8 MIles of Trails Town of Old Fort After Helene Repairs

U.S. Forest Service - Press Release National Forests in North Carolin: With the help of our partners in McDowell County, we’ve opened 8 miles of trails and additional parking today in the Town of Old Fort, North Carolina, after months of Helene-related repair work.

These trails provide new connections in the Old Fort Trail Project, which now has 20 miles of trails open for are now open for hiking, biking, and horseback riding.

The new trails include:

- Catawba View Trail: This 1.5-mile loop trail adds a new beginner experience at the Gateway Trails. 
- Deep Cove Trail: This 3-mile trail connects to areas higher up on Jarrett Creek Road and is open to horses, mountain bikes and hiking. 
- Camp Rock Trail (B3): This 2.5-mile mid-country trail addition climbs up Jerdon Mountain and then descends along a ridge back to the road.. 
- Jerdon Connector: This short half-mile trail connects the end of Jerdon Mountain Road back to Jarrett Creek Road, creating an easy loop for horses, mountain bikes and hiking. 
- Stagecoach: Connecting from the back of the Old Fort Picnic area at the bottom of Kitsuma, this half-mile hiking trail winds along Swannanoa Creek and up to the grassy Swannanoa Creek Road. 
Alternate parking areas are now open at the Gateway Trailhead (new Meadows Parking) and at Camp Grier’s Allison Trailhead on Mill Creek Road. These parking areas provide additional access to the trails while the Gateway and Bernard Mountain trailheads await reconstruction from major flooding and landslides. The bridge is still out before the Gateway Trailhead, so users must carefully rock-hop or ford across Curtis Creek. 

Information and an interactive map for trail conditions in the Grandfather Ranger District can be found at www.g5trailcollective.org/helene.
While these openings alone are a major accomplishment, the story of overcoming the damage from Helene to get them open to the public highlights how partners overcame challenges over the last 8 months. 
Just days before Helene struck, staff from the Grandfather Ranger District joined Camp Grier’s G5 Trail Collective to inspect one of the new trails—the final step to sign-off on the construction prior to opening. Towards the end of their inspection, they got caught in a sudden downpour, the first wave of the pre-Helene rainfall event. Running down from the ridge, the team was all soaked and smiles at the trailhead, excited that this trail project was ready to open to the public. 

That was all before Helene dropped 30 inches of rain onto Old Fort’s mountains and winds whipped down the trees. Once the storm passed and access was restored, the G5 Trail Collective were able to assess the conditions, but the damage to the new trails was severe. Over the next 6 months, hundreds of large trees were cut off the trails, with a huge effort from G5, their volunteers and Forest Service chainsaw crews from around the nation. After months of hard work, it is finally time to open. 

For more information openings and closings across the entire Pisgah National Forest, visit www.fs.usda.gov/nfsnc and follow the National Forests in North Carolina on Facebook at U.S. Forest Service - National Forests in North Carolina.