Although I’ve spent dozens of nights backpacking in the Big South Fork and Rockcastle River areas, for one reason or another I had never hiked the Bark Camp Creek Trail. Circumstances lined up for me to make a quick overnight trip as February ended and March began, and I decided to finally hike from the Bark Camp Creek trailhead to Cumberland Falls. My route would be relatively moderate in regard to difficulty -- about five miles (via the Bark Camp Creek Trail and the Sheltowee Trace) to the Star Creek Shelter, spend the night, then continue on the Sheltowee to Cumberland Falls, with a side trip to Dog Slaughter Falls.
Since this was a point-to-point trip rather than a loop, I had Sheltowee Trace Outfitters provide a shuttle from Cumberland Falls to the Bark Camp Creek trailhead. They were prompt and the price was reasonable. Aside from a group hike organized by the Sheltowee Trace Association earlier in the year the employee said that they hadn’t shuttled any other backpackers in the past few months. As expected, I didn’t see anyone else on the trail until I reached Cumberland Falls and the trail appeared to be infrequently used between the Bark Camp Creek Trail/Sheltowee Trace junction and Dog Slaughter Falls.
Given the beautiful scenery, the good condition of the route, the logistical ease of arranging a shuttle, and the bonus of being able to camp at a trail shelter (there are only a handful of trail shelters in Kentucky) I am baffled as to why this trail isn’t even a fraction as popular as trails in the Red River Gorge. This area is featured in several Kentucky hiking guidebooks and the Sheltowee Trace is a well-known trail, but for the most part the landscape I passed through was unmarked by the abuse and overuse that plague the Red River Gorge. Many people I speak with about hiking and backpacking who are familiar with the Red River Gorge are completely unaware of the great opportunities for backpacking on the southern end of the Daniel Boone National Forest. That said, perhaps plenty of people
do hike this section of trail, practice Leave No Trace, and don’t write about it on the Internet -- giving it the illusion of being seldom-used. For some reason I doubt this, but if this is the case then I hope it doesn’t change.
Bark Camp Creek Trail.I was dropped off at the trailhead around 1:30, giving me plenty of time of time to leisurely hike the five miles to the Star Creek shelter. As the diesel smoke from the shuttle vehicle dissipated and the sound of its tires rolling along the gravel road faded, I surveyed my surroundings. Like most trailheads in the Cumberland Plateau the scene was initially unimpressive, but hinted at the landscapes potential. The trailhead is located where a Forest Road crosses Bark Camp Creek, and the large culvert allowing the stream to pass under the road (or the road to pass over the stream, depending on your perspective) provides a somewhat industrial feel to things. The trash at the trailhead -- plastic bottles, glass bottles, aluminum cans, pizza boxes -- adds to the “modernity” of the landscape, for lack of a better description. Fortunately, a few hundred feet down the trail a more primitive charm is expressed as the single-track trail winds through rhododendron thickets and along clifflines, always in sight of the creek. The creek at this point is as wide as the larger streams in the Red River Gorge, but has a more hurried character and deeper pools.
Bark Camp Creek.The day was perfect for hiking and provided the right amount of light for easy “point and shoot” picture taking. Temperatures in the mid-50s and partly cloudy, with bits of blue sky peeking through the clouds every so often. Icicles clinging to clifflines contrasted with the relatively warm temperature. Somewhere along the way I dropped the mechanical pencil I was taking notes with and had to backtrack a few hundred feet to find it, giving me time to ponder a question of wilderness ethics -- if I had gone to the Beaver Creek Wilderness as I’d initially considered, would it be OK to have brought a mechanical pencil? Such are the conundrums of backpacking, along with the agonizing pre-trip decision of whether to bring Cormac McCarthy’s
Outer Dark or a collection of Jack London’s short stories for the evening’s entertainment.
The noise of the stream was relatively constant and the trail also passed under several low-flow waterfalls spilling over the tops of moderately-sized rockshelters. There were also some sections of cliffline with nearly gold and vermillion streaking. In a certain way, I found the Bark Camp Creek Trail and its narrow, path of least resistance routing to be reminiscent of the Swift Camp Creek Trail in the Red River Gorge, although the scenery on Swift Camp Creek is more dramatic than Bark Camp Creek for the most part (although the cascades on Bark Camp Creek near its mouth are phenomenal).
Rockshelter.
Cliffline.The new bridge over Bark Camp Creek is built to last and provides great views of the stream mid-crossing. The next section of trail is still a work in progress and is heavily flagged, but follows no discernible path . . . it’s pretty much just a straight line downstream to the old crossing. There are multiple “teaser” cascades and drops you can hear from this section, but even without foliage blocking the view they are difficult to see. I’ll likely be returning sooner rather than later to try and get a better view of these. The main set of cascades visible from the old crossing are absolutely stunning. The series of stream-wide drops turn and tumble with a fluidity that is mesmerizing. I paused to snack, rest and take photographs and could’ve lingered much longer than a mere half-hour. I was tempted to roll up my pants and creekwalk above the cascades to scout out the ones I’d heard from the trail, but the frigid temperature of the water and limited amount of daylight required the postponement of that adventure.
Cascades.Continued in next post . . .
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Topic: Trip Report: Cumberland Falls area backpacking (Read 30014 times)