PA Holtwood/Kelley's Run Out & Back - Amos' Big Ole' Nope

2022 52-Hike Challenge #3 was very close to home as the family is awaiting our newest arrival who will be born to these River Hills anytime now. As I stepped on to the muddy/icy/snow-encrusted/frozen trail at Holtwood, I imagined my son and daughter-in-law, who live just across the Susquehanna from where I was standing, taking their son out on this trail to go explore the ravine creek below or hike to the Pinnacle above. 

Across the high knoll.

Old Holtwood Road 

The old road is slowly closing over with vegetation but it made for a nice ice-free hard-surfaced walk down the contour of the hill to the mouth of Kelley's Run at the Susquehanna. Crossing over Kelley's Run below the deckless road bridge I missed a slick rock and went ankle-deep into the cold current. (I knew better coming back by hiking down to the railroad culvert and crossing there instead.)

Wet-boot crossing at the destroyed iron-span Old Holtwood Road bridge

My plans were to hike a seven-mile loop up the Blue Trail along the ravine then take the Red Trail to the Pinnacle and loop back, but about three miles up into the creek ravine I had to turn back as the trail had become very dangerous.  My hiking companion made the call to turn around and I'm glad I didn't argue with him.  Amos does not like cold feet or ice! Instead, we did an out-and-back of five miles. 

End of the road along Kelley's Run before the icy trail began.

I had my micro-spikes in my backpack and was prepared to put them on when, after crossing the creek again further up in the ravine, I stopped to consider what my big ole' coonhound would tolerate. He whined at the first cold creek crossing. He eyed the ice-covered boulders and icicles with his head lowered. At the second creek crossing he tried to turn around  midstream. He gave me the side-eye. 

Spray ice

We made our way around thick blobs of ice on the narrowing trail until we approached a very steep iced-over rock scramble. One slip and he or I or both of us would crash downhill into a sharp boulder outcrop with the icy creek twenty feet below us. Not the place for a misplaced foot or paw, he whined.  Not the time for a head-cracking swim, I said.  Nope, said Amos, and he stood on the last patch of leaf litter before the scramble. Not going up there. Good boy!  Instead, we carefully back-tracked and admired the ice formations with "curiosity stops" along the way.

Frozen cascades.

Almost back to the old road - this will have to wait for spring.

We'll try again another day.

We hiked back up Old Holtwood Road and said hello to hikers who were on their way down. They'd turned back along the ravine loop from above and were coming around the opposite loop to get a look at the mouth of the ravine and see how far they could go upstream. Amos gave them the side-eye too. I told them he'd made the decision to turn back and they laughed (giving him a lovely ear rub) and promised they wouldn't push past the icy rock scramble. 

 

PA: Holtwood Oldfields and Coventina Rising

On this Sunday's walk with Bug the coonhound, we wandered the River Hills on the Lancaster County side of the Susquehanna. It was a short few miles to stretch our legs. This area has been heavily altered over the past two centuries. It isn't hard to go a mile in any direction and find spoils heaps from dredging behind the Holtwood Dam, power line right-of-ways cut brutally through the forest, borrow pits, and all sorts of water engineering from the dam itself to reservoirs and mill races. Now we are contending with new buried pipelines and expansions of natural gas pressure stations, a new natural gas plant, and local protests. In winter this area can look much more brutalized and isn't exactly a wilderness escape, but it can often yield surprising things. The temperature today was a balmy 48' F when we started out and when we finished (at a trot) it had dropped to a chilly 32'F in just an hour at mid-day.

Fog rolls over the hill - brrr!

The clues for this drop in air temperature hung over the river as we crested a hill along a stretch of trail that ramble through an oldfields section of the Holtwood Preserve.  A slight warm breeze earlier in the walk should have tipped me off, but coming over that hill, I was awestruck and not in a very scientific frame of mind, as a dark wall of river fog rolled up from the valley. Within minutes I was shivering in the cold winter fog as the light faded to dusk. Even the barred owls were fooled into hollering in the low light. This is the stuff of spooky stories, I thought, not very Christmassy!

