The Allegheny 100 Backpacking Challenge

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Quick: What's the longest National Scenic Trail in the United States? Most people would probably say the Appalachian, Continental Divide or the Pacific Crest trails. They would all be wrong. Stretching more than 4600 miles through 7 states, from New York to North Dakota, the North Country Trail actually owns that distinction.

To help promote this relatively new and unknown trail, the North Country Trail Association is offering the Allegheny 100 Backpacking Challenge next month.

The Allegheny 100 Backpacking Challenge is an attempt to hike 100 miles in 50 hours in the Allegheny National Forest in Northwest Pennsylvania. This is not a race but rather an endurance event to challenge yourself on a 100 mile section of the NCT. The trail is not difficult in terms of climbing and descending, but 100 miles is 100 miles.

Outside support is not permitted - so you're on your own once on the trail. 50 and 25-mile options are also offered.

The event will be held starting on Friday, June 8th at 6 PM through Sunday, June 10th at 8 PM. The welcome table will be located at the PA 66 Trailhead, five miles South of Marienville and 1.2 miles North of Vowinkel.

For more information on the event, please click here.


Jeff
Hiking Trails in the Smokies

Win a Week-Long Trip to the Tour de France

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Cyclists and cycling fans may want to note that Cannondale Bicycles has recently launched its exciting Backstage at the Tour Contest. For the second consecutive year Cannondale will make a cycling fan's dream come true by giving them a once in a lifetime opportunity to spend a week with Team Liquigas-Cannondale at the Tour de France. As part of the experience, the winner will be a member of the behind the scenes team working on race-day preparation and athlete support at the world's most famous cycling event.

Consumers can enter by simply liking Cannondale's Facebook page, clicking on the Tour de France icon and filling out an application. Deadline for submissions is Thursday, May 31st at 11:59 p.m. EDT. This year's grand prize winner will spend seven days in France, touching down on Thursday, July 5 and departing Wednesday, July 11. The Grand Prize winner will also take home a SuperSix EVO bike, recently named the "Best Bike in the World" by Tour Magazine:

"Ever since I was a kid, my dream was to be a part of the Tour de France in some way and Cannondale gave me that opportunity," said Joe Praino, last year's grand prize winner. "From eating dinner with the Liquigas-Cannondale riders, to accompanying them in the team car with the directors, it was an experience that few are privileged to have."

Cannondale Facebook fans will also have the chance to vote on various backstage jobs they want the winner to perform while at the Tour de France, from spraying down bikes to preparing the team's food. Facebook fans will choose which activities make the cut, and the winner will blog about performing them while onsite at the Tour de France.

The 99th running of the Tour de France features one prologue and 20 overall stages that cover 3,479 km (2,160 miles). The Tour kicks off from the Parc d'Avroy, in the heart of Liège on Saturday, June 30 and concludes in Paris on Sunday, July 22.

I love Cannondales! I'm currently on my third Cannondale, and have been riding them for almost 25 years now. So, having an opportunity to win a SuperSix EVO bike is pretty exciting!


Jeff
Hiking Trails in the Smokies

Cherokee National Forest Offering One Free Night

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The Cherokee National Forest is offering one night free stay at several campgrounds on June 9th. In honor of the grand opening of the North River Checking Station and National Get Outdoors Day, the Forest Service is offering one night free at the following campgrounds:

* Dam Creek
* Birch Branch
* Davis Branch
* Rough Ridge
* North River
* Spivey Cove
* Holder Cove
* Big Oak Cove
* Stateline


Jeff
Hiking Trails in the Smokies

5th Annual Herding of the Goats

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Kick off the first day of summer by helping Jamey Donaldson herd 34 goats from Carvers Gap to Jane Bald at part of the Baa-tany project. The Baa-tany Goat Project is a stewardship initiative to manage and restore grassy balds in the western Highlands of Roan Mountain.

Volunteers make the Baa-tany Goat Project a success each year. This year's herding event will occur on June 20th. If interested in participating, please RSVP with Rich Preyer at rich@appalachian.org or by calling 828-253-0095 ext. 205. Please bring hiking shoes, lunch, water, jacket/rain gear, camera, and warm clothes.


Jeff
Hiking Trails in the Smokies

Synchronized Firefly Viewing Affected by Warm Temperatures

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Due to the unseasonably warm spring, the synchronized fireflies found in Elkmont at Great Smoky Mountains National Park are displaying earlier than ever recorded according to park officials. The shuttle service to the event site is still scheduled to take place from June 2-10 for ticketed reservation holders only. Park biologists are predicting that there may still be some activity during the weekend of June 2nd, but the display will be past peak and may taper off significantly well before the following weekend. Those with reservations are being advised of the possibility that the display will not be as good as in previous years.

