Pisgah Mountain Range - Mt Pisgah

MOUNT PISGAH

When George Vanderbilt looked from his bedroom window each morning from his palatial villa outside of the hamlet of Asheville, North Carolina, there was to the south, a mountain looming in the distance. It marked the boundary of his estate. It is Mt. Pisgah.  

It was just below the summit of this mountain that he constructed his hunting camp where it is said he resided most summers.  Buck Spring Lodge was torn down in 1963 leaving only stone foundations as remnants of a once glorious past.

But the views that Vanderbilt enjoyed are still there.  

 In 1776, James Hall accompanied Gen. Gordon Rutherford to the French Broad River valley to put down a Cherokee insurrection.  Noting the rich land in the valley, he compared it to that given to the children of Israel. Presbyterian minister George Newton picked up on the parallel and is credited to naming the highest peak over looking the river valley, "Mt. Pisgah".

Getting there is pretty easy.  Take the Blue Ridge Parkway south from Asheville and at milepost 408 you turn left into the Mt. Pisgah parking lot.  The first overlook to the right takes you to the short trail to the Buck Spring Lodge site.  

The upper parking lot is to the left where you find the trail head to Mt. Pisgah. There are many outstanding overlooks within short walks of both parking lots.

Mt. Pisgah at 5721 feet is easy to spot as it looms large over the ridge and unfortunately sports an ugly antenna for WLOS television station. There ought to be a law against defacing such a magnificent mountain with such an ugly structure!

The trail is labeled a 1.5 mile trail with 712 feet in elevation. I am not sure of mountain distances anymore.  It seemed longer and steeper to me but what does a Fat Bald White Guy know?  It starts off easy enough with a wide forest trail that soon becomes wet from the many springs on the mountain, including this one with a nice small waterfall.  



A fall hike up Mt. Pisgah is a treat in that the sparseness of the leaves affords the hiker with many opportunities to view the surrounding mountainsides from forest windows.  

The overcast day provided for many distant mountain tops to be spotlit by the sun piercing though the parting clouds, giving this one mountain a "snowcap" effect.   We also got a glimpse of the Blue Ridge Parkway noting the elevation we were climbing!

Of course the best thing about the many forest windows is that it provided the FBWG with a chance to stop and catch his breath while taking a photo.  

By the way did I tell you the trail was steep? The trail starts out with a gentle incline, turns into a creek then becomes a steep rock path up a mountain and finally steeper steps to the summit.

At the top of the first section of rock stairs there is a switchback and at this place we got one of the better pictures of the day.  The peak to the far right is Fryingpan Mountain and atop this peak is a fire tower. More on that in another blog!

From this overlook the path turns toward the summit of Mt. Pisgah and about half way up offered two more forest window views. 

At the summit we were met with the ugly monstrosity of the television transmission tower. Fortunately an observation deck was constructed beside it. Still what should have been a 360 degree view of the mountains was reduced to a 270 degree view.  I know.. not bad... but this is Mt Pisgah, and I am sure Moses got to see all the Promised Land without having to worry about the television viewers of WLOS.  The FBWG wants some of that same love, that's all.

Enough complaining....what we saw was breathtaking!  In every direction but one, there was a picture that needed to be taken.  Words cannot describe the wonderful interplay of color and light the overcast day provided. 

There appeared to be an endless sea of mountain tops in every directions.  Clouds dipping low seemed to lift just enough for us to see the panorama of nature laid before us.

In the distance we could make out the city of Asheville and I even could zoom in on the Biltmore Estate some 25 miles away!

Some individual features of the scenery caught my attention. I zoomed in on "The Pisgah Inn"   It is managed by the park service and has some of the most incredible views of any rooms of lodging in the world.  And is this an unusual mountain top home or a ski slope?

But the best thing about hiking is the nice people you meet on the trail.  Something about being on the trail makes people extra friendly.  We met Anna and Frank on top of Mt. Pisgah.  They are from Raleigh and are fellow NC State alums.  Of course I offered to make them famous by placing their picture in the blog and they agreed.  A great looking couple!

Needless the say the hike down the mountain was considerably easier.  After seeing the wonderful vista from atop Mt. Pisgah, we felt exhilarated and refreshed.  But as is our custom, we paused and built a cairn and with every stone thanked our Creator for the magnificence of His creation and the privilege of our experience.

In fact we even got another hike in later in the afternoon. 
Note the firetower on the mountain peak to the right. That is our next destination -Fryingpan Mountain. Check out our Fryingpan Mountain Blog entry!

Rating this hike is easy....access is a 10...easy to find and park....trail is an 8...muddy and rocky but well marked and maintained... scenery is a 9....would have been a 10 but for WLOS...don't ever watch that station!....effort to view ratio is solid....hard but short climb but the payoff is huge 

...a solid 9 hike....if you visit Asheville ....take this hike!