Milkweed pod husks

I'd been snapping pictures of some of winter's bleakness - skeletal remains of a deer, crackling dry milkweed pod husks, patches of snow that remain from our December snow squalls - the kinds of vistas and visuals that would have interested Jamie Wyeth - so I was in that kind of mental space. I looked up from my snaps to see an Amish family with their English friends moving quickly through the field, having come up from the river. We exchanged our greetings and Amish Dad said "Getting really cold really fast down there! The woods should be warmer!"

Wyeth-looking snow patches

As I looked beyond them I could see the wall of fog rolling towards us. They drew their jackets and blankets tighter and hurried into the woods. I just sort of stood there staring. As the fog shrouded the oldfields, the temperature plummeted and dew formed on my binoculars, camera, even on Bug's black coat! Brrr! I immediately thought of the fog-rise of Celtic goddess Conventina, the keeper of watersheds and rivers, who - according to Roman mythologies I encountered while hiking Hadrian's Wall - would make her energy and power keenly felt in sudden, disorienting marine fogs and unexpected squalls. As the fog thickened, even Bug, ever onward the intrepid tracker hound, wanted to go back and follow the Amish family into the woods.

Skeletal remains of Common Mullein

Of course (she says confidently) I knew what was really going on. The great lake behind the dam at Holtwood had undergone its seasonal conversion. Warm and cold water layers had flipped, exposing the warmish air to cold water surface temperatures. The warm breeze I'd felt earlier, swooping in to the river valley was cooled to its dew point and a great cloud of fog had formed.  The lake inversion fog, called marine fogs along the coast, can be fast-forming and fast-moving. Within minutes the great cloud had enveloped the entire river hill and just as quickly, it rose and hovered a hundred feet over the valley, blocking the sun and locking in the the chill. It was cold! We didn't turn around but jogged into the wooded valley, towards the river. We kept jogging till we reached the old Holtwood Road, slipping and sliding down a steep bit of trail.

Mullein spike laid low

Jogging uphill to the Holtwood Arboretum certainly helped warm me up while Bug found a whole new class of roadside smells to stop and decipher. Scent-filled embankment slides of whitetailed deer, a squashed pile of horse poo, and the remains of a squirrel thrilled her coonhound nose. The few houses we passed were busy stoking fresh fires as pellet stoves and wood stoves scented the air with wood smoke.  We met up with the Amish family coming the other way. We stopped and chatted a bit, all of us a little warmer for our efforts to move faster. "Seems to me this is late for the river fog," said the elder woman, "These fogs usually start in late October and early November when the pond flips. But times are changing." Yes, they are, I agreed.

"English" and Amish families bundle up and move fast into the woods.

Amish farm women are great diarists and have for generations kept detailed records of seasonal changes. If anyone is looking for a great climate change history  project, as I mentioned in a recent NOAA workshop for climate data visualization, you can't beat farmers journals. I've seen an Amish woman's journal that goes back six generations and have often wondered if they might let me photocopy it. I'd need to find a translator, however, as it's in German.

Bug on a scent between fields

Our fast hike ended back at the car within the hour that we started. The inversion fog had lifted but the cold was bone deep. I blasted the heat in the car for ole' Bug who sat shivering. We stopped at the local chicken place to get her Sunday tenders treat and while standing in line to pay, a welder at the new gas plant - another sore spot in our much-abused energy landscape - remarked that the cold fog had come on so suddenly at the plant that they had to stop work for a few minutes until they could see. "It was downright spooky!" he said.  Coventina, the Goddess of Watersheds pulled a fast one today!

Cold fog lifting, there's new ice on the river.

Notes:

Coventina can be found in museum collections along Hadrian's Wall. I found her in Carlisle and Wallsend. For some reason, she's associated with witchcraft, but I think she represents a beautiful Druid mythology that got mixed up rather unfairly in Roman and Christian assimilations. As the goddess of watersheds, she has a very scientific sensibility to me. On our summer's Hadrian's Wall hike we crossed the oldfields containing the standing stone that marks Coventina's Well near Carrawburgh.  See Wikipeadia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coventina

 

PA: Ice Hike - Pinnacle to Tucquan Ravine, Holtwood, Lancaster Co.

