Set the alarm for 5:25, just about the time the sun came up, though I actually was up a little before that. I heard the forest waking up about a half hour earlier, so I joined it. We had a quick bowl of fruit, then got the horses ready, were riding up the gravel road toward the trailhead at 7:00. It was still cool and lovely, and the hot sun hadn’t quite reached the tops of the trees when we turned west onto the River to River Trail. Fortunately we left the gravel behind when we did so, a nice dirt and grass footing most of the time we were on it. There was a long of growth on the trail, which made it feel almost like going through a tunnel, but there was a lot of low overhang which kept it challenging. At one point I even got down to walk under a limb, but Hubby managed to get under it without dismounting. Then we came down to a creekbed, and momentarily lost the trail, as there were orange arrows going one way, and we missed the blue painted marking going the other. Soon realized our mistake though, and managed to get back on track right away. This was a surprising nice trail once we got past the creekbed crossings and started to climb up some hills. After a few miles we came to a T, and the RTR trail was clearly marked to the left, but according to the map I had copied from the women yesterday, the road to the right should be a forest road that would form a smaller loop back to the camp, so we decided to take that rather than linear out and in. It was a forest road, but it’s been a really long time since any motorized vehicles have come this way, and I’m not sure they could make it all the way anyway, but it was great for horses. Mostly dirt and grass, a few rocky areas but not many, winding through mixed deciduous forest with a few pine stands along the way. Really lovely, though again, there were a few areas that had some pretty low overhanging branches. We came across a couple of trail markers, very old and faded, but sufficient to let us know we were on the right path back to the Camp. Eventually we landed at a family graveyard with several very large and nice stones, yet dating back to 1840-1910’s, and smaller ones even older. At that point, the trail turned back to gravel road, and we knew we were on the right road home. The horses didn’t like the gravel much (especially Clio, who was bootless this time, as she had lost one in KY last week), but fortunately it was less than a mile back and we made good time. GPS put us at about 7.34 miles, and we were back in camp by 9:40, just as the temps were starting to climb.
Set the alarm for 5:25, just about the time the sun came up, though I actually was up a little before that. I heard the forest waking up about a half hour earlier, so I joined it. We had a quick bowl of fruit, then got the horses ready, were riding up the gravel road toward the trailhead at 7:00. It was still cool and lovely, and the hot sun hadn’t quite reached the tops of the trees when we turned west onto the River to River Trail. Fortunately we left the gravel behind when we did so, a nice dirt and grass footing most of the time we were on it. There was a long of growth on the trail, which made it feel almost like going through a tunnel, but there was a lot of low overhang which kept it challenging. At one point I even got down to walk under a limb, but Hubby managed to get under it without dismounting. Then we came down to a creekbed, and momentarily lost the trail, as there were orange arrows going one way, and we missed the blue painted marking going the other. Soon realized our mistake though, and managed to get back on track right away. This was a surprising nice trail once we got past the creekbed crossings and started to climb up some hills. After a few miles we came to a T, and the RTR trail was clearly marked to the left, but according to the map I had copied from the women yesterday, the road to the right should be a forest road that would form a smaller loop back to the camp, so we decided to take that rather than linear out and in. It was a forest road, but it’s been a really long time since any motorized vehicles have come this way, and I’m not sure they could make it all the way anyway, but it was great for horses. Mostly dirt and grass, a few rocky areas but not many, winding through mixed deciduous forest with a few pine stands along the way. Really lovely, though again, there were a few areas that had some pretty low overhanging branches. We came across a couple of trail markers, very old and faded, but sufficient to let us know we were on the right path back to the Camp. Eventually we landed at a family graveyard with several very large and nice stones, yet dating back to 1840-1910’s, and smaller ones even older. At that point, the trail turned back to gravel road, and we knew we were on the right road home. The horses didn’t like the gravel much (especially Clio, who was bootless this time, as she had lost one in KY last week), but fortunately it was less than a mile back and we made good time. GPS put us at about 7.34 miles, and we were back in camp by 9:40, just as the temps were starting to climb.
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