Dec 13 Flat Shoals Mountain

Although Flat Shoals Mountain is almost fully within Hanging Rock State Park, it is barely visited. Attached by a narrow corridor crossing Mountain Road, it is accessible only in a couple spots by parking on road shoulders. The easiest access is along Young Road where the park property is adjacent to the road for about 200 yards. There is a wide shoulder on the opposite of the road. The state park side is narrow but if careful, one can park there. The best route up the mountain is almost straight up, heading slightly right to follow a slight spine. A friend told me to look for a couple upturned stones on top which looked like gravestones. That is exactly where I attained the top and a good landmark to use to head back down. 

Once on top you have the option of going either right or left along the top ridgeline. I went right or east. After a short climb I reached a rock jumble on the south facing slope. After poking around for a few minutes I spotted a cave which you could step into but I did not. Following the ridge further is a smaller rock jumble and then the ridge heads down to a gap and rises again to a lower pine covered point. Knowing that the state park property might not extend to that point I chose not to expend the energy needed to go down and up a couple steep slopes. Turning around I retraced back to the gravestones and to the other, westernmost end of the ridge. The ridge was a gradual downward trajectory and then seemed to drop off more steeply. There were some limited winter views here to the west. 

The ridge I had walked was under a mile in length. The south slope had more outcroppings but the views were not nearly as nice as those looking north. I had a unique view of Sauratown Mountain and its rock bluffs, followed by Cook's Wall, the Moore's Knob, Hanging Rock, Hanging Rock Ridge, the Three Sisters and finally Sheep Rock. Again these were limited winter views. I suspect you'd see none of this in the summer.

I returned to first rock jumble I had encountered to poke around further. It appears there a numerous caves here. I found three you could get into. All are pictured here. Small caves you need to squeeze and slither into are not what I'm looking to do so they all remained unexplored today. Walking through this area was difficult. I could not tell what lay underneath the freshly fallen leaves. There were loose rocks, holes and many places to lose your balance. Rest assured when you did lose your balance there is a devils walking stick nearby to grab onto. I think I made that mistake three times.

Using my GPS, I headed down the mountain here rather than climb back up and walk back to the gravestones. The outcropping continues down the mountain for a ways before ending. My GPS indicated I needed to head into the laurel to get back to the car. It looked thick but I found a very nice passage through it which looked like it was a well traveled deer route.