The last day of February, locked in frigid cold streaming out of the Arctic. I started out Saturday from The Pinnacle, a promontory overlooking the Susquehanna River in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, and followed the Conestoga Trail north. My plans to hike an out-and-back to the Tucquan Creek Ravine included fitting my winter hiking boots with a set of ice spikes/mini-crampons. The ravine trail section and many stream crossings on the way up are thick with ice this time of year. The starting temperature was 10' F with a light wind. But it wasn't long before I was shedding layers, gloves, hat, and jacket for the heat I was generating on this tough winter hike.

Strap-on ice spikes or crampons are a necessity on this hike in deep winter.

I looked out at the Susquehanna from atop The Pinnacle: the view of the frozen river was stunning. Wind-driven frozen waves of snow and ice patterned the surface. A fly-by of an adult and juvenile bald eagle below the summit added to the drama.  To my left an orange blaze painted on a tree beckoned.

Looking north from The Pinnacle - frozen solid Susquehanna.

The Conestoga Trail is a 60 mile long Lancaster County backpacking trail that can be accessed in many places for day hikes such as this. Blazed orange and maintained by the Lancaster Hiking Club, the lands are under a partner stewardship agreement between the Lancaster County Conservancy and the power companies who manage the watershed for the big dams at Holtwood and Safe Harbor. In addition to the scenic Tucquan Ravine, the trail passes by the Wind Caves (open for cavers),  pre-historic rock shelters, a magnetite mine (entrance blocked), and valley upon valley of native wildflowers in bloom come spring and summer. There are several established single tent camping sites that for the most part are kept clean and attentive by backpackers, though there are sometimes issues with 'trail squatters' in summer, and party groups will be sites trashed. The conscientious hiker will bring along a garbage bag to help keep things picked up, for it is truly a beautiful area. 

I've been hiking for over thirty five years and the Conestoga ranks  as one of the most challenging in the area for difficulty. There are numerous hill scrambles and steep rocky descents, while the seasons present their own versions of hot/ humid or frigid/ icy, I prefer to get my Conestoga workout in winter when snows cover and cushion the rock-strewn path - but the trade-off is ice. The hills and valleys are aligned with river drainage east to west, so south facing slopes can melt during the day and refreeze at night. It can be sticky mud  or thick berms of ice depending on what time of day you hike. The north facing slopes stay in shade for most of the day and can retain snow well into spring. Ice spikes or mini-crampons are the safest way to travel this area in winter. But hiking with sharp spikes on the bottom of your boots takes a little practice. The mantra for ice hiking is "Stay off your poles and stick your points!"

North-facing hillside still thick with snow.

As I started down the hill from summit of The Pinnacle, the snow deepened. What in summer is a rocky, precarious trail in the first half mile was now thankfully blanketed in snow, but steep and slick. Few people had been out since the last storm, but there were a few sets of snowshoe tracks that were easy to follow, so I didn't have too look hard for orange blazes. Instead I concentrated on my toothy kick-step on the steep pitches and on the incredible river views all along the way.

Frozen wind waves.

The river looked solid but certainly wasn't quiet! It groaned and bellowed and made weird whale sounds, including a deep thrumming sound that traveled south to north. I've seen the river freeze over in the past, but have never observed the zig-zaggy waves of snow and ice that I'm almost certain were the result of many weeks of high winds we've had spilling out of the Arctic. 

Rock shelter and orange blazes.

The trail weaves in and around many rock formations, some of which may have served as shelters for people thousands of years ago. The Shenk's Ferry people, who some archeologists suggest may have been absorbed into the Susquehannock nation as it spread southward out of New York, occupied this river valley soon after the last Ice Age and utilized its many rock features for temporary camps and storage. The Susquehannocks who moved in to the valley 1000 years ago established large villages and farming sites on the hilltops where today farms and beautiful crossroad neighborhoods function much now as they did then as places to grow and store crops, gather, celebrate, and trade.

Icy ledges can be skirted around but I chose to kick-step right across!

With the sound of woodpeckers working the forest around me I came to the high ridge that frames the south wall of Tucquan Creek Ravine. The trail follows the spine of the ridge down to the river and involves ledges and narrow passages through sharp schist and gneiss. The sharp rock path was covered in snow-over-ice so I went verrry slowly.  I noticed where the snowshoers chose to skirt down through the steep woods, but I decided to follow the blazes. Now the icy fun began!

