Soak Creek

Finally a Saturday without rain! Eleven hikers gathered at the Piney River on Shut In Gap Road. It felt like old home week when I saw Don and Carol and TC and Judy in the parking lot. They also had another hiking friend with them, Lonnie. When Marietta, Cheryl, Sara, Jan and Nancy got there we were ready to go. We drove to the parking area for Stinging Fork SNA and got started, 33 degrees and sunny. There was a lot of water in the creek so the falls were flowing nicely. Water was flowing down the ridges all over the place. The new segment of trail goes from the Falls to Soak Creek then to the confluence with Piney River and out to the road close to the bridge across Piney River. The CTC Facebook page said 7.5 miles of trail. Don's calculations was 6.3 or so. He is planning to wheel the trail and GPS it soon. There will be trail descriptions added to the CTC website soon. The rock work on this trail is awesome, probably 1000 rock steps in here. Shawna's trail crew rocks!

As we crossed the bridge we saw 3 kayakers in the river working on their whitewater technique. That water is cold on this second day of winter, but they seemed excited to have some whitewater to play in.

We said goodbye to the CT vols, then headed back to Stinging Fork. We hiked back to the trail junction and out to the overlook, which we had skipped on the way in. Lots of moss and a few views of the creek, you can hear it better than you can see it from here.

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Soak Creek - TTA

TTA joint hike Soddy Daisy and Plateau led by Ranger Josh and Ranger Ryan. We had 17 hikers plus the two Rangers. Lots of wildflowers and  water in the roadbed to try to rockhop around and through. We hiked the 2.5 miles to the creek crossing, and lunch by the creek.There is an old well in the area to the left of the creek crossing. It's fairly deep and rock lined. 

This area will someday be linked to Stinging Fork Falls SNA and Piney Falls SNA. 
Thanks to Cheryl and George for organizing the hike. 

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Piney Falls SNA / Soak Creek SNA

Piney Falls 2.0 miles
Soak Creek roadbed 6.8 miles

Lora and I went to Piney Falls SNA off Firetower Road on Grandview Mountain. They have a kiosk, but nothing on it.  Luckily, we printed a map off from the computer.

We followed the trail to a split at a campsite.  We went left following the signs for the bottom of Upper Piney Falls.  The trail split again for a trail to the 40' Lower Piney falls.  We went to check it out and then came back up. Pretty Falls.

We continued the trail around to the bottom of the 80' Upper Piney falls. The falls were covered with ice so we could not follow the trail behind the falls.  We found a way back up to the top and then crossed the creek and followed the trail along the top of the falls to a rope trail going to the bottom. A view from the other side.

Next on the agenda was Soak Creek off of Shut In Gap road.  After you cross the bridge over Piney Creek there is a parking area on the right side.  There is an old road bed that follows Soak Creek.  It does not got all the way to Stinging Fork Falls, but it is close.  We figured 3.4 miles. Lots of bluff walls and areas for setting up tents.

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