This early showing has prompted the Park to close the Elkmont entrance road to motor vehicles and pedestrian use every evening from Wednesday, May 30 - Sunday, June 10. Only registered campers staying at the Elkmont Campground will be allowed to access the road.

The Park had set aside 25 parking passes aside to make available the day before the event through www.recreation.gov. These passes may be withdrawn depending on the activity of the fireflies. Please visit www.recreation.gov for current status on these passes.

The popularity of the annual firefly event has made it necessary to close access to the Elkmont viewing area to protect park resources and visitor experiences. This closure requires the availability and coordination of a large number of park staff and the shuttle service provider. The event is generally scheduled based on the recorded timing of firefly appearances in the past years, but Spring 2012 was uncharacteristically warm and made it difficult to accurately predict well in advance. Due to the logistics involved, the Park does not have the flexibility to switch the event operations forward or backwards to match the peak firefly activity.


Jeff
HikingintheSmokys.com

Blue Ridge Parkway speed limit lowered in Asheville corridor

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The Blue Ridge Parkway Foundation is reporting that effective immediately, the speed limit between Highway 74A and Highway 25 (Hendersonville Road) will be reduced from 45 MPH to 35 MPH. This section of the Parkway through the Asheville corridor, from Milepost 383 to Milepost 389, is the most heavily traveled section of the most visited national park site in the country. The speed limit change is aimed at improving the safety of motorists, bicyclists, and pedestrians.

In the past six years the Asheville corridor has seen a change in both traffic density and complexity as more residents and visitors choose to use the Parkway. More bicyclists, pedestrians, runners and hikers are using the motor road, in addition to heavy traffic flow that occurs especially during the mornings and evenings and on weekdays. At those busy times, traffic volume has been recorded at levels as high as 1000 vehicles passing in a single hour, in addition to those people recreating along the road edge and shoulder.

Since 2006, 144 motor vehicle collisions have occurred on this stretch of road, including one fatal collision, and 41 collisions involving injuries, both with bicycles and motor vehicles. Collision investigations showed that approximately one third of these wrecks were caused at least in part by speed or careless driving. During the same time frame, Park Rangers have made 24 arrests for DUI, issued 870 citations for speeding, and 55 citations for careless driving, in addition to 220 citations for failure to obey stop signs.

To read the rest of the press release, please click here.


Jeff
Hiking Trails in the Smokies

$800,000 Sports Car Destroyed in Zion National Park

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NPS Digest is reporting this morning that a 1964 Cobra sports car, valued at $800,000, was completely consumed by a fire in the Zion Mount Carmel Tunnel this past Monday afternoon.

The fire was reported to the park just after 5 p.m. and the park’s structural fire engine company responded, along with the Springdale/Rockville fire department and two wildland fire engines. A Type Six engine, with a 250 gallon tank and a pump capacity of 150 gallons per minute, entered the tunnel with two firefighters wearing self contained breathing apparatuses (SCBAs). A second Type Six engine, two Type One engines, and the wildland engines provided backup for the initial attack engine.

Firefighters with the initial attack engine were able to successfully contain and extinguish the fully engulfed sports car. The two occupants of the car had found relative safety in two of the tunnel’s gallery windows. All other vehicles and people exited the tunnel prior to the initial attack efforts.

The two occupants were transported by ambulance to a local hospital, while the tunnel and road were closed for two-and-a-half hours. The insurance value of the sports car was reported to be $800,000.

Construction of the tunnel, which is just over a mile long, began in the late 1920's and was completed in 1930. At the time the tunnel was dedicated, it was the longest tunnel of its type in the United States. In addition to concerns with the potential for multiple vehicles and people trapped inside the tunnel, responders were aware that wooden timbers provide structural support and prevent rock fall in the interior of the tunnel. The NPS engine company conducts yearly training sessions in the tunnel and had determined that a smaller engine would provide better access and egress from the tunnel in the event of a vehicle fire. Firefighters were also aware that afternoon winds would likely vent smoke away from them as they approached. A protective coating along the walls in the area of the fire protected the tunnel’s wood timbers.


Jeff
Hiking Trails in the Smokies

Plowing the Going-to-the-Sun Road

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Earlier this week Glacier National Park posted a video showing a plower in a front end loader making some serious progress on the Going-to-the-Sun Road near Triple Arches on the west side of the park.

If you've never been to Glacier the Going-to-the-Sun Road is a 50-mile engineering marvel that spans the interior of the park, and allows visitors to cross the Continental Divide in dramatic fashion. For a couple-mile stretch the road hugs the cliffs of the Garden Wall, making for an adrenaline-producing, white-knuckle drive.