A tricky path to the valley bottom!

I solo hike a lot but this was one trip I made sure to text my son and daughter about.  I gave them the approximate time of my start when I expected to be back (I always add an hour), and exactly where I would be. We've done enough trekking as a family that checking-in is routine. But there's nothing routine about hiking in winter, especially solo, so it was good to remember that someone knew where I was. Each step down the ridge was intentionally taken: kick in - step down - dig in - add weight - steady - repeat - all - the- way -to- the - bottom. The river boomed and wailed (is ice-out coming?). Woodpeckers wrapped loudly on hollow wood (a sign of spring!). And though I did take a stumble (ouch!) into a sharp rock wall (blood!), I made it to the bottom where normally the Tucquan Creek would have been rushing out to meet the Susquehanna.

Normally loud and dramatic - an ice and snow quieted Tucquan Creek.

The valley bottom, however, was eerily quiet. The entire creek was encased in ice and snow with an occasional collapsed section of ice shelf revealing almost silent swift water rolling along beneath. Where waterfalls and cascades tumble noisily spring through fall, the whole valley was hushed in winter white. A red tailed hawk wheeled overhead and let loose a long screech that echoed loudly up the ravine. I spent some time carefully making my way directly up the creek - as long as the shelf held my weight - to photograph a frozen waterfall.  Then with a loud crack I quickly made my way to  the ravine trail!

Frozen waterfall I.

Frozen waterfall II.

Frozen seep from the ravine wall.

The ravine trail is a popular summer hike but even then it is tricky in places: steep and slippery with water running from seeps in the ravine wall, boulder scrambles, a narrow ledge crossing just inches wide.  Today the trail was all ice and nearly impassable for anyone not prepared. The snowshoe tracks continued  with the claw-like scrapings of attached crampons. My ice spikes kept me solidly connected to the ice. I stopped so often, however, just to admire the scenes, that it took me a long time to make the climb up. Rhododendron blankets the valley walls that in summer creates a tropical tunnel of green and humid air, but today the wide horizontal leaves were curled tight into pendant tubes. An example of thermotropic movement in leaves, the Rhododendron demonstrates protective behavior in frequent freeze-thaw areas for which Tucquan Creek Ravine is a great example.

Freeze and thaw cycles occurs daily here and this can have serious consequences for plants at the cellular level. Without protective strategies, plants that are unable to protect against freezing soon suffer. Curling is a direct response to frigid temperature as a from of cellular protection. It's a bit like me taking off layers of clothing when I heat up (unfurling) and racing to throw everything back on before I freeze (curling). Although I was moving steadily along the trail and generating a lot of heat, it was still below 20' F and when I arrived at my turn-around spot and I noticed it was much colder in the shaded recesses of the creek valley where the Rhododendron thicket was most dense.

Hidden in the ravine below are several dramatic cascades.

I took my half-way break where the creek valley opens to direct sun, but I was shivering so hard in my own sweat that before snacking I put all my layers, gloves, hat, and jacket back on! But what a beautiful break listening to the deep thrum of the creek running rapidly below ice and snow, and feeling the warmth of sun on my face. In a patch of sun at my back a small red maple was showing its bright red twigs against the snowy hillside - a sure sign that spring is very close.

Red maple twig turning red - spring!

By noon the temperature had risen to 23'F and all things being relative, it felt quite balmy! I started back down the valley and up the steep ridge section, again building heat so quickly that I was soon pulling back off my hat, gloves, and jacket. I noted that since my earlier hike down, a wild turkey had crossed my trail. With his own set of sharp ice spikes at the end of each wide-spread toe, the turkey must have moved carefully across the ice encrusted snow. This was the slick, steep section where I'd taken my tumble and I noticed I'd left my own blood trail, not realizing I'd really torn open the side of my hand. Ouch. 

Turkey trail.

Sun-softened snow made for a slow return to The Pinnacle. It was almost two o-clock by the time I made the first overlook just below the height of the summit. I rested here again for no other reason that to soak it all in. I was joined by an Amish hiker who  smiled and rested in the warm sun near me as the river stretched out in front of us. "Been fishin'?" he asked after a long while and I thought this was a funny thing to ask, sitting on a ledge several hundred feet above the iced-over river. I told him I'd been to the ravine and back and hadn't thought to bring my fishing gear. He laughed a little and said I needed to stop in at Pequea upriver on my way home and check out the ice fishing going on there. "I augured down twenty-two inches yesterday! The ice is nice!"

