Sometimes, the greatest discoveries just tumble onto your lap. Try as we might to plan and search and itinerize, attempting to structure and coordinate “wonder”, it can’t match the feeling of accidentally stumbling on a place that quickly becomes a favorite, that quickly becomes loved, that ultimately becomes a perfect visit. A perfect place.
As we made our way out of Mississippi, we checked our favorite resources for a nice free campsite, preferably under the glow of the moon and not a Cracker Barrel sign. Craig found Wolf Pen Hunt Camp, and it sounded good enough for a night’s sleep before heading off to our next spot. It was an easy road in, and as we wandered down it looking for the campsite turn off, we noticed a few trailheads - always intriguing to us - and noted the spots. Although our cell service was dicey, we managed a search of the local map and saw it littered with green dots, indicating trails and waterfalls and creeks. Since one of these trailheads was conveniently across the street, we decided we’d postpone our next plan and spend our first day in Alabama hiking.
The next morning, we packed a bag and hit the trails. It was a gorgeous day for hiking, cool enough to keep you energized, but a warm spring sun balancing it all out. The trail started out snaking through the woods, and then Craig spotted the tiniest babbling of a spring, just starting to bubble through the leaves. We followed this baby spring water as it grew into a stream and then a creek, giving us our first peek of the gorgeous moving water this place would offer. The movement of the water grew and grew, until we came upon our first waterfall, Eagle Falls, tumbling lazily down over the rocks below it. Being sufficiently wowed, we continued following the creek, stopping to daydream over potentially moving full time into these woods at one of the many perfect campsites along the water.
Our trail map showed us moving off the main creek to another set of waterfalls, and we followed the offshoot to Deer Skull Falls, although as we approached, we weren’t sure which of the TWO stunning falls held that namesake. At this point, we were both thoroughly in love with the Sipsey Wilderness, and utterly speechless at what a gorgeous hike we had stumbled upon. Craig, of course, saw the pool of cold water under the falls and decided it was a perfect day for a dip. As we spent our time splashing and lounging, respectively, we were greeted by a fellow hiker, who was also sitting around, soaking up the awe of these falls. Turns out, he had just bought a Skoolie himself, and so we got to chatting. He couldn’t help but laugh when finding out this was our first day in Alabama, considering he was a three year resident and had just discovered this stunning spot. The luck of the skoolie life!
Eventually, we had to pry ourselves away from this little oasis and continue our hike. The map I found on AllTrails listed the loop we were attempting as a 6 mile trail, although we later realized this was incorrectly overstated, accounting for a lot of back-and-forth as the original tracker attempted to cross the creeks at various points. The loop took us past several other small falls, and eventually reached its peak at the Sipsey River herself, appearing a magical and welcoming blue-green. We followed along, until we were to follow another offshoot, and we watched the water flow back from a river, to a creek, to a stream, to a spring. A full circle hike, with a lot of wonder in between.
After that, we were hooked on Sipsey. Our original destination in the area was a Natural Bridge, so we decided to take one day to see the sight and do some chores, before sequestering ourselves back into the wilderness. Although we’d seen our first natural bridge in Virginia last year, we were both wowed by Alabama’s offering to the natural bridge competition. The short path led from the gift shop to the bridge, which towered above us, creating a criss-crossing land bridge with light streaming through the openings where a skinny young tree grew up towards the sun. A path led to the inner cave and took you under the dripping rocks around the perimeter. At the end, it offered an extended loop through the woods that took you past and through some more rocky bits and reached its apex at a babbling river that made its music tumbling over the rocks. Here the trail began its easy loop back to the gift shop, following along the water, the shoreline dotted with spring wildflowers. Alabama’s Natural Bridge was coming off some stiff competition after our first venture into Sipsey, but it certainly held its own. We were already really beginning to fall deeply in love with the natural beauty of northern Alabama.
Having finished our chores and stocked up on supplies, we were ready to venture back into Sipsey and take a more dedicated eye towards exploring. There were a few more notable falls not far from our campsite, and the trails were 1-2 miles, so we figured we could squeeze them all in in one day. We started at the Sipsey Picnic Area, heading out on the Turkey Foot and Mize Mills Falls trail. At a mere 1.2 miles, this trail was able to pack in 3 waterfalls, so clearly there are so many waterfalls here, they ran out of names. It was a fairly easy trail, starting with a nice low waterfall and a meandering trail that followed the creek. As we continued down the trail, we saw another waterfall, trickling down off the rocks above, and thought we had reached the end of the trail. But there was another path heading further into the woods, and in the spirit of adventure, we continued down it. And thankfully we did, as there was one more waterfall at the end, with a pool big enough for a dip, which Craig obviously embraced. What a great trail, buy 2 get 1 free waterfalls and they even threw in a swimming hole!!!