Without a doubt, the guys plowing the Going-to-the-Sun Road have nerves of steel. There's no way I would ever want this job:



The Going-to-the-Sun Road is expected to open around mid-June this year. If you have any thoughts of traveling to Glacier, or if you know of anyone that might be interested, let our new sister website help with all your hiking plans. Just like our Smokies website, we offer one stop planning with our Accommodations page, and our Things To Do page where you can find guides, outfitters and tours for rafting, boating, hiking and horseback excursions.


Jeff
HikingintheSmokys.com

Three Men Arrested for Auto Break-Ins at Little River Trailhead

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NPS Digest is reporting that three men have been arrested for breaking into parked automobiles in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Park dispatch received a report of suspicious activity from park employees at the Elkmont Campground ranger station on April 25th. Three men in a red vehicle had been seen at the Little River Trailhead looking into the windows of unoccupied cars. Ranger Heath Soehn searched for and found the car, which was heading away from the trailhead, and got its license plate number. While following the car he saw an object being thrown from the front passenger side window.

Soehn and Ellen Paxton, a special agent on detail from ISB, stopped the car for the observed littering violation and found that the item that had been thrown from the car was a window punch. Soen and Paxton soon learned that three vehicles with smashed-out windows had been found at the trailhead. During a search of the car, Paxton found property that turned out to belong to people from all three of those vehicles. The person who phoned in the initial report also identified the three men as the ones seen at the trailhead. Paxton prepared a criminal complaint charging them with felonies and later testified before a grand jury. A trial is set for July. The three men are believed to have committed eleven other larcenies in the park before being arrested by Soehn and Paxton.


Jeff
Hiking Trails in the Smokies

Hiking Basics at REI

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New to hiking? Next month is the perfect time to join the REI staff in Asheville to learn about the basics of hiking. The 10 essentials to be exact! This free session will review planning your next hike and what to bring with you to help make your adventure a success. Topics covered include understanding trail descriptions, and how to choose a trail, as well as information on local hiking clubs and resources.

The event will occur on 6/13/2012 at the Asheville REI from 7:00 p.m. - 8:15 p.m. Registration is required.


Jeff
Hiking Trails in the Smokies

Classic Hikes of the Smokies: June

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The Friends of the Smokies Classic Hikes of the Smokies series continues next month with a hike along the Appalachian Trail and out to Andrews Bald.

Thursday, June 21: A.T. and Andrews Bald
7.2 miles, 1,600 ft ascent

We'll drop some cars at the Clingmans Dome Parking lot and drive back to the intersection with the Fork Ridge Trail. We'll walk up to Mt. Collins and to Clingmans Dome on the A.T. This section is also the start of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail. Then to Andrews Bald to see the marvelous rehabilitation of this trail by our Trails Forever Crew. We'll finish with a stop at the Clingmans Dome Information Center. Bring your Friends of the Smokies card and your NPS passport for a unique stamp.

To register email Hannah Epperson at hannah@friendsofthesmokies.org or call (828) 452-0720.

A donation of $35 to go to the Friends’ Smokies Trails Forever program is requested, and includes a complimentary membership to Friends of the Smokies. A donation of $10 is requested from current Friends of the Smokies members. Members who bring a friend hike for free.

For more information on the hike to Andrews Bald, please click here.


Jeff
HikingintheSmokys.com

Gov. Haslam Awards $547,000 in Parks and Recreation Grants

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Last Friday Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam and Environment and Conservation Commissioner Bob Martineau awarded an additional $547,000 in grants for recreational trail projects across Tennessee.

The grants are through the Recreational Trails Program, a federally-funded program established to distribute funding for motorized, non-motorized and diverse recreation trail projects. The funds are available to federal, state and local government agencies, as well as non-profit organizations that have obtained IRS 501(c)(3) status and have a written trail management agreement with the agency that owns the property where the trail project is located.

Recreational Trails Program grants may be used for non-routine maintenance and restoration of existing trails, development and rehabilitation, trailside or trailhead facilities such as restrooms, kiosks and parking lots, construction of new trails and land acquisition for recreational trails or corridors.

Funding for RTP grants is provided by the Federal Highway Administration through the federal Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act. The Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation administers this grant program for the state. The maximum federal share for each project is 80 percent, with RTP grant recipients providing a 20 percent match.

Grant recipients were selected through a scoring process with careful consideration given to the projects that met the selection criteria and expressed the greatest local recreation need.

To learn more about the RTP grant program and other recreation or conservation-based grant programs available in the future, please click here. For more information about the RTP grant program, contact Gerald Parish at (615) 532-0538 or Gerald.Parish@tn.gov.

A complete list of the grants announced last Friday can be found here.


