BY MARGARET LILLARD Associated Press
The Herald-Sun
Sunday, July 13, 2003

FALLS LAKE STATE RECREATION AREA -- The Mountains to Sea Trail is a long walk, and a lot more -- a 900-mile-long monument to the kaleidoscope of North Carolina's landscape.

One day, the completed path will snake through 37 counties, from Clingman's Dome in the west to Jockey's Ridge in the east. Right now, it's less than half established, but hikers can still find plenty to appreciate from the mountains to the Sandhills to the sandy beaches.

"You have the potential to see all of the spectacular resources of the state, from the coastal plains to some of the highest mountains -- or will have," said Phil McKnelly, director of the state Division of Natural Resources. "There's going to be basically something for everybody."

The trail has its genesis in the N.C. Trails System Act, passed by the Legislature in 1973, which created an advisory board called the N.C. Trails Committee.

In a speech to the committee in 1977, Howard Lee, head of what's now the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, suggested creating a cross-state footpath. It would be stitched together using land culled from federal, state and local governments as well as private property easements.

The path grew by bits and pieces through the 1980s and '90s. The Cape Hatteras Beach Trail was designated a section of the MST in 1982, paths along Falls Lake were added in 1987 and 1991, and dozens of miles in the mountains were included between 1991 and 1997.

Right now, the MST is most complete in the mountains and is little more than a mapmaker's dream in the east. To walk the entire route means taking a hodgepodge of footpaths, streets and backroad bike routes. Only five people have "through-hiked" -- backwoods parlance for traversing the whole trail in one trip.

When it might be finished is anyone's guess, according to Jeff Brewer, president of the Friends of the Mountains to Sea Trail, a private group coordinating volunteer efforts to help build the route.

"It takes time, patience and a lot of red tape," he said. "I think I'll be real lucky if I see it complete in my lifetime, and I'm 26. It's a slow-going process, dealing with all the land agencies, but we're doing the best we can."

In the meantime, there are plenty of finished sections to pique hikers' interest and give a glimpse of what the MST may one day become.

The route -- existing and planned -- is outlined in painstaking detail with maps, photos and descriptions in "Hiking North Carolina's Mountains-to-Sea Trail," by Allen de Hart. The book, published by the University of North Carolina Press in November 2000, is due to be updated next year, Brewer said.

Trails near Lakes Brandt and Townsend at Greensboro and Falls Lake north of Raleigh offer Triad and Triangle hikers several easygoing day hike options and are a good choice for families.

More than 20 miles in Bur-Mil Park outside Greensboro and 26 miles along Falls Lake are now officially part of the MST's route. Like much of what has been designated part of the trail so far, they are largely on government-owned parkland.

Private property owners granted rights of way for the Sauratown Trail from Pilot Mountain to Hanging Rock through Stokes County. The hiking-equestrian trail became the newest official segment of the MST last summer.

On a more strenuous level, the longest continuous section of MST-designated trail -- almost 230 miles -- runs through the Pisgah National Forest, tracing the Blue Ridge Parkway from Balsam Gap at US 23/74 to Blowing Rock.

The second-longest finished section -- and the first to be designated part of the MST -- is in the Outer Banks, running 112 miles from the Cedar Island Ferry to Jockey's Ridge.

Other small designated segments cut through Cherokee, Ashe, Alleghany, Durham, Wayne, Craven, Pamlico and Carteret counties.

Some existing trails have been earmarked for inclusion, though not yet officially designated part of the MST. Other parts of the route have yet to be cleared.

The most incomplete area is in the east. There, the project got a boost from the devastating floods of Hurricane Floyd in 1999 and the decision to use formerly residential land along the Neuse River for recreation.

Interest among outdoor enthusiasts has built since de Hart, the 77-year-old oracle of hikers in and around North Carolina, finished his book.

"It's amazing to me since the guidebook came out how many people have started section-hiking it, and even through-hiking it," said Brewer, who was a student of de Hart's at Louisburg. "Without that book, people were totally clueless on where to go."

De Hart and Alan Householder were the first to through-hike the trail, in 1997. Jason Pass of Waynesville hiked and biked the route last fall.

This spring, Asheville residents Nadja Miller and Katie Senechal became the fourth and fifth through-hikers, starting April 2 and reaching the Outer Banks on June 28.

The two college students decided more than a year ago that they wanted to do a through-hike somewhere, Miller said, but "the Appalachian Trail was too long for our schedule, with school and all. So we had heard of the MST and it was a good length for us to hike."

"We thought the change of terrain would be interesting, in the mountains, in the Piedmont and ending on the coast on the beach," she said.

Though disappointed by the amount of walking that had to be done on the shoulder of backroads, Miller said the route benefited by passing through scores of small towns. Determined to stick to their hikers' routine, Miller and Senechal foraged for places to sleep instead of renting hotel rooms.

"Every night we'd have no idea where we'd put up our tent. We'd knock on people's doors if we didn't find a secluded place to put up our tent," Miller said. "We met farmers, people in towns, who let us sleep in their fields or gave us hay sheds to sleep in."

At a roadside hot dog stand in Cove City, they met a group of workers from a trucking repair company in Trenton, near New Bern, who fed them, then let them use a shower in the shop and sleep on the floor "next to the semis," she said. "They adopted us."

"That's the big thing about this trip for me. ... People are still very hospitable and generous to travelers," Miller said. "It's a good proof that you can still travel adventurously."

On the Net:

N.C. Trails System information on Mountains to Sea Trail: http://www.ils.unc.edu/parkproject/trails/m2c/home.html

Friends of the Mountains to Sea Trail: http://www.ncmst.org