Hiking Cumberland Falls
In the autumn of 2001 Stephen Dale was twelve years old and it was about time for him to learn some outdoor skills, so we planned our first father-son hike together. |
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We jammed our gear into my little Toyota MR-2 sports car and headed south through Kentucky and deep into the Daniel Boone National Forest. We found a parking spot and the trailhead near Cumberland Falls but it was already dark so instead we pitched our tent at a nearby campground and waited until morning. The next day we packed our car (again), headed back to Cumberland Falls, geared up and hit the trail.
The first few miles of the trail were heavily traveled with tourists and day hikers. We enjoyed the wonderful views of the falls and then headed down onto the sandy southern shore of the Cumberland River, where we would follow the river basin for the next five miles or so and lose touch with humanity.
I found pretty quickly that my pack was too heavy. It was somewhere over thirty-five pounds, prepared more for a camping stay than for light and fast hiking. Plus, with Stephen Dale still only twelve, I was carrying all the gear that we would share such as the tent, cooking material, medical kit and so forth. That made for a heavy pack and lots of rest stops.
Still, the scenery was wonderful and the weather was too, at least on the first day. We were never out of sight of the river and had to make numerous crossings of the smaller tributaries that flow south off the Cumberland. After insisting on getting as close as possible to them Stephen Dale slipped on a mossy rock and went tumbling into the icy water. Fortunately it was barely waist deep but he spent the next half an hour drying off and changing clothes while I lit up our fuel canister and prepared a much-needed lunch.
We hit the trail again in hopes of making it to a trail shelter where we could spend the night, but darkness fell and we still hadn't reached it. We finally gave up near dusk and selected the only flat spot we could find along the trail to make camp. It was a small space, perhaps twenty feet across, much of which we cleared by hand. We would not have a campfire that night since we didn't make it to the shelter, but we were tired and would have to make do.
I listened carefully for rain all night long because the Cumberland is a big river and we were less than fifty feet from it. The last thing I wanted was to get caught in a flood. The bank on the opposite side of the trail was pretty steep and the thought of getting up during a downpour in the middle of the night and staggering up a muddy hillside to avoid drowning didn't appeal to me very much.
But there was no rain. The only weird thing that happened in the night was a group of men on horses that came clopping down the trail, drinking and yacking to each other loudly. We were in a camouflage tent and before we turned in, I had taken the precaution of laying branches over it to disguise our appearance. I'm sure camping in this location must have broken at least ten or twenty government regulations and I didn't want to get caught by our local federal gunmen. So we were pretty much invisible in our heavily camouflaged tent at night. The loud mouthed horsemen passed within a few yards of us without a clue and disappeared down the trail.
An hour or so later we heard gunshots in the distance and some wild whooping. I grabbed my flashlight and Makarov 9mm pistol and peered through camo screen, waiting to see what would happen. After a few minutes it became evident that the good ol' boys were target practicing with their now-empty liquor bottles. I heard no bullets cracking through the air nearby, so they were apparently shooting in the other direction about a quarter mile down the trail. So I curled back up in my blanket and went back to sleep.
The next morning we awoke and packed up, ready to reverse our course and head back toward civilization. We made it back by mid afternoon and checked into a campground where we were able to shower, grill steak for our evening meal, and repack our bags for the trip home the following day. This was our first real effort at doing any outdoor activities. It was a meager start, but lots of fun, educational and left us anxious to do more.
The first few miles of the trail were heavily traveled with tourists and day hikers. We enjoyed the wonderful views of the falls and then headed down onto the sandy southern shore of the Cumberland River, where we would follow the river basin for the next five miles or so and lose touch with humanity.
I found pretty quickly that my pack was too heavy. It was somewhere over thirty-five pounds, prepared more for a camping stay than for light and fast hiking. Plus, with Stephen Dale still only twelve, I was carrying all the gear that we would share such as the tent, cooking material, medical kit and so forth. That made for a heavy pack and lots of rest stops.
Still, the scenery was wonderful and the weather was too, at least on the first day. We were never out of sight of the river and had to make numerous crossings of the smaller tributaries that flow south off the Cumberland. After insisting on getting as close as possible to them Stephen Dale slipped on a mossy rock and went tumbling into the icy water. Fortunately it was barely waist deep but he spent the next half an hour drying off and changing clothes while I lit up our fuel canister and prepared a much-needed lunch.
We hit the trail again in hopes of making it to a trail shelter where we could spend the night, but darkness fell and we still hadn't reached it. We finally gave up near dusk and selected the only flat spot we could find along the trail to make camp. It was a small space, perhaps twenty feet across, much of which we cleared by hand. We would not have a campfire that night since we didn't make it to the shelter, but we were tired and would have to make do.
I listened carefully for rain all night long because the Cumberland is a big river and we were less than fifty feet from it. The last thing I wanted was to get caught in a flood. The bank on the opposite side of the trail was pretty steep and the thought of getting up during a downpour in the middle of the night and staggering up a muddy hillside to avoid drowning didn't appeal to me very much.
But there was no rain. The only weird thing that happened in the night was a group of men on horses that came clopping down the trail, drinking and yacking to each other loudly. We were in a camouflage tent and before we turned in, I had taken the precaution of laying branches over it to disguise our appearance. I'm sure camping in this location must have broken at least ten or twenty government regulations and I didn't want to get caught by our local federal gunmen. So we were pretty much invisible in our heavily camouflaged tent at night. The loud mouthed horsemen passed within a few yards of us without a clue and disappeared down the trail.
An hour or so later we heard gunshots in the distance and some wild whooping. I grabbed my flashlight and Makarov 9mm pistol and peered through camo screen, waiting to see what would happen. After a few minutes it became evident that the good ol' boys were target practicing with their now-empty liquor bottles. I heard no bullets cracking through the air nearby, so they were apparently shooting in the other direction about a quarter mile down the trail. So I curled back up in my blanket and went back to sleep.
The next morning we awoke and packed up, ready to reverse our course and head back toward civilization. We made it back by mid afternoon and checked into a campground where we were able to shower, grill steak for our evening meal, and repack our bags for the trip home the following day. This was our first real effort at doing any outdoor activities. It was a meager start, but lots of fun, educational and left us anxious to do more.