Hazel Falls and Cave Hike

Thursday, June 3, 2021

Hi Blog!

After a family-filled Memorial Day Weekend and a few days of virtual school with William, we found ourselves on our own. With Shenandoah National Park right next door, it was time to take a hike. With a chance of thunderstorms in the afternoon, we didn't want a ridge hike, so we found a trail down to Hazel Falls that included a cave.

Spring has definitely sprung in Shenandoah National Park. We followed the yellow blazed Hazel River Trail through a thick green tunnel.

It doesn't take long to leave the traffic of Skyline Drive behind us. The trail junctions are marked with concrete pylons. Little metal bands are stamped with the tiny names of the trails with even tinier arrows pointing in the correct direction. Make sure you bring your reading glasses!!!

Fallen trees allow peeks of sun to reach the trail.

One of the most unique things about Shenandoah National Park is that, unlike many western parks which were established to preserve wilderness and natural features on land already owned by the federal government, Shenandoah National Park was created to enable lands which had been heavily used and were no longer wilderness to regenerate. The lands in the park were heavily populated and had been used over the centuries by farmers, mill owners, logging companies, miners, and trappers. The forests of the Blue Ridge and surrounding areas were logged since the 1700's. The park was created entirely from land owned privately, rather than just setting aside land already owned by the federal government for preservation.

The mountain laurel (also known as calico-bush or spoonwood) is a species of flowering plant in the heath family that is native to the eastern United States. Its range stretches from southern Maine south to northern Florida, and west to Indiana and Louisiana. Mountain laurel is the state flower of Connecticut and Pennsylvania. It is the namesake of Laurel County in Kentucky, the city of Laurel, Mississippi, and the Laurel Highlands in southwestern Pennsylvania.

It is always fun to run into a few fun guys on the trail! This gang was particularly entertaining.

When established in the 1930's much of the land in the park was unforested open space. Second and third growth forest have reclaimed a full 95% of the park. Shenandoah National Park is often referred to as a "recycled wilderness." It certainly looks wild. Hey, where's Dave?

Along with 16 species of non-venomous snakes, there are two species of venomous snakes found in Shenandoah National Park: timber rattlesnakes and copperheads. When we met this snake sunning itself along the trail, we knew it wasn't either a rattler or a copperhead, but we could not be certain whether it was a garter snake or an eastern ribbon snake. It did not want to pose for a proper photo.

However, the really cool moss covered log was happy to pose for us.

We knew from a brief trail description that there would be about 350 yards of downhill. We did not expect such steep rock steps. We felt like we were back in the White Mountains of New Hampshire!

We descended into a deep, narrow gorge. The Blue Ridge on which Shenandoah National Park lies is part of the Appalachian Range. The entire Appalachian mountain range from Alabama to Newfoundland was created by the collision of tectonic plates resulting in a folding of the surface. The result was long, parallel ridges which formed the Appalachian Mountains. This trail takes you deep into one of those folds.

We could hear Hazel Creek tumbling its way down toward Hazel River. We worked our way upstream in search of Hazel Falls. We found the shallow cave which was more a void left by a jumble of large boulders.

The falls are just opposite the shallow cave. Part of the falls are hiding behind some of those large boulders.

We decided to have lunch before climbing our way out of the gorge. We picked a scenic spot where we could watch the falls tumble and the water burble.

We lingered over lunch before making the climb out of the gorge. We were both pleased when we reached the top. It was a good workout and great training for later in the summer when we climb Mount Washington and Mount Katahdin!

The return hike was easy compared to the climb in and out of the gorge. The only thing we had to worry about was being attacked by floating caterpillars!

A visit to a National Park would not be complete without a picture of the entrance sign!

We are hoping to get in another hike before we leave the area. Stay tuned.