Jeff
HikingintheSmokys.com

Tennessee Dedicates 54th State Park at Cummins Falls

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Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam and Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation Commissioner Bob Martineau will join members of the General Assembly, local elected officials and members of the community today for a dedication ceremony announcing the newly created Cummins Falls State Park. The new state park will serve as the 54th addition to the Tennessee State Parks system.

Located on the beautiful Blackburn Fork State Scenic River, this idyllic 211-acre site in Jackson County is home to Tennessee’s eighth largest waterfall at 75 feet high. Cummins Falls is formed on the Eastern Highland Rim and has been a favorite scenic spot and swimming hole for residents of Jackson and Putman counties for more than 100 years. Cummins Falls also has been listed as one of the ten best swimming holes in the United States by Travel and Leisure magazine.

Located in the Cordell Hull watershed, Cummins Falls’ forest includes a variety of oaks, beech, buckeye, sycamore and hemlock trees. The property’s forested streamside protects turkey, quail and eagles, as well as a variety of fox and mink. Through a cooperative agreement with the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency, fishing for bluegill and bass along the riverbank will be permitted with a Tennessee fishing license. The park will be a day-use park and will be open from 8 a.m. until sunset year-round.

The addition of the new park at Cummins Fall was made possible through the leadership of Gov. Haslam, the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation, the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency and through the very generous support of the Tennessee Parks and Greenways Foundation. Other key partners include the Nature Conservancy’s Tennessee Chapter, the Cummins Family, the State Lands Acquisition Fund and the Tennessee Department of Transportation.

For more information on today's ceremony, please click here.


Jeff
HikingintheSmokys.com

National Trails Day Events

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In 1987 President Ronald Reagan authorized the President's Commission on Americans Outdoors. The final report recommended that all Americans be able to go out their front doors, and within fifteen minutes, be on trails that wind through their cities or towns and bring them back without retracing steps. The recommendation, dubbed Trails for All Americans, became the impetus behind several public and private parties joining the American Hiking Society in launching the first National Trails Day in 1993.

In less than two weeks, on June 2nd, the American Hiking Society will celebrate its 20th National Trails Day. More than 2000 events across the nation will take place, including trail maintenance, hiking, paddling, biking, horseback riding, bird watching, running, trail celebrations and more!

Below are a few events in the Great Smoky Mountains region that might be of interest to hikers:

* 16th Annual Appalachian Trail Workday in the Smokies with the Friends of the Smokies. This year, work will be focused on sections of the AT between Icewater Springs Shelter and Silers Bald, and heading NE and SW from Low Gap.

* Firefly Hike in Elkmont with the Smoky Shadows Service Unit Girl Scouts.

* Overmountain Victory National Historic Trail Maintenance Day near Roan Mountain.

* National/Tennessee Trails Day Celebration at Roan Mountain State Park.

* Hike Cumberland Mountain State Park with the Tennessee Trails Association Plateau Chapter.

For a full list of events in your area, please click here.


Jeff
Hiking Trails in the Smokies

Travel Channel Partners with NPF for “Destination Summer” campaign

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The Travel Channel, the preeminent travel brand in the media landscape, will join with the National Park Foundation (NPF), the official charity of America’s national parks, in a summer-long campaign to promote America’s 397 national parks. The primary goal of this alliance is to motivate support of our national parks by inspiring Travel Channel viewers to visit these adventure-packed and history-rich destinations as well encourage volunteerism and monetary donations to NPF.

Travel Channel will support the NPF partnership via a myriad of on- and off-air initiatives positioned under the Network’s “Destination Summer” campaign. Beginning Memorial Day and continuing through September, the Network will feature 30 hours of programming that puts the spotlight on America’s national parks. In addition, on Saturday, June 9, Travel Channel will celebrate “Get Outdoors Day” with an on-air and online marketing campaign showcasing the national parks through exclusive videos, slideshows and feature articles. The Network will also post exclusive, national park-related content on its Facebook, Foursquare, Pinterest and other social media platforms. NPF will cross-promote these efforts on its website and social media platforms.

“Through this Summer partnership, the National Park Foundation and Travel Channel, will provide the Network’s passionate viewers with the best tools and information to plan the perfect national park adventures,” said Neil Mulholland, President and CEO of the National Park Foundation. “Together, we will also highlight the most effective ways we all can support and preserve these incredible places to ensure they remain one of the most engaging travel destinations for generations to come.”

Travel Channel’s programming campaign spotlighting America’s national parks will kick off on Memorial Day, Monday, May 28, with numerous series and specials including: a “Get Outdoors” stack of programming that includes back-to-back episodes of “Best Parks Ever” which features iconic national parks including Yellowstone, Grand Tetons, Glacier, Great Smoky Mountains and Zion; and “Glamping,” which showcases glamorous camping in the wild. Other summer programming supporting the NPF partnership includes “Park Secrets,” the series that gives viewers everything they need to know to turn from tourist to traveler in America’s parks; and “Alaska Unleashed,” a one-hour special highlighting the best and most extreme adventures in Alaska.

