First Snow on the Blue Ridge Parkway 2023 – Craggy Gardens Trail

By admin | Published November 13, 2023

Craggy Gardens Trail tree in snow. — While traveling to our cabin near Bryson City, North Carolina we decided to hop on the Blue Ridge Parkway and to pay a visit to this amazing tree found along the Craggy Gardens trail. As we got closer to the parking area for the trail head it started to rain. A bit on down the road we noticed the rain had change to snow. When we reached the parking area we bundled up and hit the trail. I’d seen many photographs of this tree but could not recall ever seeing it photographed in the snow. It was the first snow of the year on the Blue Ridge. A rare mid-October snowfall. I certainly wasn’t going to pass on the chance to photograph this amazing tree in the snow! I had visited this tree a couple years earlier. It is a frequently photographed subject. The first time I visited conditions were not great but I made a few images just the same. While a winter scene was not what I had envisioned I was not going to pass on the chance to image it with its twisted, curving limbs dusted with new fallen snow. To me this gnarled tree has always been a symbol of survival… of perseverance. Its roots leaving the soil, stretching over exposed boulders as if in a death grip, then disappearing back into the soil.

Prints available at https://bob-decker.pixels.com/featured/first-snow-on-the-blue-ridge-october-16-2023-craggy-gardens-trail-bob-decker.html

This entry was posted in General Photography, Hiking Trail, Landscape Photography, Natural History in the Carolinas, Nature Photography, Travel, Uncategorized and tagged Landscape, North Carolina, Photography.

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