Pogue creek / John Muir

Day One: 6.7
Overlook trail 0.95
Upper Canyon trail 2.05
Mesa Top trail 1.15
Moccasin Rock trail 0.65
Ridge trail 1.9
Day Two: 4.8
Ridge trail 0.6
Moccasin Rock trail 0.65
John Muir trail 3.0

Lora and I headed over to Pogue Creek Canyon for the weekend. We stopped by Pickett State Park to register our cars when we met the Ranger who we had met before at Frozen Head State Park. Telling him our plans, he questioned the section of the John Muir trail that we wanted to hike from Black House Mountain road to Hwy 154. He said that this section has not been maintained for years and he wasn't sure it was passable.

We left a car at the Moccasin Rock trailhead and drove to the parking area for Pogue Creek Canyon. We took the Overlook trail to the overlook and then took the Upper Canyon trail to the Mesa Top trail. We noticed that they had started another trail from the Upper Canyon trail heading out so it looks like future trails ahead. We had leap frogged another group a few times as we went. They lived here locally so we got some tips from them including that we missed our trail from Killdeer arch as we were turning around. You have to go through the arch and beyond an area that has no markings to continue on the trail. This is a beautiful Canyon both top and bottom!

From the Canyon we entered the Pickett State Forest and hiked to Pickett State Park doing the Ridge trail loop counterclockwise. On this side there is also an option to go over the ridge or under the ridge which we chose to go under. Very beautiful area. We saw lots of bear scat.

From Pickett State Park we headed back on the other side of the Ridge trail and made camp just past the Natural Bridge creek for the night. We got to listen to the owls as we sat around our campfire and also later in the night.

Day Two:
We got up and had breakfast and broke down camp. We continued our hike to Black Mountain road and then took the car searching for the John Muir trailhead. Since they took the signs down we had to look pretty good. There is a very large parking area just across from the trailhead. We saw where they had cut the trail signs down and found a round blue hiker dude sign on a fallen tree. Success! We went back to the car and got our pack out then headed down the trail. This trail has been used still quite a bit. We did have to break branches on the Rhododendron and Mountain Laurel and small trees to get through some areas. There are some bridges and we rock hopped the first few crossings. The seventh crossing we had to use crocs and then the eight crossing was a muddy, wide, and deep crossing with a bridge sunk in it. We found a log crossing up stream for this one which got us to the next muddy, wide, and deep crossing with a bridge sunk in it. We called it quits and headed back to the car. We found lots of bear scat on this trail too. From the looks of the scat, it's a BIG bear.

We stopped at Cumberland Mountain SP to see a raptor program called Wings to Soar. The bird handlers let the birds fly over the crowd. They make you flinch as they fly right over your head. The Golden Eagle was making a lot of racket until they let her come out and meet the crowd. The Bald Eagle was missing a wing and was blind in one eye, but was still majestic. The little screech owl doesn't look big enough to make all the noise he's capable of. Cool program.

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