✕
☰

A Smokies Rite of Spring

by

NPS photo

For nearly a decade, beginning in the mid-1980s, hiking Kephart Prong Trail was a rite of spring for me. True, there are more spectacular places in the Great Smokies, nearby Charlies Bunion being one of them. For that matter, so is the prong’s place-name cousin, the 6,217-foot-high Mount Kephart. And no doubt there are areas in the park with greater botanical diversity. Yet in my mind, Kephart Prong embodies the essence of the Smokies, especially during spring’s miraculous reawakening of the earth.

The stream’s name likely has something to do with this perception. The prong is named for author and outdoorsman Horace Kephart, who sought refuge in the Smokies—in part of what he famously called the “back of beyond”—early in the twentieth century. He later wrote the enduring work Our Southern Highlanders, which has sometimes been grossly distorted by those who disagreed with (or took offense at) his depictions of the people he lived among. Later still, Kephart became a leading proponent of a national park in the Smokies, though he did not live to see the park’s establishment in 1934. 

A rich human history along the trail may be another reason. Near the trailhead, not far from where Kephart Prong joins forces with Beech Flats Prong to form the Oconaluftee River, is the site of an old Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp. During World War II, after the CCC departed, the camp housed conscientious objectors. A bit farther upstream are the remains of a fish hatchery that was operated by the Works Progress Administration in the 1930s. And at trail’s end, where the Kephart backcountry trail shelter now stands in a beautiful hardwood cove, Champion Fibre Company once operated a logging camp. You can still see evidence of the narrow-gauge logging railroad that ran along the prong to the head of the cove. And perhaps, if you listen closely enough, you can hear voices, too. 

But aside from the trail shelter, Kephart Prong’s attractions today are essentially natural, and none more apparent than in late April when there’s a stunning display of wildflowers that announce another Appalachian spring. Seeing such stalwarts of spring as the large-flowered trillium can brighten the darkest of spirits, especially after a cold, gray winter in the mountains. Little wonder that the relatively short trail, accessible as it is, ranks as a favorite of many.

On this day, however, Kephart Prong Trail is just the first leg of a strenuous hike into the high mountains, reaching all the way to the Appalachian Trail (AT) and the highest elevations I’ve attained all year. Although there’s an elevation gain of about nine hundred feet on the two miles of Kephart Prong Trail, that’s only a start en route to a total gain of nearly three thousand feet. The rewards of today’s ambitious hike will be hard earned.

Visible a few minutes from the trailhead, in addition to the remains of a stone structure marking the former CCC camp, are chimney ruins and an old water fountain to the right of the trail. But farther up the trail, there’s a structure that has been constructed since my last visit here in the late 1990s: a footbridge, sturdily built of two-by-fours It replaced the narrow foot log that formerly led hikers across the first of four Kephart Prong crossings. 

After the bridge, the trail follows a broken macadam surface for a while. As temperatures rise rapidly, I notice a boulder that serves as host to several trilliums in bloom on this mild spring day. I’m then startled by a low-flying hawk as he flies hurriedly, just a few feet above me, in the opposite direction. Soon there’s another stream crossing, and as I approach it, a backpacker on the opposite side calls out to me.

 “Hey, is there a way around this?” he bellows. He has missed the sign for the foot log, and thus reached the water’s edge and a sizable pool.

 “Yes, there’s a foot log farther up,” I advise.

After he makes it across Kephart Prong on the foot log, he asks, “How much farther to the road?” He apparently is completing a one-way trip that will end at the Kephart Prong parking area along Newfound Gap Road. I guess that it’s likely no more than a mile, and he quickly makes tracks down the trail.

Continuing up the trail, I occasionally see tributaries of the prong, spilling off the ridge. I meet two more backpackers, then greet a group of seven also headed toward the road. Apparently it’s been a busy Saturday night at Kephart Prong shelter. The trail briefly becomes a jumble of rocks just before the fourth and final crossing of the prong. As I near the shelter, a number of bluets in bloom join the profusion of trilliums. After a rather steep ascent toward trail’s end, I arrive at the shelter—empty near the noon hour. It’s peaceful in the cove, with nothing stirring, as I spot two large evergreens on a high ridge to the west, amid the hardwoods that remain bare in mid-April. 

