Trip Report: Hazel Country Amble (Shenandoah National Park, St. Mary’s Rock, Buck Hollow, Pine Hill Gap, Pass Mountain) (November 17-19, 2023) (28 Miles)

Ahhhh—a November amble through the Shenandoah National Park (“SNP”)! Piecing together a few trail loops, we DCUL hikers strode up and down the mountains from Pine Hill Gap to Buck Hollow to Mary’s Rock to Pass Mountain. Solid mileage. Short Fall days. Bracing autumn chill. Nearby forest fires fully contained. Three DCULers signed on for two nights and two days of backpacking a classic, nearby SNP experience.

But, first, a flashback.

Mortimer Hawkins led his mule up towards Hazel Mountain on the bumpy path he called a road. Except for his companion beast, he walked alone—and felt alone. It seemed like yesterday he celebrated the New Year with his wife, Stella, and their kin. They raucously welcomed the year 1900, marveling at the futuristic novelty of a year that began with the number “19.” Where did the past 24 years go? 

Suddenly, the mule began stuttering its gait. “That’s never happened before,” Mortimer thought to himself. I’ll have to ask John, a neighbor adept at curing animals, to look at it. He pressed on. However, the mule started baying. It would start and stop. Mortimer grew worried. What if the mule was dying? That would be very inconvenient at best. He was far from help. A light drizzle started and moistened his face. He prayed the mule would heal itself so he would not be left stranded.

The flashback ends.

I drove toward the trailhead at the base of Hazel Mountain with my passenger, Maddie. Mu drove separately and planned to meet us there. It was Friday night, near 8:00 p.m. The expected rain started on the drive from Fairfax, but petered out. Still, the clouds, time of day, and drive into a mountain hollow created a deep darkness my headlights gamely pierced. The paved road turned to gravel. The straight path began to meander. We looked forward to the backpacking trip.

A mile from the trailhead, strange lights suddenly lit on my dashboard. One red light looked like a car battery. Another looked like an air bag. The windshield wipers that I had been using intermittently to sweep away post rainfall drips from the trees began moving slowly. “Uh, oh!” I muttered. “Has your car had electrical problems before?” Maddie asked. “It looks like your battery is dead.” In my experience the car was nothing but reliable. However, admittedly, I rarely use it. It sits parked most of the time. I use it only for monthly backpacking trips.

I considered turning around, but decided to press on to meet Mu—we were less than a half mile away from him. There was no cell signal at the trailhead so we could only communicate with him in person. And, if the car broke down, it would be better for it to happen near him and his car. However, I knew in my bones that once I turned off the car it would not restart.

We drove past Mu’s car parked in the woods and turned around to reach him. He came to my window, which lowered painfully slowly. Maddie and I quickly introduced ourselves and I highlighted my predicament. As we talked and my car idled, the center console screen went dark. The car began sputtering. I pressed the gas to keep the car going. I suggested that Maddie hike to our camping site with Mu and that I drive to the nearest town, Sperryville, to arrange for a tow. I figured my chances in a town with a cell signal would be better than on a gravel road in the wilderness. Maddie scampered out.

Within a minute I was alone driving back down the gravel road. I revved the engine to keep the electricity going. The center consul flashed on, then off. I gunned the engine in an effort to, at least, reach the paved road. Fate, however, introduced himself. The car shut off. I rolled off the side of the road into a conveniently located shoulder. Alarmed, I realized my window was halfway down—and the forecast called for more rain. I frantically hit the window button. The window inched higher at a tortuously slow rate. “Go, go, go!” I pleaded. It stopped not far from the top—good enough.

It was very quiet—and dark. Rats! Grrrr! Why was this happening? I felt as alone as Mortimer Hawkins did next to his stopped, dying mule in the exact same location 100 years ago. However, like Mortimer, I quickly realized this was annoying but far from life threatening. As DCULer David U (“Baseball”) always says, “When life throws you car trouble, go backpacking!” 

Having planned to hike that evening in the dark, I had my headlamp in my pocket. I put it on and turned it on. I turned off my expired vehicle. I was a mile from the trailhead. I decided to hike back to Mu and Maddie, spend the weekend backpacking, and solve my car trouble on Sunday. I grabbed my pack from the trunk, strapped it on, extended my trekking poles, and started hiking to the trailhead. It began drizzling again.

As if laying in wait, a car instantly drove up the road in my direction. I stepped off the narrow gravel road to let it pass. However, it stopped next to me and dropped its window.

“Are you with DCUL?” a voice asked.

“Uh, yes,” I responded confused. There were only three people on this trip—me, Mu, and Maddie. I knew I left those two at the trailhead. It was not possible for this to be Mu.

“I’m Gene,” the driver said. He started babbling about a sister in Tennessee who was in the hospital but now out. “So, can I come on this trip?” 

To be clear, this is not the way to join a DCUL trip. One may not just show up unannounced at 8:00 p.m. in the dark. There are liability waivers that one must make. There are important trip planning details to internalize. I’m just a co-participant on these trips, so I have to decide if I’ll like hiking with the person. However, two working cars are better than one. So, naturally, I told Gene, “welcome to the trip!” He drove me the mile up to the trailhead.

We quickly hiked the additional mile to our intended campsite. Mu and Maddie were still setting up camp, confused at seeing two headlamps bouncing toward them instead of just one. I explained what happened, introduced my new friend, Gene, and began pitching my tent. The trip was back on track!

