Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, October 4, 1993 TAG: 9310070420
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BILL COCHRAN OUTDOOR EDITOR
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
On Oct. 17, members of the Roanoke Appalachian Trail Club will take a look at their handiwork during the first organized hike on the new route. Volunteers from the club, along with Jefferson National Forest workers and a summer work crew, accomplished the relocation.
``Over a three-year period, we had about 120 different people who worked on the relocation, and I figured about 4,000 work hours,'' said Charles Parry, the club's trail supervisor.
The project was another phase of getting the trail through a maze of roads and traffic in the Troutville area in order to send it along a more underdeveloped corridor.
The trail had followed a 1.5-mile stretch of Virginia 652 in Botetourt County, a once-idyllic rural road that now carries a growing load of subdivision traffic.
``When I came here in 1971, it wasn't all that bad to hike, but there has been a lot of development in Botetourt County, and now people use the road as a shortcut to work and various places,'' said Parry, who is a math professor at Virginia Tech.
The relocation is one of several stretches of trail being fine-tuned along the club's 115-mile area of obligation. Members also recently have been laboring to get the trail off blacktop in Sinking Creek Valley and on Brushy Mountain.
``A group of us first walked the Fullhart Knob relocation nine years ago this Thanksgiving,'' said Parry.
Fullhart Knob lacks the God-like vistas of McAfee Knob and Dragon's Tooth, but it is a nice walk in the woods, especially when the autumn leaves send streaks and splashes of brilliant color across the horizon.
From a parking area along U.S. 11 at the southern end of Troutville (0.7 miles north of Cash Building Supply), you hike northward through rolling farm fields, then hit the woods and climb toward Fullhart Knob.
Or is it Fulhardt Knob? Or Fullhardt Knob?
The name changes from map to map; publication to publication; person to person.
In the Appalachian Trail Guide, published by the Appalachian Trail Conference, it is Fullhardt. It was spelled that way, too, on the official 1941 Jefferson National Forest map. But the forest's new district maps, as well as the new topo maps, use Fullhart. In the Trail Blazer, the newsletter of the Roanoke AT Club, it is Fulhardt Knob.
Joe Hedrick, forest ranger on the Glenwood District of the Jefferson, isn't sure what is behind the evolution of the name. What is certain, it is Fullhart on the new trail signs that went up about a week ago.
All this and the trail really doesn't cross the apex of the knob. It travels just north of the 2,676-foot peak, through oaks and hickories that grow from beds of ferns and berry bushes.
Near the knob, a short, blue-blazed side trail leads to an overlook, one of the vocal points of the route. It is a fine place for a hiker to sit momentarily and munch gorp while looking onto Read Mountain and the Roanoke Valley beyond.
It is just over three miles to the overlook, which makes the round trip a dandy half-day hike. If you continue north to the Fullhart Knob structure, a three-sided log shelter with the aroma of a thousand campfires, you've traveled the entire relocation, about 3.9 miles.
For hikers who prefer to deadhead a vehicle and hike from one car to another, without retracing their path, the north end of the new trail can be reached from Salt Pond Road. Take a right off U.S. 11, north of Troutville, onto Virginia 640, then 711 and finally 191.
Look for a sharp bend in Salt Pond Road with a nearby forest service gate. There isn't much parking space here, but the trip from Salt Pond Road to the trail is a modest uphill climb. If you want to make a one-way trip from U.S. 11 to Salt Pond Road, it is best done north to south, since that will give you a downhill slant.
``It doesn't have the scenic appeal of Dragon's Tooth or McAfee Knob, but if people want to get out a day when the leaves are turning, this is nice,'' said Parry. ``It is close to Roanoke, and, personally, I don't like to go to McAfee Knob where you have to fight the crowds.''
by CNB