Meeting Folks on the Slaughter Creek Trail
Sometimes it’s great to have the entire trail to oneself, to enjoy the silence (or at least the non-human sounds). But, sometimes, it’s kind of interesting to meet people along the trail. That’s what happened as I took the Slaughter Creek Trail, in north Georgia.
The Slaughter Creek Trail starts off at Lake Winfield Scott, which is just a few miles south of Blairsville in the Blood Mountain region. In fact, the trail is an access trail to the Appalachian Trail (AT) and the summit of Blood Mountain. It’s a fairly moderate 5.5 mile trail (round trip), ending at a T-junction with the AT. Most of the intense climbing is around the last quarter of a mile.
The trail itself was pleasant, and very pretty, but I don’t have too much to say about the surroundings. I’ll let the photos speak to that. But as I approached the AT, I met a trio who had gone down the Slaughter Creek trail looking for water to replenish supplies. I let them know that there was some water on down the trail that I had seen. I had not been paying that much attention to looking for water as I had brought plenty for the short trail, and I have a very bad sense of distance, so I told them that it was about a half-mile down the trail. They were a bit disappointed that it was so far, but it was my best estimate.
I got to the AT, and sat on some rocks to do a little reading. I did get a little reading done, but I greeted a number of AT trail hikers passing by. All were very nice folks, and we chatted amiably, and water was one of the topics. Apparently, water was kind of scarce on the AT, and there was supposed to be water around this junction, according to the maps.
I gave these folks my estimate, making it clear that I was in no way certain about the distance. Most decided they were fine and kept on going, but then there was one gentleman coming from the opposite direction on the AT, with a bottle and no pack. He had dropped his pack on the trail and came back this way to look for the water that was supposed to be around that spot. I hadn’t seen any water, and he was not ready to go that distance down the Slaughter Creek Trail. I offered him one of my bottles, as I knew I wouldn’t be that long getting back down, but he started looking around. I joined in, trying to see if I could see where the water was supposed to be.
He found the spring after a little searching, and with his water purification tablets, was able to refill his water supply. As he was finishing up, I realized it was time for me to make my way back down, so we wished each other safe journey, and I headed for Lake Winfield Scott.
As luck (good or bad, depending on who you were) would have it, I ran into the initial trio again on the way back down, making use of a creek that crossed the trail about…a quarter of a mile back down. I felt bad for those who might have benefitted from the quarter mile, rather than a half mile, but when I spoke to the trio, they were glad that it wasn’t as far as I had thought. So, it had been a nice surprise for them. Ah, well, perhaps I’ll try to make a more concerted effort to look for such things in future journeys.
