Water Source as GSMNP BC42

[HooKooDooKu]

Does anyone know if their is a water source at Spruce Mountain campsite (BC42), or do we need to look for water as we come up the hill?

This is the campsite that is now at the end of the dead-end trail off of Balsam Mtn road (the trail used to continue as Polls Gap Trail, but the park service no longer maintains that trail).

And speaking of Polls Gap Trail, does anyone know if that trail is still passable? I'll be parked in Cataloochee, so Polls Gap/Rough Fork would be an alternate return path.

[hiker33]

I haven't been there in ten+ years but there used to be a good spring under the rhododendrons at the back of the campsite. Hopefully someone will post more recent info.

The PGT was bad even when it was officially maintained. It was gullied 8 feet deep in places by horse traffic and very overgrown with greenbriars and blackberry. Unless there's been unauthorised clearing its probably impassable. You could use Palmer Creek Trail to return to Cataloochee, depending on where you're coming from.


The loop of Rough Fork/Polls Gap/Spruce Mountain/Palmer Creek used to be one of the better overnight loops in the park but that's long in the past.

[HooKooDooKu]

Palmer Creek is the planned route.

I only thought about Poles Gap as an alternative when I saw it came right up to the campsite when I was double checking trail names and campsites for this post. The 2009 edition of the Little Brown Book still describes Polls Gap, but with the note "The park service no longer maintains this eroded, overgrown trail."

[hiker33]

Looking back I see that I was last there in 1999. In addition to the briars, a lot of dead spruce and hemlock had come down across the trail. We ripped our clothes up pretty good by the time we reached the campsite. The thorns took over the open clearings on Chiltoes Mountain that were created by the windthrow. All this is to explain likely reasons for why the trail was abandoned.

I assume you want to get this trail because of your 900-miler quest. I don't know why the park maintains this remnant. It now goes nowhere from nowhere. If people want a short hike for an overnight there are better options available.

[TNhiker]

i did polls gap before they closed it and it was very eroded...

that was about 15 years ago or so...

then i tried to do it again about 3 years ago starting at black camp gap (?) where the lower end is and i got about 500 feet in before i turned around....

it was very overgrown and had a ton of blowdowns and i didnt want to deal with it for whatever mileage it would be to get to the campsite..

as for water for the campsite up there---bring some sorta of collection device...

the only water i found was a spring that was on the trail about 300 or so feet from road......

nothing in the immediate campsite area (i think if one goes down hill a touch---it could be found.........but not worth it after filling up on trail on way up).........

fwiw...................that campsite was one of my favorites (ive stayed in every open campsite in park)............

oh, and there used to be a firetower up there as well..............it used to sit going to the left once you hit intersection up top and one would go right towards campsite......

however there were tons of briars in way out to the old site..........

[PatmanTN]

I finished my Smokies trails with that one last summer. TnHiker is correct...no water flowing within a 50 yards radius (that I could find anyway).

Load up at the first small stream on the way up.

There was only one significant blowdown on the trail, was nicely cleared.

[TNhiker]

i looked around for water up there for a while and just gave up...........i had filled up so wasnt in need and didnt want to waste time looking while i could be sitting around a raging fire.....

[HooKooDooKu]

I assume you want to get this trail because of your 900-miler quest.

Playing by the rules of the official "900-Miler-Club", I don't have to do Polls Gap since it is no longer an officially maintained trail. But because the trail is still listed in the Little Brown Book, it would have been interesting to be able to include that trail in my list of hikes I've done in GSMNP.

I also track my progress of hikes I've done beyond what the 900 Miler Club requires. As an example, in addition to hand-written logs of all my hikes, I also maintain an electronic version in Google Earth to track what I've done visually. I started with the GPS data on the park once published at UTK, now available at TNLandForms. I've added to that base data such as mapping out all the roads in the park as well. So while I don't expect to ever hike all the roads in the park, I do change the GPS data colors for sections I have hiked... like the 2.5 mile section of Balsam Mtn road I'm going to have to hike to get from Laural Gap to BC42 this time of year.

[TNhiker]

Playing by the rules of the official "900-Miler-Club", I don't have to do Polls Gap since it is no longer an officially maintained trail.

i thought the person was talking about not doing spruce mountain trail......

[TNhiker]

and looking at the 900 miler club webpage----

found this link....

http://www.900miler.com/900%20Mile%2...te%20Final.htm


it looks sorta like the one i compiled about ten years ago.................very similar.............

[HooKooDooKu]

Well, I didn't find out about water at 42. After the hike up Pretty Hollow Gap, we were pretty tired. And just to top things off, I picked up the wrong boots so my youngest son had to hike in his tennis shoes. After hiking Mount Sterling Ridge to Laural Gap, that made for some wet feet... wet and cold feet because the snow from a few days ago hasn't finished melting up there in shady spots. So we returned to the car the next day down Palmer Creek Trail by-passing the road and hill climb to 42.