4/24/05 Tremont to Elkmont, via the Middle Prong, Lynn Camp Prong, Miry Ridge, and Jakes Creek trails.

The good, the bad, and the damned ugly... this route has it all. We were able to enjoy a late snowfall in the Smokies on this one. The hike up the Middle Prong of Little River out of Tremont is a treat. It follows an old roadbed with a gentle grade up the valley, winding slowly up the mountain until it reaches the turnoff for the Greenbrier Ridge trail. It's easy walking, with some beautiful cascades and waterfalls along the way.

When you pass the trailhead for the Greenbrier Ridge trail, the Lynn Camp Prong trail starts climbing and switchbacking up the side of the ridge, still following a now-rocky old roadbed until it reaches Campsite #28. The small campsite is located at the end of the old road and offers up what could be a pretty decent campsite in good weather. On a wet spring day, it was a bit too muddy for comfort, but in late fall, it would be a real beauty. There is one huge drawback though. Out of all the trails in the Smokies that I've hiked, and I've hiked nearly all of them over the years, none have suffered as much damage from overuse by horseback riding as the portion of the Lynn Camp Prong trail from the campsite up to the end of the trail on top of Miry Ridge. For the 2.3 miles or so that the trail climbs from the campsite to trails end, the 'trail' is a knee-deep, muddy trench, filled with boot-sucking mud and horse crap. The upper photo on this page shows a typical scene along the trail, but it is still not nearly as bad as some of the trail further down the hill. On just about any trail in the Smokies that I hike, regardless of how uncomfortable the conditions might be on a given day - bugs, weeds, heat, or extreme cold - I can nearly always say that with the right timing, I'd enjoy returning to hike the trail again. I can't say that about this one. It has been damaged to the point that I doubt that it will ever be more than a muddy bog. The Panther Creek trail, further down Miry Ridge, also drops down into the West Prong of Little River, and it too, looks like it's been worked over by bulldozers. I really don't know what the answer is to the problem. Horses will never be banned from the trails - there is simply too much money backing the riders. Trail repair work, whether by the Park Service or volunteers is a waste of time. The number of horses using the trail, along with the thoughtlessness of some of the slobs that ride them, would render the greatest effort meaningless. If you doubt that, take a look over on the other end of the Park below Davidson Gap on the ridge above Little Cataloochee Valley, where within a week of the trail below the Gap being rehabilitated, riders had totally destroyed all signs of the repairs.

The really sad thing about this is the fact that the valley of Lynn Camp Prong is a real beauty. It's mostly open hardwood forest with steep slopes, tremendous wildflower displays, and a bunch of little streams tumbling down from the mountainside above the trail. I don't regret doing the climb up the trail today, since it allowed us to gain some terrific views of the snow-covered peaks in the western half of the Smokies. However, like I said, the trail is ruined, and I doubt that I'll ever bother slogging through the horse crap and mud again. I'd rather climb up the Greenbrier Ridge trail to the AT, and then circle back around to the east to pick up the head of the Miry Ridge trail. It's a lot further, but a hell of a lot nicer.

In the lower photo, we were hiking along the crest of Miry Ridge, just south of Campsite #26. Despite its name, Miry Ridge is not any muddier than many of the other ridgeline trails in the western half of the Smokies. There are a few boggy stretches, but after plowing up Lynn Camp, it was like a thorofare. The trail varies between grassy ridgelines like this one, and rhododendron tunnels. All in all, it's a very pleasant walk, especially on a snowy day in late April. White fringed phacelia were popping up through the light snow cover in some places, though they were much thicker a little further down the ridge.

It's important to point out that I like horses, and that I feel that there are places in the Park where they can be ridden for miles without destroying the trails that they pass over. For instance, many of the old roads in the Park, such as the one that winds up the Middle Prong of Little River, have a hard surface that minimizes the damage inflicted by heavy horse traffic. Soft wet trails, such as the one up Lynn Camp Prong, should be off-limits. The meager resources of the Park should not be wasted on fruitless repairs to trails that are so poorly suited to equestrian travel in the first place. For now, it would be a good idea to close the trail to all travel, just as the Park did with the upper Rough Fork trail over in the Cataloochee Valley, in order to give it time to heal.