Linville Falls

[thesummerqueen]

Instead of spamming the member photos thread, I thought I'd post my stuff here. I had a really shitty week, and this is the way I escape emotional and mental pain.

This link gives an adequate history of the area. http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ance...istory.htm


Stopped at Brown Mountain Overlook to peer over the mountains.


Up the airy mountain,
Down the rushy glen,
We daren't go a-hunting
For fear of little men;
Wee folk, good folk,
Trooping all together;
Green jacket, red cap,
And white owl's feather!
- 'Fairies,' William Allingham


The climb to the first overlook was cluttered but not too difficult.






"Ay me! ay me! the woods decay and fall;
The vapours weep their burthen to the ground.
Man comes and tills the earth and lies beneath,
And after many a summer dies the swan."
-Alfred Lord Tennyson


Down to the first overlook

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The way to the second overlook:

The rail beyond provided scant protection through this pass, where one slithered down steep mud-slicked rocks to a narrow, marshy loam ridge below.


A doorway to some fairy realm.

"By the craggy hill-side,
Through the mosses bare,
They have planted thorn-trees
For pleasure here and there.
If any man so daring
As dig them up in spite,
He shall find their sharpest thorns
In his bed at night."
- 'Fairies', William Allingham


My plant ID powers failed here. There are so many ferns in the NC forests, and we only learned about 12 of them.


The path continued on rail-less narrow ridges, wet with rain and matted with leaves. Roots twisted everywhere, tripping up feet that weren't deliberately placed.




No lie - the stairs were as steep as those in Cirith Ungol. (I know, I’m a huge dork)


And sometimes there were corners where hewn blocks were left, like the remnants of ancient temples.




The second “overlook” at the foot of the falls.

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Duggard's Creek Falls

I had come down from the difficult trail that led to the previous pictures and took this easy one in order to rest. My asthma was bothering me, for I am losing weight but not putting on enough muscle and strength of lung to handle mountain climbs.




The water had weathered the stones away.






Elfin steps to higher ground.