While on vacation visiting extended
family in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, we hiked a few trails,
including three trails at Chimney Rock.
We started with The Outcroppings moderate to
strenuous trail that involved taking a network of stairs and boardwalks
(approximately 615 steps). We looked out over
Lake Lure and enjoyed the stunning scenery; we were not at “the rock”
(elevation 2280) long before my eleven year old son started asking about the
next trail to Exclamation Point. My
younger son and husband decided they did not wish to continue hiking up; they
were saving their energy for the Hickory Nut Falls Trail to see the waterfall.
Thinking it couldn’t require much energy to hike another couple hundred feet
up, I quickly told the eleven year old that I would make the hike with him
while the other two family members rested at the Sky Lounge.
Ascending stairways we were surprised by the switchbacks
but observed interesting geological formations and noticed we encountered fewer
people (good thing since the path was narrow now) than we had on our previous
climb with the family. Up, up, up we
climbed with my eleven year old in the lead turning and stopping often to offer
words of encouragement that we were “almost there.” That’s the tricky thing about this switchback
climb—we thought we were almost there the whole time. I began to ponder the
name Exclamation Point and the fact that I should have known the hike would be
steep, with such a name.