We headed back to the parking lot for lunch before heading out in the other direction from the Sipsey Picnic Area on the Falls Creek Falls trail. Our journey started out with an incredible array of wildflowers, my personal favorite being the fresh buds of bluebells, half dotted with their pink new buds. I knew there had been talk online of crossing a river on this hike, but when we arrived at the creek we needed to ford, we realized we weren’t entirely prepared to tackle this today with the pups. Neither Reese nor Winston are the biggest fans of swimming, and we didn’t have any way to comfort their grumpiness after a dip, so I begrudgingly turned back and immediately began planning our return.
There was one more fall on the agenda to cheer me up. I had read about Caney Creek Falls, and there were a few warnings about the main parking lot, with prompts to head to this newer spot instead. However, that newer spot was just someone’s house, and we arrived at a sign saying “closed”. We began to turn around, when the owner arrived and honked us down, telling us we were welcome to hike today. A very kind man, he recognized the problems people were having accessing these falls, and opened up his property for parking and a well blazed trail into the woods to access Caney Creek. Since the next day predicted terrible winds, he wanted to keep people safe and off the trail, so he had put the sign up preemptively. With many thanks, we headed out on the trail to our 5th, no 6th, maybe 7th, waterfall of our 3 days in Alabama. And again, we found another stunning fall with a pool big enough for a splash. Even I gave it a shot this time! It was hard not to want to embrace Craig’s spirit for fully immersing ourselves in this place.
Having had an incredible day of hiking and waterfalls, we headed back to camp for what also turned out to be an incredible night. It’s always a lovely night when we can strike up a comfortable fire, but the evening was enhanced by the first of the twinkling fireflies of the season. We spent the evening cozy in the warmth of the flames while the dancing of lights surrounded us from the trees.
The next day was predicted to be windy, leading into storms, so we opted for a nice relaxing rest day at our campsite. We prepared ourselves for a nice homey day, having gathered ingredients for indulging in some of our other favorite hobbies, cooking and baking. We started the day by whipping up a cinnamon pie, something neither of us had tried before, but were intrigued by thanks to our favorite TV show, Psych. At first, it seemed an outlandish invention from a delightfully silly show, but after finding a legitimate recipe for the thing, we knew we had to give it a shot. Taking a few bus life pivots, thanks to our lack of freezer, we opted for a graham cracker crust, and after taking our first finished bite, we both agreed it was the way to go. Nothing says stormy day like having a nice rich pie to snack on!
Since the weather is always missing the predicted mark, the day actually turned out to be rather nice, despite some strong breezes. So while our onions sat slowly caramelizing on the stove, we took to the outdoors to enjoy what time we had left in these beautiful woods. It marked another truly magical moment here in Sipsey, as swallowtail butterflies danced around our firepit and took to roughhousing gently on the ground. Our first visitor was a gorgeous seafoam green Zebra Swallowtail, who won my heart, as he seemed to be soaking up whatever heat remained from deep in our firepit. Eventually, a Tiger Swallowtail came along and seemed to be a bit of a bully towards my small Zebra friend. I watched them flutter and relax and explore their way around the campsite, soaking in the sun of the unexpectedly beautiful day.
With the inclement weather having passed, we set out the next day for Huntsville. While we were rather sad to be leaving Sipsey behind, especially with an unfinished hike, we were both getting a little tired of doing our runs on a busy forest road, and were looking forward to exploring the city.
Huntsville was a beautiful place, and we got an excellent first look at that as we spent the evening exploring both sides of Big Springs Park. We headed out first along the side that housed the large portion of Big Spring, enjoying the small fluffy ducklings and the big giant fish that called this pond home. The canals led us to the end of the waterflow, reminding me a little bit of the surprise canals of Oklahoma City, and we followed our loop back around the water to the otherside of the park across the street. Here, there was more information about the origins of Huntsville and the spring that brought the settlers here. Following the path that continued along the spring to the head, we then continued up to Clinton St, where there were a few cute little stores and coffee shops to investigate. While I generally like to know the go-to spots in a city, it is sometimes nice to find a good starting spot and spend the evening exploring.
The next day we were a little more prepared with what we wanted to check out. We headed north to Monte Sano State Park, where we took the short loop around the Japanese tea garden and then made our way out to the Stone Cuts. These incredible rock formations created the neatest little hike, so fun that we took the route again, back through the rocks. The trail leads around and through the rocks, making us both feel like we were invited to explore a long stone house. Besides the Stone Cuts, the trail was just beginning to show all the splendor of spring wildflowers, as the hills were dotted with phlox and chickweed.
