Boone, NC

Not the Alps, but I still love it.

We went on a great weekend in July and stayed a couple miles away from App State. I was still feeling super outdoors-y from my weekend in Austria and was really excited to have some more non-flooding weather. Joke was on us, really, because we got caught up in a downpour about an hour into our first hike. After that, it was good.

We didn’t want to drive too far to see waterfalls, so we opted to go check out the Hebron Rock Colony Falls. You don’t just look at these falls, you climb them! We parked at the Julian Price Memorial Park — cute picnic area with a creek all the kids can play in. Once wandering around for a little bit, we found where the Boonefork Trail was and started going. One thing Boone seriously needs to figure out is its park navigation systems because they are awful. *will get to that later*

The falls were awesome and I happily tore up my Tevas jumping around from rock to rock. And they’re HUGE. We spent a good amount of time there, I thought the water was freezing but Will swam for a bit. Honestly I think we should have just gone to the falls and back, but we thought the rest of the trail would be nice so we finished the loop. I think it would have been nice, except the rain made all the clay really slippery. Some parts were fine, but others I thought I was actually going to fall into a ravine or my Teva was going to get stuck in the mud and I would break my ankle. All in all, I did survive and it was a beautiful hike with meadows, waterfalls, creeks, forest and campgrounds.

 

I think we were completely exhausted after that and I honestly don’t remember what we did that night. I do remember driving into Boone and attempting to eat at Mellow Mushroom but having a 45 minute wait. To that, we said “no way” and drove to the next food place we could find, which was the TApp Room. It was a college-y (obviously) sports bar but I could see its fun potential on a game day or something. We got beer and burgers and I remember it being pretty good.

Day 2 was a hike on Moses Cone Trail. It was between this and another trail, and since we wanted to leave that afternoon we opted for this one because I read on a blog that it was shorter. That blog was wrong. They said 1-3 hours, and we’re like “hey, we walk pretty fast, we’ll be done in an hour”. Nope, we were there for like 6 hours and spent 2 of those hours being lost on the wrong side of the mountain because of poor signage. If any people are reading this to find out about Moses Cone : It’s not a 1-3 hour hike. And there’s not a very good view at the top. But, it is easy and would be good for bringing your dogs on a nice, long walk.

The majority of the trail looked like this, except for some random meadows where you’re not sure where you’re going when the trail dissolves for a minute. All part of the adventure.

We parked at Trout Lake on the side of the road? There’s a parking lot on the other side we didn’t see and I would recommend parking there. The summit was cool and we walked around there a little bit and played with some people’s dogs.

Upon wanting to get down the mountain a little faster than we got up, we decided to take a chance and climb over the barbed wire fence via this ladder (took this pic from another blog).. wondering why I didn’t take a picture of it myself because it was so random. Just a ladder sitting on the side of the trail with no direction what so ever. There was a path though, and it was steep down the side of the mountain, it’s what we wanted. We took the gamble and went over the ladder.

Long story short, we ended up halfway down the wrong side of the mountain on a paved road and had no idea where we were. Asked a couple where Trout Lake was, they pointed us down the road. We walked for about a mile, felt very lost, and knocked on a random person’s door to get more directions. Eventually found the cow pasture he referenced and also found the allusive Trout Lake parking lot. It was stressful and this place needs more signs FOR REAL. The hike was nice though, and next time I would know what I was getting myself into so it wouldn’t be that bad again.

Boone, I will be back!