Great Eastern Trail

We were interested in observing the waterfalls on Nickel Run so we descended the blue blazed side trail to Nickel Run Falls. The temperatures lately have been near zero so the falls were spectacular with ice.

On this side trail we did run across a black powder deer hunter. It was smart that a couple of us were wearing blaze orange.

As the trail passes through the area where the historic, now defunct, village of Landrus was located, we observed some old foundations and other evidences of homes and industry being located here long ago.

The hiking was quite easy, rarely climbing or descending steeply, until we were challenged to find a way across Babb Creek without getting wet. The creek is still quite high and, of course, now very icy. However, we found an accommodating log upstream that was only snow covered, not ice covered. Getting to this log was an adventure because we were forced to scale down the very steep, slippery, snowy, icy bank. Our alternative was to retrace our steps back to the high water route. I don’t recall that we made a decision about turning back before observing that our jumpin’ bunny, Red Riding Hood, was already on the other side of the stream. We all made it safely across without incident, but with helping hands from each other.

Just downstream the falls at Sand Run were absolutely spectacular because of the ice formations.

De gustibus non disputandum est. (There is no accounting for the preference of hiking at -272.99999 degrees temperature.)