Backpacking in Hazel Country

The light drizzle on Friday night turned to a gentle rain. We slept easily. Both Mu and Gene mentioned how nice it was to sleep with the soft rain on a tent. I smelled the smoke from the Grave’s Mill forest fire south of us. It smelled like the campfire we would not have on this trip due to a SNP fire ban. Clearly, the wildfires did not read the SNP’s website, learn of the fire ban, and blazed away in direct violation of park rules. We woke Saturday to a dry day without a hint of smoke.

Our hike for the day was a steady series of climbs and descents. We would have well over 5,000 feet of elevation gain that day. We climbed up Pine Hill Gap Trail to the top of the Shenandoahs before almost immediately descending to the base of the mountains down the Buck Ridge Trail to Buck Ridge Hollow. The combination of Buck Ridge Trail and Buck Hollow Trail makes for a great day hike loop in the SNP. The former trail features a grand “staircase” of wood beams, making it easier to manage the steep grade. The latter trail is better graded and follows an inviting mountain stream.  

After completing the Buck Ridge loop we linked to the Appalachian Trail and hiked northbound to St. Mary’s Rock. From Skyline Drive to the Rock and down to Thornton Gap the trail was very crowded with day hikers. The nice Fall weather spurred a bevy of “weekend warriors.” I’ve been to the Rock many times, so I did not linger among the crowd there. The view is extraordinary and many made an afternoon of sitting in the sun on top of the world.

On the hike down to Thornton Gap, I conducted a sociology experiment. I counted the number of mixed couples who hiked up the mountain with the man in front and woman behind, and vice versa. It was easy to count. All but one couple hiked with the man in front—and there was a constant parade of hikers making this a representative sample. I considered asking the one outlier couple what was wrong with them, but didn’t. Discussing this phenomenon with my fellow hikers, Maddie mentioned that she always hikes in front of her boyfriend. She pointed out that women are usually shorter than men, so that by hiking her way both members of the couple can see in front of them. With the man in front, the woman can only see the man’s behind. Yuck! Who would want to see that? Thinking further, she postulated that more men are interested in hiking than women and may be more experienced navigators. Empirically, I do see much fewer women on DCUL backpacking trips than men, so Maddie may have been on to something. However, hiking to St. Mary’s Rock from Thornton Gap requires zero navigational skills. The trail could not be more obvious and there are no intersecting trails. I’m filing this sociological observation away in the same category as “why do herds of cows always eat grass facing the same direction?”

We climbed out of Thornton Gap to our campsite at Pass Mountain. We arrived at a nice, neat shelter with an hour of daylight to set up camp. Mu pointed out the “kissing trees,” two trees that grew together to look like two people embracing.

Two thru hikers, both from Russia, arrived to make camp. Southbound hikers, they had a long, cold hike to Georgia. We chatted with them as we made our dinners.

After dinner, I mused that I had no plan for resolving my car problem the next day. Without hesitation, Gene confidently announced “the plan.” He’d take the battery from my car and drive me to the Sperryville gas station to get a new one. Wow, that sounded easy. Maddie chimed in by suggesting that “maybe the car will, like, heal itself.” We all laughed. “Yea, Shenandoah National Park elves haunt the hollows looking for backpacker’s cars to fix.” More laughter. Maddie did not yield. “No! My car once broke down and the next day it just started.” While I admired Maddie’s optimism, I embraced Gene’s plan. A dead battery does not just re-charge itself by sitting for a weekend with overnight sub freezing weather. Mu wisely suggested that we shorten our Sunday mileage by lopping off the planned loop around the north side of Hazel Mountain, saving us 7 miles. He reasoned that this would give us more time to solve my car problem if Maddie’s “self-repairing car” plan failed. We all agreed to Mu’s plan.

We retreated to our tents very early in the evening. The temperature was dropping rapidly and the fire ban banned our intended plan to have a campfire. That night the weather dropped to freezing.

We woke and started hiking by going back up to St. Mary’s Rock from the north. It was freezing cold, but I was dressed for the weather. Gene hiked in shorts. When one of the Russians asked him how he felt comfortable like that in the cold, he replied that he worked hard on his legs and that it was his obligation to show them off. The female Russian giggled.

The climb up the Rock quickly warmed us up. It was nice hiking that trail without the crowds from the prior day. The combination of cold weather and early hour scared them away. Once on the Rock, the remainder of the hike was predominately downhill to the cars. We hiked easily down along streams and bushy mountain laurels. This is a very pretty section of the SNP. Gene, who hiked all 500+ miles of the trails of the SNP, and who has the victory patch to prove it, did much of our navigation. He also pointed out many fun facts of the area. For example, while I knew that a turn of the century fungus killed the former American Chestnut trees that previously blanketed the area, I did not know that their root system remains. All around us were American Chestnut trees, however, they only grow just past the sapling stage. After this time, the fungus, which is also still around, kills them.

We quickly arrived back at our cars. Gene and Mu drove us all to my kaput carriage. I hopped out to test Maddie’s “self-fixing car” theory—and it worked. The car simply started up. Not a single caution light illuminated. Gene drove home. Mu followed me to the Apple House in Front Royal. I figured it would be easiest to get a tow near the interstate than anywhere else, if necessary—and I was hungry for some apple butter donuts! After lunch, the car again started as if the trouble Friday night never happened. I successfully drove Maddie to the Vienna Metro and me to my home. I’ll take the car to a mechanic after Thanksgiving—if it starts. I don’t know if the Fairfax car repair elves are as effective as the SNP elves.

Another great DCUL adventure is in the books! I’ll hike this loop again. It is a good place to crush miles with good elevation gain. It is also very pretty. Congratulations to our newest DCUL Member, Gene!

—David O (Spider—Man)