Hike: February 14, 2020 Apple Orchard Trail to Appalachian Trail to near-top of Apple Orchard Mountain and back. 8.8 miles
Photo Above: The sturdy bridges are part of what makes the Apple Orchard Falls Trail a beauty.
Yes, it was indeed February 14, 2004 when the to-become-Greatest Day Hiker Of Them All asked if we shouldn’t do something different for Valentine’s Day.
We did. We took a wonderful loop hike up the Apple Orchard Trail, across the Appalachian Trail to the Cornelius Creek Trail back down to the parking lot at the end of FR 59.
This year’s annual revisit to the beauty of those trails took a different form, decided upon as we made our way up the Apple Orchard Trail next to the rushing flow of North Creek: We’ve been up that trail next to that stream a sufficient number of times to be able to extrapolate from its flow that paralleling Cornelius Creek will have enough volume that we would be taking off the boots and rolling up the pants to cross it at two points on the way down. And it was 36 degrees when we got out of the car.
So, how about not the loop, but on up the Apple Orchard to the A.T. and then north to the summit of Apple Orchard Mountain—the highest point on the trail headed north until you get into New England?
Sure.
But the 2,400 foot climb, the wind and the projection of time till darkness combined to have us pick an eastern-side sunny spot just shy of the summit for lunch. Yes, the big ball atop the tower was right there though the trees and we could even have slack-packed it up there, but hey, on the 16th anniversary of something deeply treasured, we felt no compulsion toward the summit as we put on the heavy winter jackets for the first time this winter and busted out lunch—in the sun, out of the western wind and 4.4 miles up the trail.
Sixteen years into the Hiking Oddity, it ought to be admitted, we felt this hike more than we ever have. My thighs objected at every steep spot on the way down, and even The Greatest Day Hiker Of Them All mentioned some leg fatigue.
But hey, as the saying goes, we were out there, and on the Apple Orchard National Recreation Trail for the 16th Valentine’s Day in a row.
