The Mountain Bridge Passage Trail

The Mountain Bridge Passage is a somewhat new trail near the Jones Gap Area in an area called the Ashmore Heritage Preserve.  The Ashmore Heritage Preserve was created as a partnership between the Naturaland Trust, SC Department of Natural Resources, and SC Parks, Recreation & Tourism.  It covers about 1100 acres. 

I am very sad to report that Becky, my hiking partner for the past year, can no longer go on regular hikes with me.  She took a new job which does not allow for any days off during the week, so if we go again, it’ll have to be on a weekend.  I promise to be in shape the next time we go hiking.  So I turned to my friend from church who said she would love to go hiking – Emily!  Emily has no affiliation to Girl Scouts whatsoever, but that did not stop me from talking Girl Scouts with her!  But it turns out that Emily talks more than me on hikes, if you can believe that!  😉

We went on this hike at the end of October before the wildfires started up in earnest.  This area wasn’t affected.  I found this particular trail on my Jones Gap Area map because Emily didn’t want to do anything too strenuous, but I wanted it long enough to make it worthwhile.  This trail was a perfect choice.  It begins right off of Highway 276 past Marietta, SC (headed north).  There are a couple of different trailheads, but we started at the one closest to 276.  Eventually it winds its way up to the Pinnacle Pass Trail which leads you up to Jones Gap.  We only hiked the first half to the gate.

We arrived on a crisp fall day – a beautiful one for a hike.  And off we went!

Almost immediate we came across the largest ferns I had ever seen in my life and made Emily take a picture of me with them to prove how large they were!  Were we in the amazon?

We arrived at the loop around Wattacoo Lake.  It’s small but beautiful!  Fall was a perfect time to take a picture of the granite outcropping overlooking the lake.

I wish I had read this article before we went on the hike, because I would have made note of the pitcher plants.  I’ll definitely be coming back at some point to check them out.  As you can see on the map, there’s another parking area close to the lake loop, so if you want to just check out the lake without a longer hike, just drive up Persimmon Ridge Road and park there.  This would be a neat little trip with children, although they might whine some on the way out while going back up the steep logging road.  Emily will tell you I did not whine.  No Rainbow Falls flashbacks!

We went around the Wattacoo Lake Loop and got back on the Mountain Bridge Passage Trail and headed upwards.  At first I underestimated this trail and thought it would be about like the ones at Paris Mountain where there’s not much scenery and kind of boring if you’re expecting something like you would find up in the mountains.  But I was wrong!  A little over halfway between the Wattacoo Lake Loop and the gate at Persimmon Ridge Road, we started coming across some granite outcroppings.  They aren’t the ones you see in the picture of Wattacoo Lake though.  But this one had water trickling down from it.  We were in the midst of an extended drought, so I wonder if it’s a little more dramatic during the regular season.  This picture doesn’t really do it justice to show how large it is:

Next we came across a trickling waterfall.  I guess it was supposed to be a waterfall?  Like the outcropping, I’d be interested to see what it looks like normally when we’re not in a drought.

One of my favorite plants is the Hearts a Burstin’ aka Euonymus americanus (I looked that up).  It has a very unique bloom, and I was very excited last year to find a couple of them coming up in my backyard.  Last year the deer got to them before they could bloom, but this year a few escaped the foraging Bambis much to my delight.  We came upon a few in full burstin’ form:

When we got to the gate that hits Persimmon Ridge Road, we stopped for a bit to find a few geocaches in that area.  One cache included a very appropriate fortune cookie slip for that day!

While I slipped down off the road to grab a geocache, Emily stood there waiting.  I told her to strike a magnificent pose for my blog readers, and she obliged:

We turned around at the gate and backtracked.  Coming back, we ran across these peculiar looking acorns.  I’ve seen them on a number of hikes that I’ve been on in the mountains, but I never got around to finding out what they were.  But writing this post spurred me to finally research it, and it is… (drum roll)… THE CHESTNUT OAK ACORN!  Exciting, I know!

But we ran across another mystery!  There was some fruit in the middle of the trail that we had never seen before.  Here’s a close up:

Do you know?  Turns out it was fruit from this nearby Pawpaw tree aka Asimina triloba (I looked that one up too)!  I recognize the spring blooms from the PawPaw, but I had never seen the fruit before!  I wish I had brought some home.

We continued straight on the Mountain Bridge Passage Trail and bypassed the lake loop on the way back.  We soon came to a bat roost built by the SC Department of Natural Resources.  There’s a geocache close by as well.

By the end of the hike, we had racked up 6.41 miles – not bad!

This hike was a very pleasant surprise.  I wasn’t expecting much out of it considering we weren’t what I consider “in the mountains,” and that’s where I’ve always experienced my most enjoyable hikes.  But this one was chock full of all sorts of neat things.  I’ll definitely be back in the spring to check out what wildflowers are here!  I personally would rate the part of the trail we hiked as moderate.  There were a few steep inclines, but overall, it wasn’t bad.  Emily hadn’t been hiking in some time and did fine.

Read more about this hike and the area here:

• Ashmore Heritage Preserve from DNR
• Greenville News article about Wattacoo Lake