The Long Branch Trail

My rating for this hike is: Difficulty 2/5, Skill Required 1/5, Photo Op 2/5

Cell phone access is nil.

The trailhead for this hike is located at the Back Country Information Board (BCIB) near the Standing Indian Campground area. To get there, drive out US 64 west and turn left on Wallace Gap Rd (“Old 64”), then turning right on Forest Service Road 67. Three miles will bring you to the BCIB. Note that you will not bear right into the campground.

This hike is approximately 2 miles each way and should take about one hour to hike each way. It is marked with blue blazes.and rises from 3,420 feet to 4,200.

The trail is generally well maintained, in fact, it would be hard to get off of it.

The hike runs east along Long Branch, crosses the Blackwell Gap Horse Trail, a forest service road, and dead ends into the AT.

There is a horse trail which is also hikable, and is very beautiful at the eastern end. After that, it becomes less so. It does seem that most horse trails cross more streams, and also the streams require more, and deeper wading than the hiking trails do. I would recommend the hiking trail both ways.

There is a cove that dominates this hike. Actually, I’m not sure that it really is a cove because it is so long. You enter it at about the 15 minute mark and stay with it about 30 minutes. There are a lot of different flowers and trees in the cove, and it is a joy to hike any season of the year,

I strongly recommend using a walking staff on any hike, and it is particularly useful here because of the rocky pathway in the cove, the corduroy road, and streams to cross.

Long Branch from BCIB to AT & Return

:00 Start hike - 17N0269565E3884082N Jack-in-pulpit, cherry, birch, sasafras

:03 Left Turn.

:10 Knob - water to left - Rhododendron, birch, beach, white oaks- nurse tree birch, now old

:15 Small cove - very steep slope down from right to left - Mayflower, trillium, buckeye -rhododendren

:21 Ridge rises on right - Flame Azalea. Galex, Mt. Laurel, ferns - blueberry bushes - hemlock - mayflowers

:25 Enter cove - tree step - boulder field water

:30 Great Chestnut stump - Umbrella plant, Carolina lily, wake robin, NJ Tea, buckeye, cohosh, Christmas Fern, Jack-in-pulpit, white violets, witch hazel

:38 Cross stream - Umbrella plant, birch tree rhododendren, mtn maple

:40 Silver maple - running cedar - hemlock - a big chestnut stump not as big as first one

:44 Cross stream - ford - Amazing birch nurse tree - blowdown.

:48 Clearing - 17N0271296E3884114N Cross Orange blazed horse trail. Also fire ring & crab apple tree?

:56 Join up with Long Branch creek on corduroy road

1:00 Gravel road.

1:06 Very large fire ring

1:10 Trail ends at A.T. 17N0271905E3884262N - Logs to sit on, trails that lead off, Blackburning Warbler (June 18, 1996)