My son and I completed our first overnight backpacking trip as a duo (previously always went with Scouts) and returned to the site of our first ever trip that either of us had ever done, Uwharrie National Forest. We did the southern “short” loop starting at the 27 trailhead and hiked north on the Uwharrie Trail, then looped back on Saturday using the Dutchman’s Creek Trail. Overall a great trip – we got a late start on Friday so only made it in 2 miles or so before finding a nice campsite to ourselves, leaving a longer day out Saturday. The weather in was fairl warm for november in NC – low 70s and a bit humid. We made camp in daylight, then enjoyed dinner and some conversation until around 9:45. I forgot my thermometer but temps could not have dropped much past 45 that evening.
We saw a few dayhikers heading out as we went in, and were passed by one backpacking duo while we were setting up camp who obviously forged ahead a bit – so it was a very quiet and peaceful night. On the way out we ran into two backpacking groups coming in on the Dutchman Creek trail – a trail runner and a few day hikers – all in all not bad from a crowds perspective!
The Uwharrie is straighter and much less rugged than Dutchman’s Creek – it seems to get more use as a result – but both were well blazed and easy enough to follow. There are lots of trail options in Uwharrie so a map is a good idea if you want to forge off the main trails or take cut throughs/short cuts, etc…
The trails were in good shape and are clearly well maintained, no real obstacles were encountered.
One word of caution however, is that due to the drought conditions it was dry dry dry and water was scarce. We maybe could have topped off with some real effort but I’m really glad we brought extra water in anticipation of the dry conditions.
Can be made into a great day hike or enough trails for perhaps even a 2 night trip depending on how many miles you want to cover. Campsites are plentiful and several are close to the trailhead so you could easily arrive later and hike in a short distance.