I’ve camped at park shelters at Tricorner Knob and Laurel Gap with mostly considerate neighbors, but I confess that I much prefer sleeping in my own tent. In recent years, shelters in the Smokies—most of which are situated along the Appalachian Trail—have been renovated, which has made them a bit more inviting. Although I find the Kephart shelter to be reasonably clean inside, such is not the case outside, as a few backpackers have left toilet paper scattered about on the ground. Ugh. 

Soon it’s time to face the inevitable: a steep climb on Grassy Branch Trail to Dry Sluice Gap Trail, which will take me to the Appalachian Trail near Charlies Bunion. Grassy Branch Trail gains about eighteen hundred feet in elevation in about 2¾ miles before its terminus high on Richland Mountain, and I would not dispute even a foot of that gain. The first part of the trail is a bit deceptive, as what appears to be a trail relocation has routed the path on a wide trail with an easy grade. That changes soon enough, where a narrower trail begins to climb sharply before a rock-hop crossing of Grassy Branch. Soon a few non-native Norway spruce appear to the left of the trail, perhaps pre-park plantings by Champion Fibre Company. There also are fine views looking south from the path. Within a mile of the trail’s terminus, after a final switchback, acres and acres of spring beauties can be seen above and below the trail as it courses through a moist, open cove.

None too soon, I reach a junction with Dry Sluice Gap Trail. From here, to the left, it’s about 1¼ miles to the Appalachian Trail, the final half-mile or so heading downhill. From the high point on Dry Sluice Gap Trail, where there are a couple of healthy Fraser firs not yet wiped out by the balsam woolly adelgid, I spot Icewater Spring shelter on the slopes of Mount Kephart, along with an impressive view of Mount Le Conte. As I reach the AT, I briefly encounter three “thru-hikers,” one of whom reports that “things are going great” a couple of hundred miles into their epic twenty-two-hundred-mile journey from Georgia to Maine. I head south on the AT, toward Charlies Bunion, while they continue north toward Mount Katahdin. 

Not many landmarks are named for an inflammation on a toe joint, but such is the case with Charlies Bunion, named by Horace Kephart. (The Charlie so “honored” was a hiking buddy, Charlie Connor.) I approach the dramatic rocky outcrop from the lesser-used northern side, where a bracing breeze is whipping across the somewhat precarious path. Soon, I reach the open crags, and predictably a crowd—one of young hikers mostly—has gathered on this Sunday afternoon. A daring young woman strikes a one-legged yoga pose for a picture on a rocky perch above, prompting me to think a 911 call may be a possibility. But fortunately, she remains upright while I make my way around the Bunion to another side trail that takes hikers around the backside to an even higher point. I find a safe spot where I can eat a late lunch and enjoy the view, especially of Mount Le Conte. Its soaring profile and prominence resemble that of Washington state’s Mount Rainier—minus the snow and the much higher elevation. The young hikers are getting a bit rowdy and that’s OK, but when one lights up a cigarette that sends smoke my way, I decide it’s time to depart. At the side trail’s junction with the AT, I see the remains of a small fire that a hiker built, clearly in violation of park regulations.  

A few minutes into the return trip, an Appalachian Trail Ridgerunner (basically a steward of the trail who assists hikers as needed) greets me just before I hang a right on Dry Sluice Gap Trail. She asks if I’m out for just the day, as seems obvious with my small pack. In turn, I ask her where she’s been (Tricorner Knob) and how much longer she’ll be out on her current trip. “One more night,” she replies, “and then I get to go to my truck.”

Shortly after departing the AT, I see huge clouds of smoke billowing in the distance—much too large for a brush fire. I’m guessing that the fire is burning outside the park on the Cherokee Indian Reservation. Sure enough, I learn later that the fire scorched about two hundred acres near downtown Cherokee, forcing closure of a main road before it was fully contained. Fortunately, the fire did no harm to humans or property. It isn’t the only fire on the reservation and elsewhere in the mountains in April, as a rainfall deficit continues to worsen. But campfires create the only visible smoke when I settle in later for another clear, cold night at Smokemont Campground. Rain chances? They remain at zero.

Hike 13

From Smokies Chronicle: A Year of Hiking in Great Smoky Mountains National Park by Ben Anderson. Reprinted with permission of Blair Publisher. You can purchase a copy of Smokies Chronicle: A Year of Hiking in Great Smoky Mountains National Park at blairpub.com. Anderson, a trail patroller and Adopt-a-Campsite volunteer for Great Smokies Mountain National Park, lives in Asheville, N.C.

Back to topbutton