A 2012 study by MMGY Global and the U.S. Travel Association found that television programming about U.S. destinations encourages domestic travel. Specifically, 61 percent of Travel Channel viewers reported conducting research to find out more about a U.S. destination featured in a TV program. Moreover, 39 percent of Travel Channel viewers said they are more likely to visit a U.S. destination after viewing a TV program on the topic.

Chartered by the U.S. Congress in 1967, NPF is founded on a legacy that began more than a century ago, when private citizens from all walks of life took action to establish and protect our national parks. Today, the foundation carries on that tradition as the only national nonprofit whose sole mission is to directly support the National Park Service.

Travel Channel is one of six popular television brands within the Scripps Networks Interactive (SNI) lifestyle media portfolio, which also includes Food Network and HGTV. SNI is committed to its corporate social responsibility program, serving as a positive force for change by focusing on one meal, one home and one community at a time through its Change the World initiatives. Travel Channel’s robust summer-long partnership with the National Park Foundation builds on more than $2.5 million in support that SNI has given to the Friends of the Smokies organization over the past several years to help protect and preserve the Great Smoky Mountains National Park located near SNI headquarters in Knoxville, Tenn. To learn more about all of SNI’s corporate social responsibility efforts, visit snichangetheworld.com.


Jeff
Hiking Trails in the Smokies

Best ham you ever ate. Scout's honor.

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It had been a miserable day -- soggy, dark, mercury fixing to plunge, inhospitable, mud ugly -- when Barnie and Debbie Day walked in with a big ham, a big pot, a big saw and big hearts. They have taken us under their wings up here in the Blue Ridge and have been making sure we know what to do, especially when it comes to good eating.

Barnie has taught Jim Newlin and me how to skin a deer and where to get the meat butchered and wrapped. He has shown me his favorite early-morning hunting spots, introduced me to people who know how to fix a tractor or rive a shingle or get a small engine running again, and brought me books from his library in the century-old house where he and Debbie live.

On this night Jim and Silvie Granitelli joined us for a session in how to wrap-cook the ham.  We turned it into a party. And it turns out to be fairly easy for an old guy to cook the best ham you ever tasted.It works like a charm. I should mention that all three of us are married to wonderful cooks, so it's a delight to me to discover I can do something in the cooking category that doesn't involve making a pot of chili or firing up the grill or tending the smoker all afternoon.

I wrote about Barnie's instructions for wrap-cooking a ham about a year ago on a  blog I was writing for The Charlotte Observer, and I had tasted a wrap-cooked ham, but hadn't cooked one. Barnie says he got the instructions, by the way, from a fellow named Robert Crumpton Sr. of Roxboro and Oxford, so he always gives credit where it's due.

Detailed instructions follow, but here's the short summary: Get a Clifty Farm ham if you can find it (Barnie gets his at the Piggly Wiggly in Danville) and cut off the hock. Save it, but you won't need it to cook the ham.  Put the ham in the big pot and cover it with a couple of inches of water. Turn it on and bring it to a boil. While you're waiting, drink some Irish whiskey and tell some outrageous stories. It won't help the ham cook but it'll fill the time while you're waiting for the pot to boil.  When the pot boils, immediately take it off the stove, wrap the pot in some heavy insulation such as a sleeping bag, tie it all together, and leave it for about 12 hours. The next morning, pull the ham out of the still-hot water, remove the tough outer rind, score the fat in a cross-hatch or diamond pattern, rub in plain old American sugar, and bake it for two hours in the oven at 275 degrees. When it comes out, the flavor will just about knock you down it's so good.

Here's the longer set of instructions. Print 'em out, cook your ham, and remember where you read it first:

This is the world’s best way to cook a country ham.  Guaranteed.  Period.  Scout’s honor.  Cross my heart and hope to die.  And it’s not original.  Of course, I stole it.  And, as luck would have it, it is also the easiest.  Often the case.  We overcomplicate a lot of things.  Cooking a ham is one of them.


Let’s start with the ham itself, and how it was cured. 


There are lots of run-of-the-mill brands, some of them old and famous but still run-of-the-mill, brands that owe their reputations more to glossy catalogues and clever and expensive marketing campaigns than they do to judge-by-eating juries. 


Many of these hams are cured “inside out,” needle-embalmed with nitrate injections.  They are not the best hams -- often more expensive -- but not the best.


Still, these hams eat okay -- unless you’ve eaten ham cured like your granddaddy cured it, ham cured the old way.


