Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, October 18, 1993 TAG: 9310190243
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BILL COCHRAN OUTDOOR EDITOR
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
\ Back in 1978, Wes Barnes hiked the Appalachian Trail from Springer Mountain, Ga. to Mount Katahdin, Maine, but he had to bypass McAfee Knob, a heart-stopping precipice with gasping views of Catawba Valley.
That was the year the trail was chased off the knob by disgruntled landowners, and relocated on North Mountain for a nine-year period. North Mountain isn't bad, but it's no McAfee Knob.
So Barnes was back on a recent sun-bathed October Saturday, basking in the beauty of the knob. He is a carpenter who recently moved from Maine to the Roanoke Valley.
There were other thru-hikers perched on the craggy Silurian sandstone, part of the crowd, yet set apart by their lofty accomplishments: Medicine Man from the class of '92; Bad Dog '91 and Frodo '87. Barnes said he was just plain Wes. Fifteen years ago, trail names weren't all that common.
Also on the knob were a group from Roanoke College, a Boy Scout troop, scores of couples, knots of friends and two or three dogs more interested in food pouches than distant vistas.
And Joe Kelley.
Kelley is the gangly 26-year-old, with long blond hair capped in a blue bandana, a pack towering above his shoulders and a genuine smile on his face.
He is an Appalachian Trail Ridgerunner.
``I am the greeter. I am mainly here because this area gets such heavy use; weekend hikers,'' he says, handing out a yellow brochure titled ``Leave No Trace! An Outdoor Ethic.''
This is the eighth year that the Roanoke Appalachian Trial Club has sponsored a Ridgerunner, said Dr. Bill Gordge, the club's land management supervisor.
``It is an attempt to have people develop an environmental ethic in a low-key way - trying to get across our rules and regulations without shoving them down their neck,'' he said.
Since the trail's return to McAfee Knob in March 1987, the 3.5-mile hike from Virginia 311 on Catawba Mountain to the knob has become one of the most popular along the famous 2,100-mile footpath. It is a welcome refuge for urbanites out of the Roanoke Valley, the New River Valley and beyond.
``Something like 5,000 visitors per year is a pretty fair estimate,'' said Gordge.
It seemed as if most of them were there the day Barnes was on the crest, but Kelley's tally was 157, not counting another 50 or so he said he probably missed. The license tags on the vehicles in the overflowing 311 parking lot reveal a clientele from Maine to Florida.
October is the peak-use period, when the hardwoods are streaked and splashed with autumn brilliance, and a cooler breeze sings in the hemlocks and combs the tough clumps of grasses and sedges that survive in the rock crevices.
Kelley has been a Ridgerunner since Memorial Day, but he began hiking McAfee Knob prior to that.
He has seen it blanketed by 30 inches of snow, he has seen it born again in the pastel shades of spring, he has seen it blistered in the near 100 degrees of summer and he has seen it ablaze in autumn beauty.
While the color season is a glorious benediction for many hikes, Kelley likes to probe deeper into the year, savoring the time when the leaves are gone and so are most of the people. You can better view the heart and soul of the trail then - the mountains - something Kelley does with an artist's eye.
``I like the line that the mountains create along the edge of the sky. It really is intense at night, almost purple. That's what I find the most fascinating, the way the light hits all the ridges.''
Some days Kelley gets out his sketch pad - rocks are a favorite subject - and fulfills what founder Benton MacKaye saw as a purpose of the trail, ``To see what you see.''
But on weekends, people are Kelley's priority. ``It is a public relations job.''
The questions from hikers come like wind-born leaves: ``What's that we are seeing in the distance.'' ``Can we drink the water?'' ``Is there any wildlife?'' ``Snakes?'' ``How long does it take to reach McAfee Knob?'' ``How'd you get this job?''
``You probably won't see snakes,'' Kelley says, then recounts an occasion when that wasn't the case.
``I met these people who were standing in the trail. I took a step forward and the girl said, `Is that a snake there?' I looked and said, `Yes it is.' It was a copperhead that I had been standing next to for five minutes.''
Kelley embraces the ``Leave No Trace'' ethic in an influential, yet gentle manner that suggests: ``This is a really neat place, isn't it? Let's take care of it.'' More love than authority.
``I am not an enforcement person. I try to avoid confrontations, mostly.''
The ``mostly'' means that Kelley will ask you to put out your campfire if you've built it in the wrong spot.
Near a shelter he meets five young men and a young woman who are standing around a smoky fire that they built in the middle of the trail.
``You shouldn't build a fire here,'' he tells them.
One of the men says the group reached the shelter at 1 a.m and found it full, so they set up camp on the trail.
Kelley tells them to put the fire out and disperse the chared wood. Then he starts up the trail to show the group a nearby overflow camping spot.
Only the red-headed woman tags along, and she tells a different story.
``When we got here we saw this thing up under the shelter and thought it was a wolf. It was really growling and snapping.''
So the group backed off and built a fire down the trail. The wolf happened to be a German shepherd owned by a backpacker sleeping in the shelter.
Kelley scratches a report on an index card, a kindly smile etched across his face, then heads on toward the knob.
by CNB