at 6:30am the official event ends and the real fun begins. we will shove off and drive about 2 hours arriving at The Slade, Ky rest area at MM 33 on the Bert T Combs Mountain Parkway. This will be a Last TOILET potty break until dinner time. The Red River Gorge-ous as I call it is nick named the Land of the Arches, is home to around 100+ natural stone arches including the famous Natural Bridge which we will be on top of just shy of dinner time.
Our first hike will be around a mile on 2 terrain trails at Sky Bridge. This is a very popular and very scenic at picturesque so bring those cameras
Our second hike will be around 2.5 miles round trip all on travails at Rock Bridge State Natural Area. Rock Bridge hike is my personal favorite of the whole area including the only arch that has a flowing river under it. The sandy bottom is a wonderful place to wade and walk thru the overpass if you will. About 500' upstream is the beautiful Creation Falls. Gc43kq9 is the EC there and you can see the pictures of how pretty this is ( let's hope for some rain over night ending around 5am so the falls will be flowing nicely.
The trail from this point back to parking goes thru one of the tallest forest canopies in Ky. The average tree here is around 150' tall including a few old growth White Pine and Hemlock.
Our Third hike will be around 1.5 miles but will seem farther. This is in Natural Bridge State park and we will be taking the original trail up ( which includes what is known as fat man's misery. The trail here is about 15" wide with solid rock on both sides of you for about 120' the the stairs to the top. We will descend on trail 2 Balanced rock trail ( lots of steps ).
Our next stop is dinner at the State Park Lodge Restraunt. Good ole down home cookin' buffet style. Oh it's good and you will need this for energy to do our sunset hike to a lesser known place called Pilot Knob. This is where Daniel Boone named Ky the Bluegrass State. This is one of the best overlooks in all of Ky ( that I have seen, and I've seen a lot ). The hike is up a moderately steep hill on an official trail for the first mile then a granule climb to the summit in the last half mile. You will want flashlights for the return hike.
If you need to leave early, please drive separately. The hardest hike on the day will be around 3.5 terrain. Total hiking distance on the day will be around 8-11 miles. Drivers?? Riders please share gas costs with your drivers. Mileage will be around 280 on the day, driving. My Susie gets around 27 mpg with gas costs at 2.40 at time of submission, fuel cost will be around $24.00 split 4 ways is $6.00 a person. That is an EXTREME bargain to get to see what we will see on this day. In case of really bad weather, this hike may be postponed but it will NOT be cancelled.