He cured his hams “outside in.”  He didn’t know about nitrate injections.  (And if he had, he wouldn’t have done it to his hams!)  He simply packed his fresh in plain salt for six to eight weeks, took them up, washed and dried them, maybe smoked them a little, maybe not, probably peppered them, hung them in cotton sacking in a cool place, out of reach of the dogs, and aged them for several months. 


A note here:  don’t be flummoxed by the term “sugar cured.”  Often salt is mixed with sugar, with pepper, with molasses, with honey -- all kinds of stuff -- and labeled some fancy “cure,” or another, but these things -- including smoke -- be it apple wood, hickory, whatever -- only flavor hams.  What cures, or preserves, a ham is the salt that it absorbs during the curing process. 


Buy whatever brand you want.  For my money, the best country ham in this part of the world, the one closest to what your granddaddy cured, is a Clifty Farm ham, processed for 60 years or so by the Murphey Family, in Paris, Tennessee.  They’re usually available, and reasonably priced, across Southside Virginia around Christmastime.  ($1.79 a pound at the Piggly Wiggly in Danville.)


Okay, now let’s cook that bad boy!


Unwrap the ham and wash it.  Yeah, they all have a little mold.  No big deal.  Really.  It would cause me some concern if it didn’t have mold on it.  Just palm it off with a little warm water.  Two minutes, tops. 


Put the ham in a pot that you have a top for.  I always have to cut the hock off so it will fit the pot I use.  They’ll cut the hock off for you at the grocery store.  If I have to tell you what that hock is good for, stop reading this and move on.  You got no business with a country ham.  Either that, or you’re a Yankee, and threw the ham out when you saw the mold.


Fill the pot with water until the ham is covered with 3-4 inches, put the top on, and bring it to a boil.


Now here is the trick to this:  As soon as it begins to boil, you take it off the stove.  That’s right.  Off the stove when it begins to boil.  Set it somewhere where it will be out of your way. 


Now we’re going to wrap that puppy up.  Pot and all.  You can use most anything -- towels, an old blanket, a quilt, a sleeping bag.  The patio lounge cushion works well.  That’s what I use.  The idea is to insulate the pot so that it holds the heat.


I put an inch or so of newspaper under the pot, the same amount on top, wrap the patio cushion around it, and tie the cushion in place with baling twine.  This doesn’t take five minutes.  Just make sure it’s insulated good.


When you get it wrapped, leave it alone.  Walk away from it.  Forget about it for 12 hours.  Just let it sit.


After 12 hours, remove the wrap, and take the ham out of the pot and put it on a baking pan.  Careful here—even after sitting 12 hours, the water will be too hot for you to put your hands in.


Trim the skin off, score a diamond pattern on the thin layer of encasing fat, rub into it a cup of white sugar, put the ham -- uncovered -- in the oven and bake it for 2 hours at 275 degrees.  And that’s it.  You’re done.  Let it cool before slicing. 


Merry Christmas.  And best to you and yourn


Barnie K. Day
Meadows of Dan, VA

Snowed in today? Drive the 'Digital Blue Ridge Parkway'

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It snowed a couple inches overnight up here at 3,100 feet -- not nearly enough to snow anyone in  -- but for those who appreciate the Blue Ridge Parkway yet can't get there as often as they'd like, there's good news: Anne Mitchell Whisnant has done it again.  The author of "Super Scenic Motorway," a myth-busting history of the parkway published in 2006 by UNC Press, and, with David Whisnant' "When the Parkway Came," a 2010  children's book that adults will also appreciate, Whisnant has collaborated with libraries at UNC-Chapel Hill, the N.C. State Archives and the National Park Service's Blue Ridge Parkway, among others, to produce an online digital history with maps, photographs and satellite view of the region through which the Blue Ridge Parkway runs.





  Like her previous works, the new project is reflective of her meticulous approach to what many of us believe qualifies as a modern wonder of the world. It's called "Driving Through Time: The Digital Blue Ridge Parkway."

In a note she sent the other day, Whisnant said, "Although the grant funding for site development has ended, we will be continuing throughout spring to publish  more and more of the NC digital photos online, as well as creating more and more interactive, georeferenced maps.  As we can, we will also be adding more of the short narrative essays we call “overlooks”.

