just so you know there's several good choices if you intend to stay within a trail system and loop back to your car.
Minister Creek happens to my fathers favorite place, and he's an avid hiker/backpacker (moreso than I ). Quite a few rock formations, and the combination of boulders and colorful leaves is beautiful and very scenic. Get a little more scenic by hiking the North country trail, which connects to the minister creek loop at its far end. you might hike east to Henry's mills and return. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I took a boys scout troop up into the tracey ridge trail system. It is a trail system with short interconnecting trails. you could easily loop around for 20-30 miles or so. I grew up within 7 miles of tracey ridge, so its kind of like in my backyard. Its a little less popular than other places and the reservoir scenery is superb.
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Also recommended, is the Hickory Creek wilderness trail system. I believe it is, still, the only "wilderness" within the national forest. That designation just might be more important than ever given the oil/and natural gas production within the forest. and moreover, I Did the backpacking/hiking on just that very place. yep. it rained 3 days strait! LOL.
The wilderness designation also means there's a minimum of roads, and no clearcuts / oil-gas wells, and other not so pretty areas within the watershed. And a nearby stream, The East Hickory is stocked with trout.
At the top of the trail is the beautiful hearts content park. Hearts content is one of those VERY rare places that have never been clearcut (even back in the old days, when the logged away all the hemlock). You can see what the old forest really use to look like. its also less rocky than most places.
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and lastly there's cooks forest. It is also virgin uncut trees. Certainly the biggest tract of Virgin woods in this part of the world. If you like big trees this is the place for you! one little trivia most people don't know. It was of course Hemlock that dominated the entire pre-colonized region. But cooks forest, inspiring as it is, is NOT mainly hemlock. its mostly white pine. the culprit was a wildfire and drought in 1644. I believe the trees started then are still standing. Wikipedia says it has "more white pine over 150 feet fall than any other site in NorthEastern United states." I'll take its word for it. It truly is a magnificent stand of trees. Fishing is a little more diverse to from the small streams within to the clarion river.
there that will do you. You can get online information about all these areas and more in print. I personally have hiked in all these places so I can answer questions, too. Hopefully I haven't given you too many choices
. And There's still others
that are quite pleasant as well (and that just in or near the ANF).
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striking out on your own, Doubletaper , is cheating isn't it?
by the ways if you can afford a LONG walk you can hit all these places (and much more) with a really long thru hike. It would be probably 100 miles+ (I can't remember how long it is but you can look it up) to go from cooks forest to tracy ridge on the NCT but it could be done. the downside is that it wouldn't leave much time to fish
.
I have hiked all the segments of the NCT from the line to cooks forest. There's truly alot of beautiful sights in the forest.
post edited by jolie - 2010/09/24 08:41:43