Fall Mountain Trail - Morrow Mountain - 11/12/2011

Fall Mountain Trail
Loop
4.0 miles
Easy/Moderate

On Saturday, BC and I continued our quest to hike all of Morrow Mountains hiking trails by the end of 2011.  BC has been wanting to do some "long hikes" for the last couple weeks.  So we picked the Fall Mountain Trail, which is Morrow Mountain's longest hiking trail.  There are bridle trails that are longer, but dodging horse piles isn't my idea of fun hiking.  Therefore, we are going to skip those for now.

We arrived at the parking lot at 7:45 and were on the trail by 8:00.  The river was covered with fog.  I would have been happy if the whole area had been covered.  Hiking in the fog would be fun.  It was a bit chilly (there was frost on the grass as we drove in), but not really cold.  To me, it was perfect hiking weather.

 

The trail is rated as Moderate, but it is only moderate in comparison with the other trails in the park.  We chose to hike the loop clockwise.  The first part of the trail is mostly flat with some easy climbs away from the river.  The woods are open and show evidence (as does most of the park) of the hurricane that came through and knocked down a lot of trees about ten years ago.

Being early in the morning, the deer were very active.  In all, we saw sixteen deer, including the drive in to the parking area.  We saw one large six or eight point buck.  It was a brief view and I didn't have time to get a picture.  As soon as he realized we were there, he took off.

The few water crossings were mostly dry.  BC still enjoyed balancing on the rocks at this crossing.  At this point, the trail is still mostly level with just a hint of up-hill tendency.  It follows this dry creek bed for a short distance before heading up the south-west flank of Fall Mountain (Elev. ~720).

BC liked the yellow leaves on the ground, so we took a picture.

On the way up the gently sloped mountain, we saw deer scat.  At least, I assume it's from a deer.  For some reason, I thought it would be more like bear scat.  It's not every day you nearly step in a fresh pile of deer droppings, so we took a picture.

BC was having  a great time hiking and talked nearly non-stop.  A couple times, I tried to get him to be quiet "so we could see more deer" but it never lasted long.

There were rocks scattered through the woods along the side of the trail. 

We stopped near the top of the mountain to take a rest.  There is a trail here that leads back down to the road (0.6 miles).  This trail is not on the map, so we won't include it in our quest, but I am curious to walk down it just to see what it's like.  It appears to be for use by the rangers to access this area by vehicle.

We got to what looked like the top of the mountain, so BC posed on the tallest rock we could find.  Turned out to be a false summer.  It's a good picture anyway, so I think I'll keep it.

Here's BC on the true summit of Fall Mountain.

The hike down the other side of the mountain was a bit steeper (but still not bad) and rocky.  Care must be taken to not turn an ankle.  Especially with the leaves covering the rocks and roots.  It was also a lot narrower than the rest of the trail.  I read reports on another site that said this section of the trail has been changed which likely accounts for the rough nature of it.

As you can see, it had warmed up considerably by this time, and we shed our outer layers.

After a quarter mile of the steep downhill, the trail widened out and became more moderately sloped.

As we walked, we played letter games.  BC is learning his alphabet and the sounds.  We started with a round of "Animals That Start With..."  Then we made it through two rounds of "Names That Start With..."  We both thought that was a lot of fun.

This tree got all twisted up and splintered on its way down.  Very cool...

BC liked the trees that pulled up root systems when they fell.  There were a lot of trees that have apparently fallen since the hurricane.  These did not look ten years old.  This tree had the largest root system that we saw.  It stood nearly 10' high.  In the picture, BC is standing about six feet from the base which was in a hole he didn't want to get in.

The trail wandered back and forth and gently lead to the base of the mountain.  After that, it was mostly flat with easy up and downs.  I asked BC if he wanted to count the trees, but he gave up after getting to 40 or so.  He said there were just too many to count.

Finally, we came down a short hill and the rest of the trail ran along side the river, which was now free of fog and beautiful in the November sunlight.

We had the trail to ourselves for the first three miles.  Then we saw to large groups of father/son hikers and a few couples/families after we got down near the river.  BC found a compass on the side of the trail.  There was no practical way to try to find the owner, so he now has a compass to carry when we go hiking.

We finished the hike in just over three hours.  Not bad considering our frequent rest stops and letting BC set the pace for most of the hike.  It was a lot of fun.

We have four more trails to finish our quest.  The Morrow Mountain Trail, the Rocks Trail, the Sugarloaf Mountain Trail, and the strenuous Hattaway Mountain Trail.  I think we can finish in two more trips.

See ya' on the trail!