Lake Lure Trip - Day 2 - Chimney Rock, NC

From the travel journal:

Weather: High 48 / Overcast and cloudy

(Cara) - We have opted to drive into Chimney Rock today. It is approximately a 20-25 minute drive from Lake Lure. There is a park there with several trails for hiking and an elevator which will take us up to Chimney Rock, a large rock high up in the sky.....a death trap if ever I've heard of one.

(Kelly) - Cara, in her older age, has become a little over-dramatic. There are possible death traps everywhere in life. I'm sure hiking in Chimney Rock is safer than driving your car on an average day. Nonetheless, I agree that we did decide to go to Chimney Rock Park. This was a place that I especially wanted to go to. In high school, our science class went to state parks often. I loved the walking through the woods, climbing on rocks and bridges, etc. 

So I was looking forward to hiking. As we left the resort area, after getting some instructions from the very helpful staff at the Wellness Center, I accidentally made a wrong turn. I should have gone left to stay on Buffalo Creek, but I went right onto Buffalo Shoals. Krista and I had wondered earlier if this road would be a shorter way to the grocery store but had been warned that this road was too twisty. Now we were on this hazardous mountain road and Cara was sure I had done it on purpose. That simply wasn't true.

This road certainly lived up to its reputation. We couldn't drive faster than 15 mph and the road went like this: (Kelly has drawn a line that wiggles up and down and all around, but I don't know how to duplicate that via the computer). 

Cara was in the second row and quickly started getting nauseous. She got a plastic bag and kept telling us to shush whenever anyone would mention, "Wow this curve is crazy." or "What would you do if you had to drive this in the snow?" or "Hey, look at that woodpecker!......

Cara: "No Kelly, not you! Keep your eyes on the road!"

After an eternity, we reached the bottom of the hell-slope and turned toward Lake Lure. Darcy was also a little green around the gills when we finished with Buffalo Shoals.

The road into Lake Lure was less twisty (sing: The Long and Winding Road). We drove for a while and then wondered if we were going the right way. It was Sunday and there were no signs of life at any businesses on the side of the road. Finally, we stopped at some real estate offices that had an "open" sign lit up in its window. Krista got out and Cara followed to get some fresh air. They returned with glowing assessments of North Carolina people, so friendly, so helpful. We were on the right path going in the right direction.

We drove through Lake Lure, which I found to be unremarkable. After Lake Lure, the next town was Chimney Top. Chimney Top was a small street lined on each side with shops, restaurants, gem mining businesses, bars, antiques and a lot of pedestrian traffic. The entrance to Chimney Top park was right in the middle of this business district. 

Two rock towers marked the entrance and then you drove over a wooden bridge. A sign informed you that you had to drive up the mountain a mile to get to the ticket office. The road up was as narrow and twisty as Buffalo Shoals and even higher up. Each turn took up to new elevation and a new spectacular view. 

Finally, the ticket booth! The cashier seemed uninterested in counting the people in our van and took my word for it that we had 3 adults and 3 children. Natalie has apparently regressed back to age 5 and was free. From the ticket booth, it was another mile and a half up the mountain to parking. The van did pretty well considering we were asking it to perform like a Range Rover. 

We parked by the elevator up to the Chimney Rock. You could see it from the parking lot and, to my horny, middle-aged mind, it looked like a circumcised penis. To get to the elevator you walked through a light-up tunnel bored through rock. The man in the elevator informed us how to get to certain trails and that this elevator would take us to the most dangerous spot in the whole park.....the gift shop! He ended up being right as I would soon find out.

We went to the Skyline Deli atop Chimney Rock for lunch. Cara needed some food. While eating, Cara suddenly thought of something. She had left the coffee pot on at the hotel. She worried about the place burning down. We told her not to worry because our unit already had a well-documented history of electrical problems and therefore we wouldn't get blamed. We can always say it was bad wiring. I told Cara that even older and cheap coffee makers have an automatic turn-off feature. In the end, she decided not to drive back, like that was even an option.

(Cara) - Well, first of all, I, of course, would never have suggested we drive back to turn off the coffee pot as Her Majesty has written. For heaven's sake just getting here was enough to wipe that idea out of my head, but I will admit to having an itty, bitty panic attack. This resort stay is on my mother's dime, and despite the fact that I'm 43 years old, the woman can still instill fear. Burning down our unit in Lake Lure would certainly bring the wrath of Connie. 

But once I left the eatery and walked across the wooden bridge 50,000 feet above the ground, a burning coffee pot flew right out of my mind to be replaced with my death. The slats in the bridge had some gaps in them, which afforded me a nice view of my death should the bridge collapse. Luckily, through those same gaps, I could see reinforced steel beams under the wooden slats. This made me feel a tad better. Across the bridge you had two options:

1. Go to the left and climb up about 100 steps up the mountain to get to a major hiking trail that was recommended only for professional rock climbers and Olympians.
2. Go to the left and climb up about 100 steps to sloping Chimney Rock (Giant Penis in the Sky) to hang suspended in the air, protected by a little white picket fence.

Everyone chose option #2 so I followed along as I so often do. I made it up halfway, looked out at death, told my children to be careful, turned around and climbed back down where I hugged the side of the option #1 mountain. Someone else will have to talk about the Chimney Rock experience.

(Brianna) - Walking up the stairs I saw how high up we were, and when I touched the railing I wasn't sure I was safe. It wasn't nailed down right or something....the railing. When I got up on Chimney Rock I stood on one of the many rocks up there, and I felt like I was on top of the world. I could see all of North Carolina. It was beautiful.

