Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio -August 9th to 12th, 2021
Hocking Hills State Park is a gem for hikers and nature lovers in Ohio. We both grew up in Ohio and had been to Hocking Hills as children. However, our memories of the place are pretty faint, so it was time to freshen up those memories.
On our way to Hocking Hills State Park in Ohio on Monday, we stopped for ice cream. Right Buddy’s (RB’s) brother talked about a dairy north of Yellow Springs that he used to stop to get ice cream whenever he was in the area. The dairy is called Young’s Jersey Dairy. We decided to check it out. The place turned out to be much larger than we expected. We were expecting something like Moomer’s Dairy in Traverse City, Michigan that we visited a couple of weeks earlier (Traverse City, Michigan - July 25th and 27th, 2021).
Young’s Jersey Dairy is more of a destination. If you have young children, you could easily spend a whole afternoon there, or longer. They do serve ice cream in their restaurant and store, along with a lot of other food and goodies. Deep fried cheese curds seems to be a specialty. The barn and petting zoo allows the kids to get personal with the cows and goats. There are tractors the kids can climb on and a big slide they can glide down on top of burlap sacks. For the older kids (and adults), there are batting cages, a driving range, and a miniature golf course. But if you are in a hurry, there is a drive thru.
After checking out the large complex, we did get their ice cream. And yes, it was pretty tasty. RB had a waffle cone with one dip of Cow Patty (a dark chocolate with other goodies mixed in) and mint chocolate chip. Left Buddy (LB) had his usual vanilla shake.
We reached Hocking Hills State Park in plenty of time to make dinner. Then we walked around the campground and over to Rose Lake. It didn’t seem really hot out, but we are still adjusting to the higher humidity. We had a good sweat going by the time we got back to our campsite.
Tuesday looked like the best weather day, so we went on a long hike. Our basic route was south on the Grandma Gatewood Trail (the blue trail) to Cedar Falls, then back north on the Gorge Overlook Trail (the red trail). We started right from the campground. A couple of connector trails lead from the campground over to the Gorge Overlook Trail. The connector trail we took continued past the Gorge Overlook Trail onto the A Frame Bridge over the gorge and to the Visitor Center. From the Visitor Center, we got on the Grandma Gatewood Trail at the Upper Falls.
The Grandma Gatewood Trail follows the floor of the gorge. Most of the highlights are at the beginning, the Upper Falls, Devil’s Bathtub, Old Man’s Cave, and Lower Falls. There was not much water flowing over the falls. This was mid August and several people were saying the area has not had much rain recently. It’s probably better to view the falls in the spring. Many of the popular trails were one way traffic only. This made it tricky to plan out a route. Because we wanted to continue on to Cedar Falls, we could not visit Broken Rock Falls or Whispering Cave. If we branched off to those sights, then the one way trails force you back to the visitor center.
Old Man’s Cave is technically not a cave, but an alcove or grotto. It is quite large and spectacular to see. It is one of the best known features of Hocking Hills State Park. Both of us have been to Hocking Hills when we were little. When RB mentioned to her dad that we were going to Hocking Hills, he asked “That’s where Old Man’s Cave is, right?”.
The Grandma Gatewood Trail is a pretty wide and smooth trail from the Upper Falls to the Lower Falls, but there are quite a few stairs along the way. Continuing past the Lower Falls, the trail gets a little rougher. We did not bring our hiking poles, but RB wish she would have. There were a few steep, slick spots and some climbs over tangles of tree roots.
The crowds thinned out and the trail was pretty peaceful. At one point, RB had stopped to take a picture up at a trickle of a water fall dripping over the rocky rim of the gorge. She heard wood crackling and popping overhead behind her. She took a few steps forward, ready to run, but she wasn’t sure what direction to run. A small tree limb came crashing down to the ground about fifteen feet behind her. It wasn’t very big, but probably would have knocked her unconscious if it landed on her head. She felt lucky that it missed her.
We took advantage of the restrooms and picnic tables at the Cedar Falls trailhead. After sitting down for a while to eat our snacks, we took the loop trail around to see Cedar Falls. Again, there wasn’t much water flowing over the falls. We picked up the Gorge Overlook Trail just past the falls to head back.
After crossing over the suspension bridge, the only significant point of interest along the Gorge Overlook Trail is Rose Lake. This is the same lake we walked to from the campground the evening before, but the trail goes by the opposite end of the lake. However, the trail is a lovely stroll through the woods.
We counted our hike as number 32 of our 52 Hike Challenge: 7.1 miles with an elevation gain of 781 feet in four hours and 36 minutes.
By the time we were done with our hike, we were both soaked with sweat. After taking showers, we hung our wet hiking clothes out to dry. We are still not used to this humidity.