Here's part of a news release from UNC:

The history of the Blue Ridge Parkway, America’s most visited National Park System site, is now online. The new collection, “Driving Through Time: The Digital Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina,” was created through a collaborative project based at the library of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. “Driving Through Time,” available at http://docsouth.unc.edu/blueridgeparkway/, presents photographs, maps, news articles, oral histories and essays documenting development and construction of the parkway’s North Carolina segment. The site invites users to explore parkway history chronologically, geographically or by dozens of topics from access roads and automobiles to wildlife and workmen. An interactive maps feature layers historical maps atop current road maps and satellite images. The comparisons provide insight into the parkway’s development and its impact on pre-parkway towns, farms, roads and topography. The 469-mile parkway radically altered the landscape of 29 Virginia and North Carolina counties when it was built between 1934 and 1987, and its construction sparked intense controversy, said Anne Mitchell Whisnant, adjunct associate professor of history at UNC and the project’s scholarly adviser. Whisnant, author of the parkway history “Super-Scenic Motorway” (UNC Press, 2006) and the children’s book “When the Parkway Came” (Primary Source Publishers, 2010), was often frustrated as she combed archives and historic documents and tried to translate conflicts about routing and land rights into words. “I found myself thinking, ‘If only I could see and show what and where they’re talking about, it would be so much easier to explain the arguments,’” she said. “‘Driving Through Time’ makes the park’s history visible and accessible to historians, planners, local communities, landowners and anyone who wants to know more about this American landmark.” At the heart of the project are thousands of items from three institutions that collaborated to create the site: The Wilson Special Collections Library at UNC; the Blue Ridge Parkway headquarters (a division of the National Park Service, located in Asheville); and the North Carolina State Archives. Materials in the online collection include: Historic photographs showing construction of the parkway and images of communities it passed through; Maps depicting private land parcels purchased for the parkway, proposed alternate routes, landscape planning and the completed parkway; Letters and documents pertaining to the community of Little Switzerland in McDowell and Mitchell counties, which sued the parkway; Oral histories from parkway designers and laborers; Images by the late N.C. photographer Hugh Morton, depicting the parkway as it passed Grandfather Mountain, which he owned. Eleven essays share more insight into the building of the parkway and its impact. Whisnant and her students wrote about issues including competition between the tourism and logging industries, the parkway’s impact on the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians and selection of the parkway route.  Also included are K-12 lesson plans that faculty from the School of Education developed to help students use the site’s extensive primary source materials and interpretive essays. “Driving Through Time” was made possible by a $150,000 grant from the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services under provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act, as administered by the State Library of North Carolina.

There's just one hitch...

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When it snowed a couple of inches the other night, it reminded me of a chore I'd been putting off for months: hooking up the big scrape blade to the back of the tractor.The tractor was still attached to an old Haban sickle bar mower -- too short to get at all the vile-tempered briars growing along the banks of our creek but better than any of the bush-hog brutes we've got to help keep the foliage down and the fields open. So I had put off what needed to be done.

I'm the hired hand on this old farm and I've been fighting tractor hitches just long enough to have an appreciation for the mule. Nope, never plowed with a mule, but the notion of an uncooperative, stubborn, recalcitrant, mind-of-its-own beast adequately describes my view of the three-point hitch. Shoot, just getting an implement unhooked from the tractor hitch can consume more time, effort and strength than you might have for the remainder of the day.

Or used to, anyway, until I traded in two old, leaky, shackley underpowered tractors that would barely pull some of the steep hills we have up here at 3,100 feet elevation. A fellow clued me in to part of the problem -- the two lift arms on each of the old tractors weren't adjustable,  and thus all manner of levering, banging around with a nine-pound hammer and cussing in the style of a stevedore on steroids was part of any change from, say, a finish mower to a box blade. It will wear you out.

A word about three-point hitches: They're far safer than the hitches many farmers used in the early days of tractors. I've written about this before: The three-point hitch was developed by Irishman Harry Ferguson in 1926 after the British government asked him to develop a system to prevent tractor accidents caused by plows catching on rocks.

"The plow would halt but the tractor would attempt to keep going – and with the large rear wheels’ axle serving as a fulcrum, the tractor would rear up and flip over backward, killing or maiming the driver. 
Ferguson came up with the three-point hitch, a sort of A-frame shaped connection whose two lower bars would provide stability and whose top bar would apply forward pressure, keeping a tractor from flipping back when a plow hung up on a rock. He also developed the hydraulic lifters that allowed the driver to pick up the plow or bush hog it was towing. That made turning or getting to and from the fields a lot easier."  Ferguson years later became the Ferguson in Massey Ferguson Tractors.

Yesterday the wind was screaming and the mercury around 30 when I finally fetched up the grit to go out and unhook the sickle bar mower and put on the scrape blade.  We're having a relatively mild winter, but I keep remembering two years ago when there was snow and ice on the ground from early December to the first week of April, and there was no way to move that stuff around once it froze.


