The Backbone Trail

I grew up very close to Chief Logan State Park in Logan, West Virginia. When I was a kid we went on a few of the trails. A couple of times we would start on the backbone trail but we would turn around usually at the big tree that was in the way on the steepest part of the trail near the ranger station. Essentially that means we never walked the trail but it was always a goal of mine.

We walked other trails that were miles easier. Actually they weren't much harder than walking on your typical city street. One day my friend, Jessica, and I decided that we were going to do it. We met after school and praised ourselves silly when we made it past that first major obstacle. We ooohed and ahhed over a herd of dear that we watch race through the hollow below us. We kept going further than we had ever been, that is until darkness struck. We realized we were in trouble when we peaked the mountain and couldn't follow the trail another inch. It was past dusk by this time and it was just plain dark.

Jessica started to panic. So I started to lie to her and tell her that I could tell where we were going just to keep her calm. We had to backtrack even though we knew we were well over an hour on that trail but we didn't know how much further it went. I guessed my way through the woods while she whined the whole way, but we made it safely home eventually. We didn't try that again.

I did complete that trail many times though. I did it with my ex husband who thought nothing of traipsing over the mountain and even though he tried to be considerate of my less than adequate knowledge of the woods it was still hard to keep up with him. He taught me much on those walks through the woods.

I hope to complete that trail again sometime.