up some good food and called it a night. The next morning we awoke to rain and stayed in our tents for a while. Eventually we decided to get our rain gear on, break down camp, and just hike through the rain.
After a relatively steep descent, we made it to the Linville River.
We hiked south along the west side of the river, looking for the island that was supposed to have a spot to camp on. We ended up setting up camp in the woods as seen below.
The island was very close, but this location was great!
The next and final day we were able to complete the southern portion of the loop. Looking up, we could view where we had been earlier on the journey.
Some of the trails in this section weren't all officially marked. We used a gps with the waypoints from trimbleoutdoors in order to make sure we were going in the right direction. Sometimes the trail would go up for no apparent reason so it was important for us to pay close attention to our location. As seen below, sometimes we ended up just walking through open fields.
We had a fun time crossing the Linville River (unfortunately no picture of the crossing). Tyler had a the opportunity to watch his hiking boot float down the river until it got stuck on a branch. He was able to happily retrieve it. After crossing the river, we had to climb back up and were able to see a nice view of the lakes in the distance to the south.
We made it back to the trail junction and then it was time to head back to Wolf Pit Road and return to our vehicles.
This hike in Linville Gorge holds special meaning to me as it was one of the first that I did where I began to contribute to planning The success of this hike helped inspire me to look for new backpacking possibilities, which led to me re-discovering the John Muir Trail, which itself, opened an unlimited supply of hiking adventures.
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