mrfs.net – the little trips pages

Little Bradley Falls is in the Green River Gamelands near Saluda, NC. Easiest access is via a red-blazed trail that leaves across the road (Holbert Cove) from the trail to Big Bradley Falls. The trail follows the creek about a mile to the falls which are quite scenic.

Little Bradley Falls

 There’s a lovely (if murky) swimming hole at most water levels here although it’s a substantially longer hiker than the more popular swimming holes on the way to Big Bradley Falls. On the plus side, you can actually see Little Bradley Falls close up without risking your life.

Little Bradley Falls

Another bonus is that along the trail we found several wineberry bushes with ripe berries. Wineberries are a close relative of the raspberry.

There are a bunch of waterfalls in DuPont State Forest, most of which we have neglected to visit so we decided to check out a couple of them.

Triple Falls

Triple Falls – named for obvious reasons is only about a quarter mile hike along the river. The only vantage point where you can see all three sections is from the trail well above it but there were people scattered all over the rocks at each level of the falls.

High Falls

Another half mile or so down the same trail is the creatively named High Falls. There are probably about 5 “High Falls” within 30 miles of our house and oddly enough none of them are really all that high. This is a rather popular picknicking area. There are several nice pavillions on the ridge above the falls which no one uses. Instead, most people prefer the rocks at the base of the falls.

Trout below Triple Falls

Also partial to the base of the falls is Trout. This is actually a little ways below Triple Falls but it was a moderately hot day. This hike appears to generally be very popular with dogs.

South Mountains State Park is about halfway between Asheville and Charlotte, located off a confusing network of roads south of Morganton. Despite the relative difficulty in getting there, it was pretty crowded on the day we went.

South Mountains State Park

The park has a dense network of trails in the eastern half. By far the biggest draw is High Shoals Falls which is about a mile or so from the parking area. Several different sources bill this hike as easy. While it’s short it actually involves a lot of climbing on uneven, slippery stairs.

High Shoals Falls

Technically, there’s no swimming at the falls although we saw about 20 people directly in front of the no swimming sign. There are a multitude of decent swimming holes along the trail though which generally follows the bank of the river.

Setrock Falls

After the short hike to Roaring Fork Falls we drove over to the Black Mountain campground.  The setrock trail branches off of a campground road and once the trail starts it’s only about a quarter mile to the falls.

Setrock Creek

There’s a shallow rocky pool at the bottom of setrock falls so it’s not as good for swimming as roaring fork is.  From here, we headed up to the Blue Ridge Parkway