One Last Look

One more series of photos of Tanawha and the Boone Bowl.

More than with other southern peaks, this particular spot did look to me as if there was some Pleistocene glaciation going on here. The sub-peak from which I took this shot even reminded me of the Lion's Head on Mount Washington in New Hampshire where I once took similar photographs. If any can find definite signs of glacial striations in the bedrock in the headwaters of Boone Fork, that should close the book.

Photo with text.

Some videos I took on Tanawha:

Following are some video clips that I took on the hike on Tanawha. I was impressed with the mountain. More so than I have in past visits. This was actually my first real exploration of the peak. I've been a number of times but either spent my hours there muddling around the base of the mountain in the drainages hunting for waterfalls, or around the tourist crap near the summit (which I hated).

I plan to go back again. I may try to camp on the mountain overnight the next time I visit it. There's a shelter near Calloway Peak that I might use. Now that the area is a state park, hiking and camping there is at no charge. When it was still owned by the Morton family, you had to pay to hike the trails and to use the campsites scattered throughout the wild forest. These days there's only a permit system in place, but no charge. For now, at least.

On the trail, alone, at about 5600 or maybe even 5700 feet elevation.


The famous Boone Bowl, showing what might be the possible location of a localized glacier from the last Ice Age.

The Boone Bowl as seen from Storyteller Rock. You can also see Calloway Peak just poking above the ridge line.

Boone Bowl, Part Deux

My pal Andy Kunkle, (who has logged about ten jillion more hiking miles than I have), sent me this photo of the Boone Bowl on Grandfather/Tanawha.

Looking at that, I rather do think that it is, indeed, a glacial cirque. I'm wondering where the glacial moraines would be. I don't think it would be difficult to locate them by looking at some topo maps or, perhaps, scouting around points where a terminal moraine would have been located.

If there was a local glacier there, it looks like it was a rather big one. Far wider than some of the other glacial cirques I've seen on eastern mountains.

Bottom line is, I think it really is evidence of a localized glacier that once flowed here in North Carolina!

Photo by Andy Kunkle.

Localized Glaciers in the Eastern US

Here in the eastern USA there are some signs of localized glaciation, mainly in New England. Of course almost everyone is aware of the huge continental glaciers that once covered much of North America and which is now isolated in Greenland on our continent.

Katahdin, Maine's highest summit.

What has always intrigued me are the smaller local glaciers that were left behind when the huge ice sheets retreated. As the higher elevations of New England were revealed from beneath the melting ice, there were still some areas just high enough and just far enough north to have localized glaciers that spilled off of some few peaks, creating glacial cirques and leaving behind glacial moraines and making tarns on some of the high ridges.

The first place I ever went that had obvious signs of local glaciers was Mount Katahdin. The rivers of ice that carved out the enormous gulfs and soaring cliff faces are long gone, but if you know what you're looking at, it's obvious what forces created these features.

I've now hiked in several eastern glacial cirques, including some on Katahdin in Maine and two on Mount Washington in New Hampshire. These peaks stand 5,268 feet and 6,288 feet respectively, and so were able to retain local glaciers for a long time after the retreat of the continental ice sheets that had covered the north.

Here in the South there is almost no sign of localized glaciation. But although the enormous ice sheets never reached this far toward the equator, some of the peaks should have been able to spawn some local glaciers. After all, there are many peaks here in Tennessee and North Carolina and southern Virginia where elevations approach or exceed 6,000 feet above sea level. Surely conditions should have been right for local glaciers on some of these peaks.

Arrows indicating the two most obvious glacial cirques on Katahdin (from this perspective). Known locally these days as 'Gulfs'.

However, in my reading and research I have found that only one spot has enough evidence for such a local glacier. And that spot is on Grandfather Mountain (aka Tanawha) here in North Carolina. Grandfather/Tanawha is considered the highest peak in the Blue Ridge Mountains. At 5,964 feet above sea level, it's not even in the top 20 highest peaks in the east. However, it just misses being an official "sixer" and looks more like a peak in the Sierras than one on the Blue Ridge. If any southern peak could have spawned glaciers, it seems that this would be it.

Today, there is a formation on the mountain called "the Boone Bowl". This bowl was likely carved out of the mountain by a small river of ice that formed below the summit and etched its way down the slopes, creating the enormous natural amphitheater the locals call "the Boone Bowl". I hope to be able to go there and scout it out in the next few weeks, and produce some photos that indicate some similarities with the glacial cirques I've hiked on Mount Washington and Katahdin.

We'll see.

Possible view of the "Boone Bowl" (Photo copyright by grouchomark)