With this hike, Ed and I were starting to specialize in leading the SMHC’s fall off trail trips to Mt. Cammerer. These were super fun trips, there were a number of great routes to explore, all ending at the Cammerer Tower and its unobstructed views of some of the finest fall colors in the park. In 2007 I’d led the club trip up Toms Creek, and just two weeks prior we had led the club up Panther Branch and Rich Butt to the summit.
This time we would move over a ridge, and attempted the climb via Leadmine Ridge. By now we were aware that upper reaches of all the ridges on Cammerer were guarded by steep, rocky walls of massive Thunderhead Sandstone. In honor of the similarity to the scramble route up Greenbrier Pinnace, Ed had named the cliffs on Rich Butt “the Panther Stairs”. And so, to honor all my buddies at work we named the cliffs on Leadmine Ridge “the Miners Stairs.”
Our
original route plan was to start from the informal Groundhog Ridge Trailhead on
TN 32 and follow either lower Rowdy Ridge, or the west fork of Groundhog Creek
to the Lower Mount Cammerer Trail. Then we would follow the LMC trail west to
the crest of Leadmine Ridge. The final leg would follow Leadmine Ridge to the
spur trail to the Cammerer tower. This would be a scouting trip for a planned
2010 club hike. I took a GPS track and Jean took pictures.
From
the trailhead we turned uphill to climb to the crest of Rowdy Ridge. But we
found the broad and relatively gentle crest choked with rhodo. Rowdy Ridge has
a fearsome reputation for its dense clusters of ill-tempered rhodo, as Janes
and Mary had found out in a 1990s trip, and Charlie had confirmed from his
experience. So, we quickly backed off and decided to try the right fork of
Groundhog Creek.
The right fork was easy at first, and then picked up some minor rhodo where the creek split again. We stayed right at the fork and followed it directly, but steeply, to the LMC Trail. In later trips we’d try a number of alternatives to gaining the LMC Trail from this fork, with none having a substantial advantage over the others. We turned west on LMC to Rowdy Creek, which divides Rowdy and Leadmine ridges, then climbed steeply west to gain the crest of Leadmine.
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| Fall vista from Mt. Cammerer. |
The Leadmine Crest was variable, never awful for long, but never that open either. Fairly soon we hit rock outcrops and enjoyed some views. The crest was very narrow and there was a continuous bear trail along it. Bears are not known for diligent trail clearing so the going was still rough. The bushwhacking and scrambling proved too much for Jean’s old hiking pants which busted out in the seat. We hit the steep, rocky section later than we expected.
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| Ripped hiking pants. |
There was only one great vista from the rocks, and we had less of the fun scrambling that we had anticipated. But that may have been because we left the crest near the top to the right to try some hardwoods in a small draw, potentially bypassing the fun stuff. The draw led directly to the Tower spur, popping out about 100 yards from the tower. We had lunch at the tower while enjoying the views on a typical clear fall day.
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| Ed emerging onto the trail. |
The
climb took about 4 hours, including our early detour onto Rowdy Ridge, but
barely covered two miles. We would end up overstating the trip mileage in our
hiking club reports, assuming no one would believe how short the trip actually
was. We enjoyed the route, and knew it would make a good club trip, but thought
that Rich Butt was a more interesting climb.
We descended the Groundhog Ridge manway back to TN 32.
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| Ed and I on the summit of Mt Cammerer. |
10-16-10, SMHC Mt Cammerer via Leadmine Ridge
This SMHC hike repeated the route of the 2009 scouting hike by Jean, Ed, and I. Jean took pictures again, but this time I did not save a GPS track. Once again, my notes are brief since I was leading.
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| Climbing the Miners Stairs. |
From the trailhead we followed an old road on the left bank of the right fork of Groundhog Creek at the start. I lost my Brunton altimeter down a hole in my pants, but we backtracked briefly, and Chris found it. Once on Leadmine Ridge we found cliffs at 3600-3700’, and then once again near the top.
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| Near the top of the Miners Stairs. |
This time, instead of leaving the ridge to the right near the top, we kept to the crest despite the thick brush and found a fun rocky section with spectacular views that included the tower. I thought this direct route far superior to our bypass, and felt it made up for the occasional tedium in the brush on the ridge crest.
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| At the Cammerer summit. |
At the top we ran into the other SMHC hikers who had come up via the Low Gap Trail. After lunch and appreciation of the fall colors our group descended down the Groundhog Ridge manway. The manway was more grown over than I had noticed on previous trips. Jenny mentioned that the club used to descend via McFalls Branch, but that route was becoming more overgrown through lack of use.
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| David descending Groundhog Ridge. |
