Since I hadn’t planned this trip my first step was to hit the computer and find a hike that I hadn’t done before, which was fairly accessible, had something to recommend it, and was about the right length. That led me to the idea of doing a hike on some of the trails out of Mathew’s Arm campground area. There’s a nice hike there that leads to what is supposed to be a pretty waterfall. Unfortunately, this choice turned out to be problematic. At the entrance to the park I noticed a sign saying that the campgrounds, including Mathew’s Arm, were closed for the season. I asked the range if I could still get to the trailhead there. He said yes, but that I would have to park across the road at Rangeview and hike down into the campground. What turned out to be good about this is that it gave me the opportunity to see (from the outside) one of the few remaining WPA bunkhouses – the houses that were built to lodge the workers who built the park as part of a New Deal construction effort in the 1930’s. What was bad is that it added quite a bit of distance to hike down Skyline Drive and then down the access road into Mathew’s.
It should be said that I’m pretty good at scaring myself. As I walked into Mathew’s Arm I thought about the fact that I was kind of light on supplies (just basic day hike stuff) and that I was going into a part of the park which was closed off and would probably deserted. Pus, no one knew I was there. Needless to say, I soon conjured scenarios where I injured myself or was attacked by a bear and died out in the wilderness because no one knew where to look for me – my very life depended on the ranger at the entrance remembering that hiker who asked about Mathew’s Arm. Sad to say, I can whip myself into this kind of frenzy even while hiking in suburban parks. I drive myself nuts.
I found the trail head at Mathew’s Arm and proceed with my hike, soon adding the worry that I’d lose the trail, since there was a thick carpet of newly fallen leaves, making it hard in spots to follow the trail. That latter fear was alleviated a little when the trail turned into a wide forest road.
I hiked out the Mathew’s Arm trail, hitting the junctions with the Weddlewood and Beecher Ridge trails as expected. I have to add that in the entire time since I left the car I had not seen a single other person, reinforcing my idea that I was alone in the wilderness. As I approached the Tuscarora trail junction, not far from the waterfall, all of a sudden all the hairs on my body (yes, I have some) stood on end and I spontaneously turned around and started hiking in the other direction. I’ll never know whether I had sensed something ahead of me on the trail (a bear!) or whether I had just succeeded in scaring myself into irrationality, but something told me to turn around rather than go on. So I did. That’s why I can say only that Overall Run Falls is “supposed to be” pretty – I never quite made it there to see it for myself. Needless to say, on the way back I started to run into other hikers, and when I got back to the Mathew’s Arm lot there was a crew there working on some repairs. It turns out I was far from alone out there.
When I got back to my car (BTW, there were other people in the parking lot) I felt a little short-changed since I had cut my hike short (the extra distance to get to the trailhead notwithstanding) and so I did a short hike there. I hiked about a mile up the Appalachian Trail (1 mile down, 2159 to go!) to Range View cabin, one of the PATC cabins in the park. It was unoccupied and so I sat down on the front porch, had a snack, and enjoyed the view. The day had warmed up nicely and so I laid back for a bit and enjoyed the warm sunshine. Finally, I hiked back to the car and headed home, stopping at Spelunkers in Front Royal for a somewhat-earned milkshake.
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