Saturday, September 5th
This hike was supposed to be the previous Saturday, but weather got in the way. In the meantime I developed a chest cold that I hoped would clear up in time. It did not. I hiked anyhow.
We drove down before 7 in the morning and put my wife's van on Kenyon Hill Road, about 17 miles from our starting point. Piling into the other van, Scoutmaster Kelley, my son Peter, two other scouts, and I drove down to Ninigret. We parked on East Beach Road. It was about 8:30 before we started walking. The trail markings were exceptionally clear.
We followed East Beach, crossed route 1, then entered Burlingame State Park. The bugs were ferocious. As usual, I resisted putting repellent on. While in Burlingame we saw a strange ant. Very large (about an inch), and orange and black. I'd never seen anything like it. I let it crawl on my hands to get a better look, and maybe a picture, but it moved too fast and quickly dropped off the other side. Eventually I got it to cross the back of my map and got a shot of it. The picture wasn't much, but the following Tuesday at work I googled it to find out more.
What I learned was that what I let crawl on my hand was a Velvet Ant, which is actually a female wasp. It also goes by the name Cow Killer Ant because the sting is so painful, it is said to kill a cow. And I let it crawl on my hand. It won't actually kill you, but if it's a painful as I'm told, it would have ended the hike real fast. I stole this picture because it matches the bug we saw.
We continued through Burlingame. We spotted a couple deer. Somewhere near the half way point, we stopped for lunch. I ate too much, but the mosquitoes seemed to eat more. After Burlingame we were walking on roads for what seemed forever. A jeep stopped and asked us directions to the campground. I was tempted to say continue driving, then turn right into the woods, but that wouldn't have been very helpful. I did the best I could. Later a man stopped to ask us if we were hiking the North South Trail. I said yes, up to Arcadia. He eagerly told us how great the trail was. The man who stopped behind him was less enthusiastic.
After walking through Wood River Junction, we finally reentered the woods near the Carolina Management Area. Here there are corn fields, high as an elephant's eye. This is where the trail markings finally let us down. We continued following a farm road when I noticed three things: the grass on the trail was very tall, we hadn't seen a trail marker in a while, and the sun was now in our face. We were off the trail. We came to a point where we could see landmarks we passed earlier that clearly indicated our location, so we turned around. There is a jog in the trail that is perfectly obscured. This is described in the book, but I don't hike with a book in my hand. They could have prefaced the paragraph describing the turn with CAREFUL: or some other words of warning. Two woman on horseback happened to be coming out of the wood on the trail we needed to follow.
Back in the woods, we continued through Carolina. Evidence of horse traffic was in great quantity, if you catch my meaning. We watched our step. We banged a left on Pine Hill Road and passed a hunter check station. We crossed the road for the final mile and a half of the hike. The trail turned into a forest road, then a dirt road, then a paved one. We walked by some very interesting houses. Soon after that, we came upon my van. I have never been so happy to see it. It was about 4. We hiked for about seven and a half hours, including lunch.
I expect to do another leg of the trail, maybe in the 12 to 14 mile range, but I have no plan to do it soon. With the additional off trail walking, I estimate we hiked around 18 miles, much further than I ever have before. I've done more strenuous hikes that took longer (Katahdin back in '07 took twelve hours), but this was different. My hips hurt, my feet hurt, my shins hurt, my thighs. A couple advil later and some extra rest, and I am fine, but boy oh boy was I sore on Sunday. And I've been dreaming about expensive hiking boots.
This hike was supposed to be the previous Saturday, but weather got in the way. In the meantime I developed a chest cold that I hoped would clear up in time. It did not. I hiked anyhow.
We drove down before 7 in the morning and put my wife's van on Kenyon Hill Road, about 17 miles from our starting point. Piling into the other van, Scoutmaster Kelley, my son Peter, two other scouts, and I drove down to Ninigret. We parked on East Beach Road. It was about 8:30 before we started walking. The trail markings were exceptionally clear.
We followed East Beach, crossed route 1, then entered Burlingame State Park. The bugs were ferocious. As usual, I resisted putting repellent on. While in Burlingame we saw a strange ant. Very large (about an inch), and orange and black. I'd never seen anything like it. I let it crawl on my hands to get a better look, and maybe a picture, but it moved too fast and quickly dropped off the other side. Eventually I got it to cross the back of my map and got a shot of it. The picture wasn't much, but the following Tuesday at work I googled it to find out more.
What I learned was that what I let crawl on my hand was a Velvet Ant, which is actually a female wasp. It also goes by the name Cow Killer Ant because the sting is so painful, it is said to kill a cow. And I let it crawl on my hand. It won't actually kill you, but if it's a painful as I'm told, it would have ended the hike real fast. I stole this picture because it matches the bug we saw.We continued through Burlingame. We spotted a couple deer. Somewhere near the half way point, we stopped for lunch. I ate too much, but the mosquitoes seemed to eat more. After Burlingame we were walking on roads for what seemed forever. A jeep stopped and asked us directions to the campground. I was tempted to say continue driving, then turn right into the woods, but that wouldn't have been very helpful. I did the best I could. Later a man stopped to ask us if we were hiking the North South Trail. I said yes, up to Arcadia. He eagerly told us how great the trail was. The man who stopped behind him was less enthusiastic.
After walking through Wood River Junction, we finally reentered the woods near the Carolina Management Area. Here there are corn fields, high as an elephant's eye. This is where the trail markings finally let us down. We continued following a farm road when I noticed three things: the grass on the trail was very tall, we hadn't seen a trail marker in a while, and the sun was now in our face. We were off the trail. We came to a point where we could see landmarks we passed earlier that clearly indicated our location, so we turned around. There is a jog in the trail that is perfectly obscured. This is described in the book, but I don't hike with a book in my hand. They could have prefaced the paragraph describing the turn with CAREFUL: or some other words of warning. Two woman on horseback happened to be coming out of the wood on the trail we needed to follow.
Back in the woods, we continued through Carolina. Evidence of horse traffic was in great quantity, if you catch my meaning. We watched our step. We banged a left on Pine Hill Road and passed a hunter check station. We crossed the road for the final mile and a half of the hike. The trail turned into a forest road, then a dirt road, then a paved one. We walked by some very interesting houses. Soon after that, we came upon my van. I have never been so happy to see it. It was about 4. We hiked for about seven and a half hours, including lunch.
I expect to do another leg of the trail, maybe in the 12 to 14 mile range, but I have no plan to do it soon. With the additional off trail walking, I estimate we hiked around 18 miles, much further than I ever have before. I've done more strenuous hikes that took longer (Katahdin back in '07 took twelve hours), but this was different. My hips hurt, my feet hurt, my shins hurt, my thighs. A couple advil later and some extra rest, and I am fine, but boy oh boy was I sore on Sunday. And I've been dreaming about expensive hiking boots.
