Pilot Mountain

Even though today was another travel day, we had some important business to attend to - exploring North Carolina's geo-site, Pilot Mountain.  Even though our morning hitching-up was interrupted by a thunder storm, we got an early start.

Something that we have notice is the landscaping along North Carolina's highways, particularly the interchanges and rest stops.

Panorama shot of a North Carolina, park-like, rest stop.

Impressive semi in the rest stop parking lot.

Beautiful wildflowers along the way.

 We got to our new campground, for one night, the Holly Ridge Family Campground in Boonville, NC, around 1 p.m.  After lunch we set off to explore near-by ( 25 miles) Pilot Mountain which we could see in the distance.

 North Carolina's geo-site is another monadnock, like Stone Mountain, but it is not a pluton, crystallizing at great depths and thrusting upward through the earth's crust. Rather, Pilot Mountain is a remnant of the ancient Sauratown Mountains which formed as sediment in the ancient Iapetus Ocean. As the continental plates that today constitute Africa, Europe, and North America merged to form the supercontinent Pangaea, the Iapetus Ocean closed. The tectonic pressure folded, faulted, and compressed the Sauratown rocks into metamorphic equivalents and formed the Sauratown Mountains anticlinorium, rearranging the once simple, layer-cake rock sequence into a rolling complex of elevated and stacked anticlines. Pilot Mountain has survived for millions of years while the elements have eroded surrounding peaks to a rolling plain.

Panoramic view from the top of Pilot Mountain.

Mr. Spock enjoying Big Pinnacle, a massive, 200-foot-high, circular ledge a-top Pilot Mountain.

Spock "fascinated" by this geo-site.

Beautiful mountain laurel blooming at this elevation - 2,421'.

Mountain laurel and rhododendrons.

Pilot Mountain served as a landmark on the Warrior's Path, a north-south trail running parallel to the Appalachain mountains, used by the native Saura and Tutelo Indians who populated the area. The native Saura Indians knew the mountain as Jomeokee, the "Great Guide" or "Pilot". This trail later became known as the great Wagon Road used by European immigrants from the northern colonies who arrived after most of the native population had been decimated by disease introduced by Spanish explorers and warfare with other tribes like the Cherokee who dwelled in lands to the west. Pilot Mountain has been referred to by several names, including Stonehead Mountain and Mount Ararat, after the biblical Mount Ararat. The first written reference to the name "Pilot" was by Moravian missionaries traveling the great Wagon Road, who called it "the Pilot Mountain." The mountain was mapped in 1751 by Joshua Fry and Peter Jefferson, father of President Thomas Jefferson.

We opted to take the Jomeokee Trail which circles Big Pinnacle.

"Moderate" is in the eyes of the beholder.

Spectacular rhododendrons blooming along the trail.

Crossbedding and ripple marks within the quartzite rock wall along the Jomeokee Trail provide evidence for its near shore environment formation, where water currents disturbed the sand.

I could see a face profile in this formation. 

Layered rocks.

More rhododendrons.