Porters Gap to Chandler Springs.

[trailtigger]

Well we cut our trip a day short thanks to the four weathersites on the internet that missed the call for Monday-Wednesday lol!. Ran into a pretty good downpour on 459 just pass mtnbrook and it rain/sprinkled all the way to the trail parking lot. Hit the trail around 7:40 and made preety good time considering this was the first time for both of my boys to do a backpacking trip. They only carried their sleeping bags, water, food, and their snacks, I had around 32lbs with the tent and everhting else, not bad for my first time on the trail like this in 4 years. The sprinkling rain stopped right after we got on the trail but the wind was unbelievable! It really got bad on top of Rocky top #1 and so we did not stop long for pics, the wind had to be hitting between 15-20 mph and was really cold. Several trees were creaking as we passed by very quickly and then we came to an area just pass Chandlers Gap were it appeared that some strong winds had taken down almost every tree on top of the mtn. There was one tree inparticular that was only being held up by two small limbs that hung over the trail, needless to say we made haste through that section. I must say that I was very impressed with my boys in that they never complained and we only stopped three times on the way out. I let my youngest (10 yrs) lead the way and he did great, we saw a small group at the campsite on private land by the Talladega Creek bridge and made it to the campsite by 11:30. The boys begin to explore the area and found two salamanders, a scorpion, and several turtle shells (no animals were harmed in this expedition). The wind continued so no campfire for the night and another group passed by us as I set up the tent. (let me say here that this was my first time using my new tent, MSR Mutha Hubba and it is a great tent, even with the wind blowing like it did you could not feel any breeze inside) With darkness setting in fast(thanks to those partly I mean completely clouded skies) we ate and played cards and games on the ipod until about 9:30.

Now to those of you who have posted on here about this area, YOU FAILED TO MENTION THE 20+ TRAINS THAT PASS THROUGH THE AREA FROM 9:00 PM -7:00 AM,( I stopped counting around 12:am at 12)  AND THE PLAINS THAT FLY JUST OVER THE TREE TOPS ALL NIGHT!!!!!!  
Any way we had a great trip and we will be back out there soon.

http://s743.photobucket.c...rail%20Chandler%20Spring/[/url]

[Cuffs]

Glad you had a good trip despite the weather.  About those trains... Yea, I know exactly what you're talking about!!  I studied them in the morning (after a sleepless night). It's one train, but the track wraps around the side then end and then the other side of Chandler Mtn.  The train has to blow the whistle at EVERY little crossing whether it be paved road, bridge or dirt road...  What a PITA those darn trains are!!! 

[BCM]

Trail Tigger, I was looking at the picture of the camp you stayed in and it looked mighty familiar.  When I went to the pictures of my March 2009 AL Pinhoti Hike, I found out why.  I was there on March 18.  It is posted on my trailjournal.  http://www.trailjournals.com/photos.cfm?id=425092  Your picture made me want to head out and do it again.  It was fun.  I hope your boys catch the backpacking fever.  About the trains, I use earplugs.  The plugs make things faint enough to ignore, but doesn't cancel out all the sound.  However, they didn't work well enough in the Birds in the Pines campsite North of Hwy 78, because the trains are braking for Anniston/Oxford.  Sounds like the Banshees from the nether regions. 

[trailtigger]

I actually changed our trip to the route you took after I considered the lack of water from Bulls gap to the Horn Mtn shelter. Good thing too as we used alot of water for coffee and hot chocolate. We are already planning our next trip, dont know when it will be yet.

[todd150hp]

That is a great campsite. Unfortunately the campsites are few and far between through there. I plan on using it next month. Hopefully it is available or at least whoever beats me to it doesn't mind company. I did not notice the trains too much when I was there.

Yep, the weather men seem to have a hard time nailing down a forecast these days. The weather pretty much wrecked our spring break plans as well.

Ya'll looked cold in the pictures. Sometimes having a little adversity adds to the adventure and helps make the trip a little more memorable. It will be intersting to see who is willing to go the next time dad announces a backpacking trip.

[WolfVanZandt]

I've noted some nice mineralization in the area of Chandler Springs (and, in fact, the whole Talladega Mountains area). I've got a specimen of turquoise (somewhere) from the area and have seen tourmaline and gold specimens that would make you drop your jaw.

Are any of you interested in that sort of thing?

[Firedog]

We panned gold back in the 70's when I was in The scouts. I remember panning in the upper Hillabee creek area. There were a couple of gold mines just east of the Cheaha mtn area. Also there is an old iron forge just down stream from where you cross Talladega Creek. This Pic is from 1910
Carl W.

[trailtigger]

very interesting, I didnt know about any of that. I know that the stream beside the campsite has some strange looking boulders in it that have a metalic shine to them. If you go straight across from where the tent site is and then walk up stream about 20 feet you will see them.

[WolfVanZandt]

There's a lot of pyrite in the rocks east of Cheaha. I also noticed a lot of chrysoprase (copper stained quartz) between the primitive campsite and the developed campsite across from Cheaha Lake. There's actually a panning park in Cragford (though I would expect it to be salted) and there are some old galena prospects there.

[trailtigger]

Trail Tigger, I was looking at the picture of the camp you stayed in and it looked mighty familiar.  When I went to the pictures of my March 2009 AL Pinhoti Hike, I found out why.  I was there on March 18.  It is posted on my trailjournal.  http://www.trailjournals.com/photos.cfm?id=425092  Your picture made me want to head out and do it again.  It was fun.  I hope your boys catch the backpacking fever.  About the trains, I use earplugs.  The plugs make things faint enough to ignore, but doesn't cancel out all the sound.  However, they didn't work well enough in the Birds in the Pines campsite North of Hwy 78, because the trains are braking for Anniston/Oxford.  Sounds like the Banshees from the nether regions.  

It was actually a pretty good campsite there were two roots that were in the way some and had to put my tent down ontop of one of them. My boys found a better campsite 40 feet down from there on the right just on the other side of the stream. you cant really see it from the trail but there are two downed trees that form a bit of an enclosure and someone made a fire ring between them. The place where they put their tent is in the middle of some small trees but the ground is very level and there were no roots or rocks to get in the way. I had already put the tent up when they found it and contemplated taking it down and moving it down there but was too lazy .
I noticed in your photos that the water had gone down some and my son wanted to know if his stone monument was still standing that he built by the fire?

[BCM]

Sorry, can't tell him.  I was there on March 18, 2009.  If I go, I will look.  Isn't Jaybird's hike going through there on 4/17.