South Mountains State Park

 June 5, 2020

We were going stir-crazy from quarantine and wanted to get out of town so we decided to take a weekend trip to see some mountains and waterfalls. Once we settled on Mt. Mitchell as our main attraction, we decided to find an airbnb near Marion to stay for two nights. This was very Covid safe and also was a little like camping without the actual camping! Our agenda included South Mountains State Park and Tom's Creek waterfall on Friday, Mount Mitchell summit and nature trail followed by Roaring Fork Falls and Setrock Creek Falls on Saturday, and Chimney Rock Park on Sunday. We loved where we stayed and we had a fun yet tiring trip!

Although it was Friday and not the weekend yet, we wanted to get to South Mountains as early as we could so we could make sure to get a parking spot. State parks in NC had been getting record high attendance during quarantine because well, there's not much else to do! I think we got there by 10am and had no trouble parking. It's south of Morganton, about an hour and a half from our house. 

We were really impressed with this park and its trails. They were well marked and wide. There is one waterfall here, High Shoals Falls, so I think this path is the most crowded. We didn't stick around to explore any other trails but would come back some day. High Shoals Falls loop trail is 2.4 miles including the 80 foot tall waterfall. Elevation gain is 557 feet. We are learning that when trails are marked as moderate on All Trails, that means pretty strenuous for us! There were many water views on the way to the falls of the creek and small falls, and there are observation platforms when you get near High Shoals Falls. From there it might make more sense to just turn around and head back the way you came, but this was our first hike of the trip and we were excited so we continued on the loop which meant so many stairs to get to the top of the falls and then back down to the parking lot through the forest area.

Logan took some pictures with his DSLR camera

Spotted a copperhead near the path

While there is no wading or swimming at the falls, there is a nice area near the parking lot where we had our picnic lunch and the kids splashed around. This was a great start to our weekend and our next stop was Tom's Creek Falls!