Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page. It is also available as plain text as well as XML.

( O October 21 ml 19 9 3 rFU I his ovv By BRYAN MEMS c Staff Writer C I left Greenville on U.S 276 with tempera- f tures in the low 50s. A few clouds brushed 1 the sky over the hazy blue ridge, and deep c reds and yellows scorched the mountain a slopes. 1 Driving north from Marietta to the Cleve- ^ land community, the highway narrowed to f two lanes. The golden October sunlight set v the hickory, maple, ash and oak leaves ^ aglow. At the intersection with S.C Highway J 11, the Cherokee Foothills Scenic Highway, I stopped at the Cleveland Grocery where r Clifton Croggins was boiling peanuts in a ^ huge propane burner. White, Styrofoam cups f rimmed with steaming highway twisted and turned for six miles on 1 its course to Caesars Looking Glass Falls in Head Scale Park, National Forest is a po which has as its cen- motorists traveling U. terpiece a rock outcropping 3,266 feet in elevation. Hordes of ^ leaf-lookers from throughout the Carolinas, ^ Georgia and elsewhere were enjoying picnic c nkrx.al V 1U11CI10, lUgglllg CU111CU1UCI5 U11 UIC11 M1UU1ders and gawking at the panorama of Table i Rock Mountain, a wall of granite looming v more than 3,100 feet in elevation. 1 Pointing to a cluster of buildings at the ^ base of Paris Mountain, one youngster said, ^ "Look, I can see downtown Greenville!" Indeed, from this vantage point, you can see 0 much of the Upstate and a slice of Northeast v Georgia. On the clearest days, I have even c spotted the TW Services building in down- 11 town Spartanburg, 30 miles east of ^ Greenville, through my binoculars. A mile from the Caesars Head State Park BUCKLE Dver the Rive mil rt n Wr lUUfell 111C VYl hought of getting away? Bry ? the road to idyllic North Ca eace of mind and a quiet sp< n. >verlook, I parked at the head of the Raven Fi Dliff Falls trail, which meanders 2.2 miles to C taven Cliff Falls, a 400-foot cascade near 2 he headwaters of Millers Creek. A wooden b< >bservation deck at the end of the trail offers R in unobstructed view of what must be one of le he most pristine waterfalls in the Carolinas. s< rhe Raven Cliff Falls Trail also follows a Si ragment of the 70-mile long Foothills Trail, tc vhich begins at Jones Gap State Park in a! jreenvnie county ana extends to wmtewater ra alls in Oconee County. d' If you're not up to tackling the 4.4 mile d< ound trip hike on the Raven Cliff Falls Trail, ki J.S. 276 has a handful of waterfalls within a "1 ew yards of the roadside. Connestee Falls, ai located between Bre- st vard, N.C., and Cedar st Mountain, N.C., is one fc of them. I spent a few si minutes walking around Connestee ai Falls where I hap- gi pened upon three Bre- vi vard College graduates di who were spending a R weekend in the West- th ern North Carolina m mountains. "We just b) wished we lived clos- th er," said Melanie m Hansen of Greensboro, gi N.C. C Bryan Mims/The Gamecock Stretch, U.S. 276 ly i the Pisgah turned into a four- si ipular scene for lane commercial strip hi S. 276. as it passed through R Brevard, N.C. But at tu tie boundary of the Pisgah National Forest, C? tie clear, chilly water of the Davidson River ne hurned through a maze of rocks. Fishermen of /ere perched on the banks. America's first forestry school began in th /hat is now the Pisgah National Forest in w 898. Carl Schenck, a forester at George w fanderbilt's Biltmore Estate in Asheville, ai J.C., founded the school in an effort to better ;ach his apprentices. The school remained in ap peration until 1913 when colleges ana uniersities began offering similar forestry to ourses. In 1914, the land was sold to the C lational government and became the Pisgah National Forest, which has the nickname to Cradle of Forestry in America." th A paved trail beginning at the Cradle of th up; irs1 r, )ods an Mims . m . I to )t to call - . ?. v, xestry Visitors enter on U.S. ^ M^id^|. 76, four miles ;low the Blue idge Parkway, I ads the m :henck lectured i his students. It HHjH so passes the I ngers' the stu nown as the I Hell Hole" ? id the commis- I try where the bought other After strolling k ^jBWP sitors center, I I ie famed 470- ^ ^ ile Scenic Bryan Mims/The Gamecock ^way that winds Jennifer Bowling and Michael Lee of Greenville enjoy a pi cnic irougn me lunch from an overlook along U.S. 276 near Caesars Head State ountains of Vir- Park, inia and North arolina. Not far from the intersection with In 1981, Collins and his wife moved from .S 276, a moderate hiking trail leads from Dothan, Ala., and "planted apple trees from e parkway to the observation deck atop Mt. scratch." They now have 200 acres of apples, isgah. You can distinguish this peak for strawberries, peaches, com and tobacco. But lies around by WLOS-TV s transmitter these days, Collins believes he's witnessing wer producing from its summit. the demise of agriculture in Western North On the other side of the parkway, I entered Carolina e Cruso community, Nine miles of Friend- . & People Plus One Old Crab" as the wooden in ustry. gn along U.S 276 proclaimed. Here, the 1 seeing this as the onset of Daytona ghway zigzagged across the East Pigeon Beach, he said. There is a need to photoiver, and forests gave way to small pas- graph all of the old buildings and document ires, modest homes and mom-and-DOD the history." tmpgrounds. Smoke billowed out of chim- I kept that in mind as I traveled through ;ys, tingeing the autumn air with the scent Haywood County, but it soon occurred to me burning wood. that in spite of the changes, much remains Closer to Waynesville, N.C., I pulled into the same in this wedge of Western North ,e gravel parking lot of Collins Orchard Carolina Perh n0 lace illustrates ,hal here two wh.te-haired Urd.es from Fiona. ^ ^ F , & ? s 2 ere inspecting 25 vaneues of apples while ... XT_ ' .other woman wouldn't stop bickering. Whynesv.lle, N.C., where old men in overalls iVhat are we going to do with all these st'" 8atber everyday to solve the world s )ples?" she snapped. problems or just to reminiscence about old Chatt Collins, owner of the orchard, said times. crisis help keep apple growers in Haywood To those who know the mountains as they ounty afloat. were generations ago, the four-lane highways "The Eastern apple industry is giving way and interstates are welcome sights. But all of ? Washington State," he said. "The main us occasionally long for the slower pace of ling that keeps it going is the tourist trade mountain backroads. U.S. 276 offers a ip tirrxn r\f \roo?* " ' 3 generous dose of the past flavor. fflE LAW 1HB