(Darcy) - When I walked up to Chimney Rock there were a lot of rocks on top of it. Big gigantic rocks that were tall. We were high up and I could have fallen over the railing and broke my head. It was very cold up there. It was cool.

(Madison) - There were tons of rocks and it was bumpy and very high up. It was scary. The view was pretty with trees, mountain tops, hills, and rocks.

(Krista) - It was a very windy day, and when I approached the stairs (they should call it a ladder) it went straight up, and the higher we climbed the windier it got and the colder it got. I thought the top would be flat, like concrete, but it wasn't. I really felt like we were higher than any mountain. I never really looked down. It really felt like I was in the clouds. It was the highest I've ever been anytime except in an airplane.

(Kelly) - I loved it. It was very high and the top of the Rock was surrounded by a metal fence that was embedded into the rock itself. The view was great and there was an exhilaration and dangerous feel to it. Natalie's running and leaping did make me a little nervous. I kept picturing her flying over the fence and disappearing! 

After everyone came down the stairs from the top, Brianna and I noticed some other wooden stairs that were going down steeply between two huge slabs of rock. The stairs/boardwalk wrapped around the mountain stopped for about 15 or 20 feet and then restarted again. From our view, it looked impossible to cross the area from where the walkway ended and where it began again. The area without a walkway looked far too narrow and far too steep. We were intrigued. Brianna and I proceeded down the steps while Krista took pictures from above. When we got down to the ledge we could see that it was not as treacherous as it looked from above. A couple was down there with their dog. They had walked up from the other direction.

Brianna and I returned to the gift shop where the others were. After some purchases, we were headed for the Hickory Nut Trail. Some of our purchases included friendship bracelets, socks, and coffee mugs. The Hickory Nut Trail was described as "family friendly" even for small children. The trail would take 45 minutes to an hour to hike and ended at the middle of a waterfall. I loved the hike and all the stops along the way to take pictures. We had to photograph every rock formation, every weird knot of tree roots or burrowed-out areas that a bear might live in.

I suggested we come up with code names for the wild animals we might encounter. I stated, as though it were a fact, that if you yell, "Bear!" when you see a bear, it will make a bear attack more likely. This is truthfully just my theory and has not been proven in scientific experiments. The code names were: bear = pineapple, wolf = pancake, Sasquatch = papaya.

A lot of the time was spent keeping the children and sometimes the adults (well, me) away from the edge of the trail which dropped off steeply. We reached the waterfall and Brianna, Madison, Darcy and I climbed up another rock ledge even higher. Some of the water falling off these high cliffs looked like snow falling. My leg muscles were starting to twitch and did not respond as quickly to my commands. It felt good to be tired and a little achy from all the exercise.

After we hiked back to the car and drove back down the mountain we parked at a shop on the main street in order to find a restroom. The restroom led to us walking down to a large stream littered with small and huge rocks. We all jumped and climbed over the rocks. Madison and Brianna managed to cross a stream by jumping from rock to rock. Darcy and I soon followed, but we were less adept. Darcy was nervous and I was old, fat and nervous, which made chances of succeeding even slimmer.

(Cara) - Krista, Natalie and I stayed behind. The weather was overcast and chilly and the thought of wet clothes and shoes due to a misstep was enough to keep my rock climbing to a minimum. Krista didn't want Natalie to follow the others, but Natalie was quite game. She spent the time whining and crying and begging to be allowed to follow the others, but the roaring of the rapids drowned out most of that for me. Unfortunately, it didn't for her mother and there were some tense moments at which I tried to intersperse more of my wisdom on her child. It was not welcome.

I decided to head back via some different rocks. I had to climb down the big rock I was standing on to a medium-sized rock. From that rock, I went on a tiny one just a tad below the surface of the water, but since I was in my "clodhopper" sneakers my foot didn't get wet. From there I climbed on to another small rock. It was quite a stretch, but I did it and was quite proud until I realized there was no way to continue on to the side of the shore. 

I hadn't been able to see what was on the other side of the small rock, but there was nothing but water. Now I was stuck because getting from the small rock to the medium rock would require some arm strength. Despite my daily weight lifting regime, I wasn't sure I could make it, but I attempted it. My sneaker got wet this time around and I had to huff and puff and push and strain.....until Krista walked over, grabbed me under the armpits and hauled me to safety. Who knew she was such a heroine.

Brianna and Madison eventually rejoined us and we began climbing rocks in the opposite direction to get back to shore. Every once in a while we would turn and look for Kelly and Darcy, but they seemed content to remain where they were - or so we thought. 

The next time I turned around to check on them Kelly had her pant legs rolled up to her knees, her socks and shoes off, and she was in Broad River with Darcy clinging to her back. Darcy: (looking down into the clear water) "Those rocks must be hurting your feet, Kelly! Thank you for saving my life!"

We finally got back to land and ventured down some stairs to a gem mining company. The prices were ridiculously expensive, but I insisted that Krista fork over half the money for a small bucket of dirt so that her girls could have the gem mining experience.

(Natalie) - It was fun. I found some blue gems. I thought it was awesome. You had to put the dirt into this pan that had little square holes, and then you had to shake the pan so you could get to the gems. We put our gems into plastic bags. I'm going to take them home. Everyone likes my gems.

(Cara) - After our trip into Chimney Rock, we headed back to the resort. We were tired, sore and cold. We whipped up a fine dinner of spaghetti, Caesar salad and garlic bread. Kelly made another fire and we relaxed. No electrical problems. A nice end to a nice day.