Hike for the Birthday Boy - Little River/Cucumber Gap/Jakes Creek

Date: 2014 July 05

Hikers: Andy, Shannon, & Logan

Miles: 8.39

Hikers Seen: two families and one ranger on Little River, nada on Cucumber Gap, two hikers on Jakes Creek

Highlights: old cabins, Huskey Branch Falls, a blue heron

Low Points: failing to locate the side trail for the Avent Cabin until it was too late

Logan's birthday was last month. He initially wanted to do the same thing we always do for his day out with Momma and Daddy: MagiQuest and Splash Country. Considering his birthday was a Saturday this year, we told him that we would do whatever he wanted, but how about a hike with just us? I was surprised how quickly how he changed his mind.

Andy initially wanted to do Abrams Falls trail….a trail we have done multiple times, although it would have been the first time for Logan. I didn't want to, though for two reasons. One was the fact that, like I said, we have already hiked that trail multiple times. Second, it is one of the busier in the Park and the drive there (and back) would have been horrible. Holiday traffic at its finest, or worst depending on your view of things.

So instead, we headed up to Elkmont with the intention of a loop hike that was to be just over five miles. We started on Little River Trail, which follows the old logging train bed up the river. We passed all the old cottages on Millionaire's Row and listened to the roaring river. Somewhere between the beginning of the hike and our turn off for Cucumber Gap we were supposed to come across Huskey Branch Falls. Our map didn't really give us an accurate idea of where the falls were and we had forgotten our hiking book.

Anyhow, close to where our turn off was going to be, we came upon an easily accessible cascade in the river with a bench to take in the view. We briefly debated whether this was the falls, but agreed either way that is was a great swimming hole. I may have to bring some of our friends up to it before summer is over.

A little ways more up the trail and we came across the real Huskey Branch Falls! The trail went right over them via a bridge that was wide enough for a vehicle. They were actually very pretty, but might have been more impressive if the bridge didn't bisect them. Regardless, it was a perfect place to stop for lunch.

After lunch, we continued down the trail. We met up with a park ranger who was wearing an Secret Service-esque ear piece. Not sure why. I am pretty sure he was checking out the backcountry camp sites, though.

Right after we spoke briefly with the ranger, we saw a beautiful blue heron in the river. I wasn't able to get a photo of it though. The thing must have had amazing hearing to be able to know we were coming over the roaring waters of Little River.

Shortly after we scared off the heron, we reached the intersection for Cucumber Gap trail. We took a right onto the trail, left the river, and began climbing.

Cucumber Gap is supposed to have three water crossings, but the creeks seems to be low right now and two of the three crossings were more of a dribble surrounded by mud.

I don't have a lot to say about the Cucumber Gap trail. I read after the fact that the trail was originally cut by the loggers as a way to cross from the Little River watershed to the Jakes Creek watershed and that was pretty much what we were doing. We did think we spotted a manway at one point, and I read there is a manway somewhere along that trail after we got home, but I wasn't interested enough in it at the time to go to far down it.

We soon hit the intersection of Cucumber Gap trail and Jakes Creek trail. Once upon a time you could actually drive quite a ways up Jakes Creek trail and in the late nineties Andy and I remember doing just that with some friends of ours. At one point we stopped to explore one of the old cottages along the road and I remember the snake skins that were hanging from the rafters. (The mental image STILL gives me chills.) Anyhow, we decided turn left onto Jakes Creek and walk for a bit to see if we could find the house and where we had turned around so long ago.

After stopping to take a look at one of our trail maps, we noticed something called the Avent Cabin as being listed near where we were walking. I vaguely remembered seeing photographs of the Avent Cabin and thinking it was an artisits' retreat, but I wasn't sure. Andy thought perhaps it was the cottage we remembered.

We walked close to a mile up Jakes Creek before I made Andy take his map back out, my map did not show the Avent Cabin, and compared it to my GPS. It was then that we realized that we had been looking on the wrong side of the trail. We turned around and Andy had just decided we would never be able to find the thing in the summer time when I saw a tell tale foot bridge down the gap crossing Jakes Creek. Soon after we saw the stairs leading down to the bridge and, I assume, the cabin. At this point, however, we were closing in on six miles and Logan was starting to complain that his feet were aching so we decided to save the Avent Cabin for another hike.

We continued hiking Jakes Creek trail back towards Elkmont. I pointed out an empty lot to Andy where I'm pretty sure the cottage we remembered once stood. Soon other cottages doted the left-hand side of the trail and we made it to the trail head.

I left the GPS running as we walked through Daisy Town and back to our car. I had joked with Logan at the beginning of the hike that maybe we should hike eight miles since it was his eighth birthday. (Remember, we were planning a five mile hike.) Well, by the time we hit the cottages of Daisy Town, we were closing in on the eight mile mark thanks to our not-so-little detour. We stopped by the car so Logan could change into swim trunks and then walked up to the swimming hole behind Spence Cabin. When I finally saved our track for the day, we had officially hiked 8.1 miles. Pretty impressive for our new eight-year-old as I am pretty sure his longest hike up to that point had been 5.2 miles.

The kiddo attempted to swim in the icy waters for a bit while I soaked my feet and Andy read up on the trails we had just walked. We finished up our day with crab legs at Joe's Crab Shack. I think this is the third year in a row, maybe fourth, that we've had Logan's birthday dinner there.

Can't wait to hit the trails again!