July 2010 Hike

The Clarion County Chapter of the North Country Trail Association held a monthly hike on Saturday, July 17, 2010.

Seven hikers headed off from the trail head at White Oak Drive at about 10:20 in the morning on what turned out to be about a 7.6 mile hike.  The original seven hikers were Dave Galbreath, Ed Scurry, Devin Callihan, Gene Stiglitz, Katie Callihan, Brian Pidgeon and Dan Ochs.

It was a beautiful, but hot and humid day in Northwestern Pennsylvania.  This section of the trail follows a path that has been thoughtfully placed on beautiful hillsides and old logging roads as it winds through relaxing conifer and hardwood forests.  Everyone reveled at the sight of the occasional interesting plant, flower, or fungi found in a forest basking in the sunlight of a mid-summers day.

After reaching Breniman Road, the band proceeded on a .7 mile road walk down the road and across the bridge over Toby Creek.  We entered the forest again on the other side of Toby Creek and began the second half of our journey.

For the first part of this section, the trail follows the hillside above Toby Creek.  Along this part of the hike, the group stopped to several times to find some geocaches located along the trail.  The trail descends again to Toby Creek and meets up with it, but does not cross it, at Game Lands Lane (a gated game commission road bisecting Game Lands 72).  The group found another geocache at this location, and took the opportunity to take a rest and a picture at the nice bridge that the Game Commission has across Toby Creek.

After this short break came the most challenging part of the hike.  The trail follows Game Lands Lane at this point, which ascends pretty rapidly from Toby Creek.  The group slowly broke apart into 2 slightly spaced out groups for this part of the walk, and the first group got a little bit of a break in the shade where the trail leaves Game Lands Lane, while waiting for the second group.

Once the hikers were all back together again and standing around talking, we were joined by another hiker, Frank Ochs, traveling towards us on the trail.  Frank joined our group as we hiked across the wide open mountaintop on Game Lands 72.  This area offered some pretty spectacular views even though it was very hot and the sun was not letting up in the cloudless sky.

At the “Duck Ponds”, the group briefly stopped to hide a geocache and then continued along the trail towards the boar farm and Rapp Run.  As we entered the forest again from the wide open hilltop, the trail follows briefly along a boar farm and the hikers kept looking to the right, through the fences, trying to catch a glimpse of a boar.  No boars today.

On the last mile or so of the hike, the group found a few more geocaches and stopped briefly to sign the trail log book located beside Rapp Run.

Our band reached the trail head at approximately 2:30 PM.  It was another great day along the North Country Trail in Clarion County Pennsylvania.