Dale, Nice pic. Reminds me of most (not all) of the trails in my area – though some of the vegetation is different. Your pic could be part of the Red-triangle southern half, eastern portion of the Orange trail, or the eastern portion of the Green Trail – both in a State Park near my home. Very rough, lots of rocks and roots from water erosion on these old trails. Typically, the E-W trails have more elevation changes (often 500′-700′ per 1/4 to 1/2 mile traveled, then back down again and back up – tedium ad inifinitum – so it seems. N-S can have similar elevation changes (sometimes 700′ per mile), but much fewer of them and over a greater distance, maybe a mile. The reason is plate tectonics at work, hence much more folding in the E-W direction, making N-S travel easier – this, in part, influenced earlier colonial migration and development of settlements out this way as these landscape features also determined the courses of rivers which were used for travel due to the difficulty of efficiently traversing such terrain by foot.
Trails like this, especially in the 95 deg summer days makes controlling sweating very difficult to say the least. Typically, I can’t make more than 1.75mph pace, sometimes 2mph, on these trails with a 20lb load – and I’m literally drenched with sweat and my heart is pounding on the ascents – typically above 170 or 180 on my HRM (though in the heat, some of that HR is for cooling not oxygen requirements) – sure can deplete muscle glycogen. Yeah…i know…HR too fast for an old geezer like me – don’t tell my wife. The descents are easier on the heart, but harder on the knees and you don’t make fast progress as the footing is sometimes pretty treacherous and foot placement becomes quite important. I find it’s much easier to slip and fall on the descents than the ascents, so sometimes actually make slower progress on the way down than the way up – or maybe i’m “milking it” to get my heart rate down before the next ascent.
Ankles always want to “roll” as it’s difficult to find a flat surface, other than an occasional larger rock, for foot placement. Hence, my being “big” on using trekking poles for added support and balance on trails like you’ve pictured. When it’s wet, i’d like to see someone hike it without at least a single hiking staff and not slip, fall, or roll/twist an ankle. Well, maybe someone could, but i’m too much of a klutz to do so. Before trekking poles, i would use a suitable piece of deadfall for a hiking staff – sometimes two pieces simultaneously.
At least the air isn’t “thin” like y’all out west have to deal with.
Anyways, thanks for the pic. Always like to see what the trails, terrain, and landscape is like where y’all hike. I, personally, don’t own a camera so I can’t share a pic, hence my description so you can get an idea of the similarity.