First Overlook, a short hike downhill from The Pinnacle.

I returned to the car, ice spikes clacking on pavement. The weather is supposed to turn a bit warmer this week with some rain, some more snow, and the possibility of March flooding. It is now a season in change, that like early spring freeze-thaw cycles, is a process of cracking the shell of winter's grip.  Who knows what this river will look like next Saturday, or two Saturday's from now? Each day brings the promise of release from here on out!


Notes:
 
For more about the Lancaster County Hiking Club and the Conestoga Trail -
 http://lancasterhikingclub.angelfire.com/abouttheclub.html

The Lancaster County Conservancy maintains an excellent system of preserves and natural areas throughout the county.  See their list of properties and opportunities to get involved:
http://www.lancasterconservancy.org/about/
http://www.lancasterconservancy.org/preserves/

PA: First Day Hike 2015 - Kelly's Run and The Pinnacle

Happy 2015 from The Pinnacle!

This is a tough, rocky bit of of the Conestoga Trail and as our First Day Hike of the New Year it was a winter hike at its best. Windy, cold, and steep, this 'lollipop' circuit combines the up-and-back run from the base of a high river hill to the top with a round-and-up loop of Kelly's Run for a total of 5.5 steep miles. We both agree that winter hiking beats humid hot days of summer in these parts. We built up heat soon enough and were comfortable the whole way.

A new hiking pole for Kim from her son, disguised for wrapping purposes!

The tradition of First Day hiking started over a hundred years ago and has endured as a New Year's Day event for families, friends, clubs, and parks in the EU and North America. It comes from the hiking traditions of Germany and Austria where long distance walking and family holiday hike outings have deep roots. It was a pleasure to come across so many folks out on this trail today celebrating the First Day Hike all wishing each other a Happy New Year with smiles and conversations about plans for the day and tales of past hikes in the Holtwood area. 

Hiking poles helped a lot!

Kelly's Run and The Pinnacle are both part of a large land holding managed by Pennsylvania Power and Light (PPL) that includes several large dams across the Susquehanna River and the inflow valleys that contain dozens of creeks and streams. PPL land is managed for recreational use with miles and miles of trails, many picnic pavilions, ball fields, campgrounds, and boat launches. Several unique natural area sites are protected by PPL as well. These sites  have Friends groups and university clubs that oversee and offer events and hikes to the public.  The rugged orange-blazed Conestoga backpacking trail is almost completely contained within PPL lands. It starts in Marctic Forge, twenty miles north of The Pinnacle. There are two campsites available for backpackers who follow this craggy path south  through scenic ravines, lush hollows, and across steep cliffs to the Norman Wood Bridge just south of Holtwood.

Share the trail! A pheasant hunter and his dog.

It's good to know, too, that public hunting grounds are snug up against PPL lands in many areas, including here at Holtwood, so seeing hunters using PPL trails to access public lands is a good possibility. This morning we met up with two polite young men on their way to a nearby PGC gamelands unit, excited to have the whole day to hunt. Later on a pheasant hunter and dog crossed Kelly's Run on their way to the scrub forest and open lands along the base of the cliffs. Though some hikers (usually not from Pennsylvania) are annoyed by the close proximity of hunting lands or by the presence of hunters themselves, there has never been trouble to my knowledge. Hunting is an important part of PA as anything I can think of, and we've done well with the idea of 'multi-use' in my home state. 

The Pinnacle up-and-back is rocky and steep!

From the Kelly's Run crossing at its mouth (under an old road bridge and railroad culvert) the climb up to The Pinnacle involves a bit of scrambling but the views from the edge of the trail overlooking the river are outstanding. Stands of Virginia Pine frame every look across towards York County and we looked over at several of the creek valleys we've hiked this past fall on our Mason Dixon Trail trekking.

View from the top!