After a morning of hiking, we headed back into the city to explore some of the local breweries. Downtown, there was a perfect stretch that housed a few spots, so we headed there for the afternoon. First up was Yellowhammer, where we both immensely enjoyed their rich Belgian Tripel and their fruited lambic, which we entirely ordered because the name was The Randolph Winston and we sure do love our Winston! We headed across the lawn to Straight to Ale, which really blew us away with their incredible Toasted Coconut IPA and the real star - Puckeretto, their amaretto apricot Berliner Weiss. Just when we thought the wilderness alone could make us love northern Alabama, they swoop in with the best beer I’ve ever had and really up the ante to make us want to stay!
The main driver for us to come to Huntsville was to get ourselves some better spots to run, and it also delivered on that front. We both got in some great long runs on the Aldridge Creek Greenway and mixed it up with a beautiful morning of runs and a walk on the Tennessee River Greenway. It was about here on our trip that I decided I just had to go back to Sipsey Wilderness to finally finish that one trail we’d bailed on. So we made a few more stops around Huntsville, including a silly quick visit to the US Space & Rocket Center to recreate a childhood picture, stopped at Straight to Ale for another tasting and a Puckeretto to go, and hit the road.
On our way out, we stopped at the Madison County Nature Trail for a nice loop around the lake and to see a few of the well designed displays showing off the history of the area. They also had the most charming rustic birdhouse community, matched by their collection of magical gnome homes.
Upon our arrival back at Wolf Pen camp, we were a little surprised to see it was packed. Our first visit landed us there on a Saturday, and the place was all ours, so I didn’t expect the crowds to have gathered quite so much only one weekend later. But I can’t say I blamed them, the place was gorgeous and the weather was delightful. We managed to find a little spot in the trees to park ourselves for the night while hoping the crowds would clear the next day.
I was woken up the next morning, a warm and perfect Sunday, by some weird shaking happening on the back of the bus…and will be delving more into that mysterious tale in our next post.
On our first visit, we had really enjoyed our time at Deer Skull Falls, and had been looking forward to heading out on that hike again. So we packed a bag and a lunch and a blanket and relived the stunning beauty of the hike, our first in Alabama, that had really sparked the first fires of love we were now officially feeling for the place. We spent the day picnicking and splashing in the water, relaxing in the sun and soaking up all the sights and peaceful moving water sounds this spot had to offer. Sometimes you want to pack in all you can see, and sometimes you just love something so much, you want to do it over and over again. Every visit offers new delights and insights.
The next day, we set out to finally conquer Fall Creek Falls. We made our way along the trail, enjoying the wildflowers that had seemed to bloom even more plentifully in our few days away. When we approached the creek to cross, we got ourselves all ready, taking off our boots, tightening up our packs, and bracing Reese and Winston for their little swim. As we started to cross, we all struggled a bit, as the sand beneath sucked us in with every pause in our step. Winston was definitely feeling this discomfort, and started to tug me towards the other shore. I climbed the ladder on the other side and Craig boosted the boys up to me and voila! We had made it! Since both of us had slimy wet feet, and the ground was softly covered with leaves, we opted to continue our hike barefoot, feeling the earth squishing beneath our feet. The trail continued straight until it culminated at the booming Fall Creek Falls. It had been well worth the return trip and the conquering of our worries regarding fording the river! The trail continued further past the falls, and while I was absolutely itching to continue exploring these gorgeous woods, we weren’t well prepared for a day of wandering the forests. I took consolation in the fact that this was a place we had just started exploring, and we both felt certain a return visit was in our future.
After making it back to camp, we soaked in the last of the calm, empty campsite energies, spending our time floating in the hammock and reading by the fire. Since we were optimally relaxed, we figured it was a great time to really reverse all of that by making an involved and messy dinner! Craig had gotten me a pasta roller for Christmas, so we decided to make our own fresh pasta, and then make this delicious recipe from Half Baked Harvest, which involved cooking up some sun dried tomatoes and whipping up some ricotta. While all these elements really took up every square inch of our 90 square foot home’s tiny kitchen, it was so utterly delicious, it was worth it! Our feast was amazing, and our on-hand Trader Joe’s champagne helped us push through our clean up. To finish up an incredible stay, we sat sipping our crowler of Straight to Ale’s Puckertto by the fire, mulling over the beautiful sounds and experiences of our wonderful time in Alabama.
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