On Wednesday, we drove around the state park and hiked four short trails. The trailheads were spread out, but the drives to them were scenic so we didn’t mind. The windy roads went over rolling hills and through dense forests.
Our first hike for the day was Cantwell Cliffs. The trail splits, so we took the Cantwell Gorge Trail and came back the Cantwell Rim Trail. The other fork was about half way between the rim and the gorge floor. The trail starts out going down steps through a narrow slot between large boulders. They call this section Fat Woman’s Squeeze.
Along the trail we saw several workers. We asked one of the workers what they were doing. They were injecting a chemical into the base of the hemlock trees using a needle and syringe. The chemical protects the trees against an invasive species insect, called the hemlock wooly adelgid. The insect is killing the hemlock trees in the area. A single injection of the chemical into the tree protects it for about five to seven years.
Along the rim trail, there was a shelter. It looked like a shelter for backpackers. The trail seemed too short to be used by people backpacking, but perhaps the trail connects up to other trails. However, we did not see any. It took us thirty seven minutes to complete the 0.9 mile loop with an elevation gain of 233 feet.
The second hike we took was Rock House. Again we chose the gorge trail instead of the rim trail. The two trails join up just before reaching the Rock House, the only real cave in Hocking Hills State Park. The cave is 250 feet long, following along the cliff. There are several openings along the cave’s length. Steps lead into the cave through one of the windows, allowing easy access into the cave. The loop trail we followed was 1.1 miles long with an elevation gain of 253 feet which we completed in forty minutes. Afterwards, we enjoyed our picnic lunch in the shelter at the trailhead.
Conkle’s Hollow was our third hike. Technically this hike is not in Hocking Hills State Park, but in a State Nature Preserve. Again we took the gorge trail. This one is an out-and-back trail instead of a loop. The trail is paved most of the way so that it is accessible to people who have mobility issues. The scenery steadily got prettier the further we went, with the best scenery beyond the end of the pavement. There were large boulders littered at the bottom of the gorge, covered with ferns. Some trees clung to the boulders with a tangle of tree roots surrounding the surface of the boulder. At the end of the gorge was a tall waterfall. Unfortunately, just like the other waterfalls we encountered so far in the park, there was only a trickle of water flowing over the edge of the cliff.
It was time for ice cream, so we headed for Old Man’s Cave General Store. They only had soft serve, but in lots of different flavors. RB had chocolate, but was not very impressed. LB thought his milkshake was OK. Oh well, you can’t have the best all the time.
Ash Cave was the final hike of the day. We could have reached Ash Cave if we had continued on the Grandma Gatewood Trail past Cedar Falls the day before, but we didn’t want to hike that far that day. To reach Ash Cave from the parking lot at the Ash Cave Trailhead, it is only about a quarter of a mile or so. The trail is paved all the way to the cave. Just like Old Man’s Cave, Ash Cave is not a true cave, but rather an alcove. It is large and impressive, with a waterfall flowing over the cliff edge from above, or rather trickling over the edge. The mobility impaired can take the paved trail back, but everyone else is encouraged to climb up the stairs and take the rim back to the trailhead. For us, it was a 0.8 mile loop with an elevation gain of 108 feet which we completed in 27 minutes.
We counted all four hikes as hike number 33 of our 52 Hike Challenge. The totals for the day were 4.2 miles with an elevation gain of 699 feet in two hours and 32 minutes.
On our drive back to the campground, we stopped at Grandma Faye’s Grocery to pick up a few items. Lo and behold, we discovered they served hand-dipped ice cream. We believe the ice cream was Velvet Ice Cream, because we saw a Velvet Ice Cream delivery truck out front. We are very familiar with Velvet Ice Cream. We have visited their factory at Ye Olde Mill in Utica, Ohio many times over the years. LB was full from his milkshake, but RB could not resist. She ordered a scoop of mint chocolate chip. Now that was much more satisfying than the soft serve cone she had earlier!
In the evening, our inverter/charger troubles came back. We made the mistake of running the air conditioner while using the Instant Pot to cook the pasta sauce for dinner. Luckily the sauce was just about done when our electricity in our van shut down. The inverter had overheated. What we didn’t realize was that the inverter was drawing extra power from our batteries in addition to shore power. So our batteries were drained down to 26% and had also overheated. We opened all the doors of the electrical cabinet to cool everything down. After everything was cool enough, we let the batteries charge from shore power using the inverter/charger. Then we turned the charger off and turned the air conditioner back on. We also decided to change the max current coming from shore power from 14 amps to 17 amps. We had no problems the rest of the night with the air conditioner running.
Hocking Hill was even better than what we both remembered. We’ll have to come back again to explore the trails we missed this time around. The only part we didn’t like was the high humidity. The humidity didn’t seem to bother us when we were kids. How did we grow up in all this stickiness?
Check out our related video: Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio
(RB)