We recently did a spur of the moment hike up on Viking Mountain. Actually its Camp Creek Bald, but locals refer to it as Viking Mountain after a now defunct ski resort built at the top. At dinner at friends one Saturday sitting on the porch looking at Viking Mountain one of us said…
‘Have y’all hiked up to the Blackstack Cliffs on Viking?’
‘No.’
‘Well we should do that.’
‘When?’
‘Tomorrow. It’s not a long hike, maybe 30 minutes. Then we can go on to the ridge trail, that is the Appalachian Trail. Only another 30 minutes or so.’
So a date was made for after church for a ‘little’ walk in the woods with the 5 of us. The group grew by Sunday afternoon and 9 and a dog set out. Our ‘little’ walk turned out to be a 7.4 mile hike! Had I been told that at the start I would have never gone! Thank goodness it had been a few years since John had done this hike and forgot how long it was, it was a grand day and a good time was had by all and I’m so glad I went! We want to keep this going now and there is no shortage of places to hike in these mountains!
This peak is 4,844 ft. in elevation. The view is spectacular! The trail borders the Tennessee/North Carolina line. There are fire towers up here that can be climbed. We’ll save that for another day! You can click the link above to read about Camp Creek Bald and see pictures from when the resort was there. Nothing is left of it now.
Peggy's Porch 