Once up and over the cliff  we followed a woods road to the top and  it seemed people simply appeared! Note: There is an access road open only in summer that leads to the ridge top, and in winter with the gates closed and locked below, people will park at the end and walk in on the flat. Today there were plenty of hikers who'd made the trek as we had, some coming from the north, some from the south, others road walking up. There was a lot of mingling with the car-folks who walked the half mile from the lot. Lots of "Happy New Year's!" exchanged up here. Conversations started about past hikes, where to go from here, birds and birding from the lookout, the river, and fitness goals for the New Year that included these rugged trails.

Cliff top overlook on the orange-blazed Conestoga Trail heading down.

After watching an eagle pair circling a nest on the opposite shore, we returned the way we came to rejoin the Kelly's Run loop. Inching down some of the steeper bits, some of it on our butts, we stepped aside to allow a more adventurous hiker forge past. He had at least twenty years on us - but he hopped along like a mountain goat. Oh. I aspire to be like him in my 70s!

Before I forget - here's my First Day poem-prayer for 2015...

Prayer for the Dawn of A New Year


May we grow in understanding of our role as stewards of 
this old and ailing Earth.
May we replace paranoia, fear, and denial with acceptance...


of our responsibilities to our one and only home.
May we rediscover the beauty of seascapes, heavens, 
forests, and hills - and in all the creatures who live here.
May we put aside our clinging to boundaries and borders,
and open our hearts for the sake of humanity
and our Planet. 
May we truly grasp the ideas of interrelatedness and 
interconnectedness.
May we realize and enter into the hard work that is Love, Healing, Caring, Compassion, and Gratitude. 
May we teach this to our Children, Grandchildren, and Great-Grandchildren so that they may teach theirs. 
Amen.

Kelly's Run Trail - south ridge.

We intersected the blue-blazed Kelly's Run loop at the bottom and began our trek up the very narrow boulder strewn creek. The shady, cold recesses of the valley contained a lot of ice, some of it on the trail, so we continued to take our time. We watched a few people slip into the cold water from  glazed rocks and logs trying to make crossings. The poles were especially helpful and we suffered no more than a little slip here and there.

Rocks and crossings were glazed with ice.

Kelly's Run ravine is mostly in shade during the short days of winter, so ice is a possibility even on days when the air temperature is well above freezing.  The tall and ragged cliff walls were draped in icicles  today and as some of the higher cliffs caught an hour's sun, we could hear the glass-breaking sound of large daggers shattering down into the ravine. 

Lots of ice along the cliff walls!

When the snows finally come (and we hope they come soon!) it would be a good idea to use strap-on  ice spikes (Yaks)  for your boots. Most quality outdoor shops like REI and EMS have these available and they are worth the $20 to have in your pack for these slippery stretches of ravine trail when you can't see the ice that underlies the snow. And if hiking alone, it's not such a bad idea to let someone know you are down in this cell phone/ GPS free zone. If you fall or find yourself in trouble and need help, you'll have to wait until someone comes along or wait until someone doesn't hear from you! Many of the Susquehanna ravines are deep and dangerous and require a hiker to pay special attention to weather - flash flooding and ice are high on my list! 

Icy blankets under dripping boulders.

The Susquehanna River Valley is known for its deep creek ravines that drop precipitously from the tableland above, the Piedmont Plateau. The slight eastward tilt of the vast plateau above coupled with repeated cycles of glaciation to the north and massive melt-off over tens of thousands of years have combined to create rapid down-cutting by the river and its tributaries. Some of the streams have become entrenched - unable to meander - held in place by high cliffs, large boulders, and deep V-shaped valleys. Frequent waterfalls, cascades, and tumbling steps of rushing water are constant companions as the narrow trail skirts around or over rocky obstacles. 

Kelly's Run at it's icy best on New Year's Day.

By mid-afternoon we'd come up through the creek valley to the dense woods that blanketed the gentler hills above. We heard a screech owl whinny as we left the steep canyon as if to say 'Good Job!" In the oak-poplar woods the trail is wide enough to hold two hikers side-by-side for a time until the trail opens out into the park where we'd left our cars. A great start to the New Year! 

Notes: 

From the website Mid-Atlantic Hikes, a fully indexed and mapped hiker's trail share.:http://www.midatlantichikes.com/id96.html