Another nice day and so we decided to get out of the house
for a hike. I found a nice loop marked on the map and decided that it did not
look too difficult for our experienced hiking crew. We loaded up the car and
hit the road headed for Horse Creek. We arrived at the Horse Creek picnic area,
parked the car and got ready for the walk.
The start of our hike followed the
rough, flower-fringed
Horse Creek Road for a short distance
before crossing Horse Creek on a
footbridge and heading into the Sampson Mountain Wilderness.
I knew there would be a few creek crossings on this hike,
but I was surprised to find the first few were bridged, especially considering
that we had entered into a designated wilderness area.
Soon, however, we passed
into a small section of private property and an old A-frame cabin I along the banks
of Squibb Creek. The owner of the cabin must have some sort of easement to
allow entry of wheeled vehicles etc. into the wilderness area.
After we passed by the cabin, we crossed Squibb Creek
and
followed the trail into a tunnel of rhododendron gently ascending. A little later
we found ourselves at a trail junction where we left the Squibb Creek Trail and
headed up Turkeypen Cove. The climbing got very steep and Parker had a
difficult time with it. To make matters worse there were several blow-downs
that we had to make our way over , under, or around.
Eventually we found
ourselves on the top of a ridge and it was here that we started to make our
descent on the Middle Spring Ridge Trail.
Sierra was in good spirits this whole time. She never
complained at all despite a wet diaper. We changed her right on the trail, ate
a snack and made our way back to Squibb Creek. All in all it was a good hike,
but it was much more difficult than I had anticipated.
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