Recently in Hiking Category

Yesterday (February 29, 2008), I attempted a new trail, Rocktop. It is a 1.5 mile strenuous trail that is mostly upward with many hazards associated with mountain climbing. The trail is quite nice. On Pinnacle you can only see the mountain ahead of you and the trees that you have already passed, but on Rocktop you get many opportunities for some very nice views as you ascend the mountain. At about the middle of the trail you can see the radio and other communication towers that are located at the peak. That is where the hike ended for me. I have for a long time had a fear of heights. This fear occurs only when I can see the ground below me through a straight line descending down, such as while hiking up a trail without many curves (Rocktop). While I turned back this time, next time I intend to take the trail all the way to the top.

And now for some GPS data....

The overall trail. The trail to the west of the road is the first half of Crowders trail. Once crossing the road there is an option, continue on Crowders (a less rocky, but more winding trail to no where... ) or go to the right and head up Rocktop. On this map, everything highlighted to the east of the road is Rocktop.

This is an elevation profile like the one in my previous post. It shows with its curve and with color, the level of height

Here is a new way to look at it, it is overlayed on the same map as the usual Google Earth maps. The altitude is shown in varying colors, indicated by the key on the side.

This is a speed profile that shows how fast (or slow) I was going during the hike. Obviously, as the hills become more steep, I became more sluggish. There are also a few points during which I stopped to take a break.

If you are interested in all of the details of the hike, they are located at http://www.livecurt.net/gps/20080229.html.

Now that I have had a little more time to play with the data obtained during my hike on Monday, I have found a few tools that will allow me to show interesting things from the tracklogs. One of my favorite things so far is the elevation profile, which shows the change in elevation during the hike. This isn't likely to be something that I generate for every tracklog, since most of them are either flat and boring, or they are on such a tiny scale that every mild incline looks like a mountain (they look like an EKG, which doesn't show a balanced or sensible geographic profile). The thumbnail of my first elevation profile is below. As always on my blog, click the image to see it big.

Hiking is a healthy and fun outdoor activity.

King's Pinnacle

I am a bit fatigued at the moment (woke at around 3am and then went for a hike), so I am just going to let the GPS explain everything: [click me]

This is a sample of a tracklog being overlayed on a map, using Google Earth. This shows the best and worst of the GPS system. First of all, it provides a nice clear shape of where you travel. The trouble begins when the device records a bogus point in its log. When you see sporadic lines and lines that look like they should be the same, but aren't, thats what has happened. In this map, the best example of this is at the top of the map where the device was on its return path to the park office parking lot. Those lines should overlap, or at least parallel, but on the reverse trip something went wrong, data bounced off of a cloud or some other interference "bounced" the signal, placing some of the trackpoints in locations where I didn't travel.

This evening I am saddened by news that my favorite place to hike has been mostly destroyed, by fire, likely due to the careless actions of a smoker. The peaks at Crowders Mountain usually burn at least once per year due to lightning, but the peaks have always survived and recovered from that and likely became stronger because of it, but in this situation it is very different. The source of the fire was not natural, and the mountain burned quickly, as opposed the slow replemishing burn that occurs due to lightning.

I don't understand why some people visit parks like Crowders Mountain, it just doens't seem normal for those types of people. I think of the mountain as a very healthy place, why would someone as careless about life as a smoker be somwehere like that? Additionally, I am bothered that people are not more cautious with things like that. There are several points at which the mountain could have been saved. 1. the smoker could have not gone to the park, 2. the smoker could have not smoked at the park (prefered option), 3. once the fire began, the person could have used the abundance of dirt availible to smother the fire, 4. the person could have gone to the ranger station, or the call station at the welcome center once getting down to inform them of the problem. Instead, this cowardly smoker did nothing and said nothing, leaving the mountain to burn and be destroyed, taking its beauty away from everyone else. If you care so little about life and beauty, then STAY THE FUCK AWAY FROM MY MOUNTAIN!

Current Mood: Pissed and Hurt

On Tuesday, November 8, 2005 Chris and I went back to Crowders mountain to go all the way to the top of King's Pinnacle, the secondary peak at Crowders mountain. We began our hike at around 3:30pm, giving ourselves 2.5 hours to get to the top and back. We went up in daylight, but by the time we were on our way back down the sun was almost down and the woods surrounding the trail were dark. The view from the top is quite nice, but it is a little scary close to the edge, especially since it goes straight down. Getting to the top was most of the fun. Over half of the trail up is very easy, only a few rocks in places, but once passing the connection to "Turnback Trail" it is pretty much straight up, as is noted by the warning sign at that point. Chris and I had to rest a few times along the way, iincluding right before the giant rock that has to be climbed to arrive at the top. It is quite a chore to get to the top, but the view and feeling of accomplisment is well worth it.

Chris and I took several pictures during the hike, as well as from the top of King's Pinnacle. Those images are posted to my gallery at http://www.disturbingthoughts.net/gallery.

For a more interesting view of the hike, see Chris's Blog: http://www.psychoticwolf.net/archives/2005/11/view_from_the_t.php.

Yesterday was a very eventful day for me in comparison to most other days for me. At a little passed noon Chris called me and asked if I want to talk to him in person in a quiet location. My first thought was his room or on a drive somewhere, but for once he was actually being more adventuous, he wanted to go hiking! It took a little bit of convincing for him to get me to do it, but I agreed finally. The idea originally came from Marshall though, on Monday he was telling me about his trips on Thursdays to go for a run up the mountain, and I was pretty much pasting every line he typed to Chris. If I ran up like him, I would be dead now. Chris and I went to Crowders Mountain and took a slightly more leisurly pace at it. The difficulty level of the hike was supposed to be strenuous, but it was a fairly nice path, there were some rocks, but nothing I couldn't handle. We hiked Pinnacle Trail, Fern Trail and then Lake Trail, then we had to walk back up the road to the visitors center, as we were nearing the end of availible time before the park closed. I am presently a little sore, but not bad considering the distance walked. I am really looking forward to doing it more often now. Chris usually gets bored with things we do repetitively, but if we explore new trails each time we go, it shouldn't be too boring, and the physical challenge portion of it makes it more fun.

We got a few pictures while we were there, but I don't have access to them at the moment, as im posting from Barnard Labs (although, a different lab in Barnard than usual). I will post the images as soon as I can.

For more information on Crowders Montain State Park, please visit http://ils.unc.edu/parkproject/visit/crmo/home.html