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January 03, 2006
Hiking at Lost Maples
(stealing Marius's format for these entries)
Hiked on: December 28th, 2005
Weather conditions: 80F or thereabouts. Clear skies. No precip on ground.
Elevation: 2000-2300 (more, actually, but I don't have a topo for the park)
Location: near Vanderpool, TX
Pictures: none
TPWD: http://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/spdest/findadest/parks/lost_maples/
Distance: 13mi
I went on this trail with some friends from ASS (Bryan, Tina, Sarah, Clint, Joe, Andrey, and Julie). The trail is very developed for the most part, with steep ascents often resulting in steps being cut out of the mountain. The first half of the hike was a bit slow. We did the East Trail at about a mile a hour, mostly because we were busy taking photos and looking at the scenery. Andrey especially had a firm plan to take a certain number of photos of "nice things". Towards the West Trail, things are a bit less picturesque and the trail gets a bit rougher.
Bryan and I separated from the group to complete the West Loop. It was more rugged than the main trail, with the same elevation change we had previously completed (up and down rock slides instead of steps, however). We made good time, and finished the eight miles in maybe 4 hours.
Notes: hiking shoes would be nice for dry trails like this. My trekking poles worked a wonder.
Posted by jeff at January 3, 2006 02:04 PM