Lately, I have been fantasizing about the Appalachian Trail (a hiking trail that stretches over 2,150 miles (3,400 km) through the mountains from Georgia to Maine. I have been trying to convince my co-worker that she should join me for this excursion; however, she's never even gone hiking before! Since I've been talking endlessly about the Appalachian Trail, we decided to head towards the mountains of western North Carolina and try a quick day-hike (just to give her an idea of what hiking is really like.)
Although we had originally hoped to walk part of the true Appalachian Trail, we thought a 4-5 hour drive each way would be a bit much for a single day-hike. Instead, we opted for the much closer Pilot Mountain, which was only 2.5 hours north near the city of Winston-Salem.
Our hike on Pilot Mountain was a 7 miles (11 km) loop that took us both around and atop the mountain. I first learned of this loop hike in the book 50 Hikes in the Mountains of North Carolina, which described this trail as strenuous (in fact, it listed the required hiking time as 6.5 hours - something that scared me considering the trail was only 7 miles!) Fortunately, the trail proved much easier than I was led to believe (and took nowhere near 6.5 hours.)
The loop began with 3 miles (5km) of Grindstone Trail, which circled around the north side of the mountain. Although the majority of this trail was an incline, it was actually a fairly mild slope that presented no real challenge. Unfortunately, the Grindstone Trail soon joined the Ledge Spring Trail, and the real climbing began!
Although the Ledge Spring Trail was a steep climb upwards, most of it was made (slightly) easier by the endless series of stairs leading towards the mountaintop. When you are about 3/4 of the way up this trail, the tree-line starts to open up to give magnificent views of the surrounding countryside. (You also encounter endless numbers of rock climbers scaling the mountains jagged cliffs.)
When you arrive at the "top" of the mountain (you can't actually climb to the very top - you have to settle for a nearby plateau instead), you are greeted by dozens of park visitors. Pilot Mountain State Park maintains a road leading up the mountain, so that people can easily reach the scenic lookout points without all the work we went through actually climbing the mountain! Although it was a little disappointing having to share the mountaintop with so many "tourist", the functioning bathrooms and water fountains made up for the small crowd.
From the upper parking area, we were able to enjoy great views from the park's outlook areas before continuing along the mile-long Jomeokee Trail (which circles the mountain's actual peak. Then, the trail continued down a different segment of the Ledge Spring Trail (which would have been just as challenging had we been going up.) At the base of the mountain, we followed two unremarkable trails (Mountain Trail and Grassy Ridge Trail) through the forest south of the mountain. The only challenge from this final segment was the difficulty I had in locating the dark red trail markers against the trees; for someone who is mildly colorblind, it was nearly impossible to find the route markers (thank goodness I had my coworker there to be the eyes for both of us!)
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