This time it was almost pleasant. The picture at left, pulled from a website called TractorByNet, shows part of the solution.  After I finally learned how to extend the lift arms by pulling a clip and a clevis pin on each side, the old mower miraculously slid right off the now-loosened lift arms and settled onto a couple of six-inch beam cutoffs that keep the thing out of the dirt.  It's a lot easier to slide off the power take off (PTO) link, the devilish device that transfers engine power to the farm implement you're trying to attach, than it is to put it on. Detaching the top link is a simple matter of backing off on a threaded sleeve.  And hooking up the heavy-duty scrape blade was just about as easy, especially with no PTO to reattach.  I was done in about 10 minutes, a new world record for an aging, arthritic farmhand with too much newsroom experience and not enough farmland savvy.

I wrote about three-point hitches nearly five years ago for a newspaper blog I was putting out at the time. Shortly after it appeared, I got a nice note from a Raleigh lobbyist for agricultural interests. In part it read:

"Once you master the PTO, you can move up to the manure spreader!"

Several ways to take that, of course, but I decided it was a compliment. At my age you got to take them any way you can get 'em. Let it snow.

A hoarder's story

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Woodworkers are among the worst hoarders. It's a character flaw, but there it is.  Among my conceits is the idea that one day I'll know enough about joinery and dovetails and turning and planing to make museum quality stuff from the wood I've been hoarding for decades.

 And so I hang on to the walnut coffee table top I made in 8th grade shop class, the heart pine door panels that came out of a Greensboro house William Sidney Porter (O. Henry) played in as a child, the burl, if I can still find it, said to have been cut from a tree where they hanged one of Mosby's Rangers in 1864, the rough-cut walnut from a Wake County tree bought by four college friends in 1977, the cherry that my father-in-law and I rounded up somewhere the other side of Willis back in the 1980s, the mahogany that came as part of a pallet made somewhere in South or Central America and discarded by a dealer after arrival of some gizmo or other. Even the mahogany cutoffs from a Raleigh billiards table maker.  And I always regretted not having bought some of the old maple floor from UNC's Woolen Gym, the same floor where Lennie Rosenbluth and Tommy Kearns won a lot of the 32 games they took in that 1957 run to the national championship.

But the thing that made me feel rich was the 2,500 board feet of clear Southern Yellow Pine that I got from a Chatham County, N.C. mill after a foulup over a botched order of flooring back in 2007. We were building a log home then, and had ordered pre-finished pine flooring, six inches wide with tongue and groove edges. The builder was putting it in the first week of December that year, and I was sitting in a State Board of Community Colleges meeting when the cell phone beeped with the bad news: the tongue sat a couple of hundredths of an inch higher than the groove, which meant that the flooring would not fit together in a smooth way. In fact, it would tend to rock as it dried out. It was a mess.

Long story short, that batch of flooring went back to the factory, which could not deliver a new batch for weeks.  In a sweat, we found locally-produced oak flooring in Hillsville and the contractor went on to install that.  I didn't find out until much later that the oak flooring had a similar problem, and had to be ripped out after half a room was done, to be replaced with proper flooring. When that (third) floor was finally down, it was lovely, exquisite, perfect.  And it stayed perfect for several weeks, until the appliance store tried to roll a refrigerator with a frozen caster across the floor and etched an interesting pattern in the wood. Duck fits ensued. But that's another story.

What I wound up with was some lovely 12-foot and 16-foot lengths of 1x8 Southern Yellow Pine that the mill in Chatham County sent me in exchange for the bad flooring. Mostly straight and mostly smooth, it looked mighty good. I built pantry shelves with some of it, and bookshelves in the great room with more of it. Looked fine right up until lightning struck and made a big pile of ashes and rubble in June 2010.



We've rebuilt, and my winter project this year was replacing the bookshelves. I started on the side away from the stereo system and TV and about two dozen kinds of wires that looked too complicated to even think about for awhile. Once the easy side was done, I started labeling the wires and running speaker cable beneath the floor and figuring out which speaker was going to go where. And instead of shelves that went to the floor, that side had to have a base cabinet large enough to house a receiver, CD player, Blu-Ray player and set-top box, plus a lot of CDs and the subwoofer, and hold the flat-screen TV at the proper height.

For a couple weeks I did nothing more than turn 1x8 boards into 1x18 inch boards, for cabinet sides, shelves and top.  I used every clamp in the shop and quite a bit of Gorilla Glue, and then a good-sized batch of 3x21 belts and six-hole oscillating sandpaper discs trying to get everything flat, or at least reasonably smooth.

It all came together about 10 days ago, and since then has soaked up a couple cans of hand-rubbed satin finish.  For a batch of botched flooring, these shelves and cabinet look pretty good. But you still can't walk on 'em, nosireebob.

Now, if I could just find a couple boxes of missing books....

Spring's slick snow job

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There's a reason folks up here atop the mountain advise against planting flowers or vegetables much before sometime in May.  You only have to look out the window to see why: it's snowing sideways, with fat flakes screaming along out of the northwest here on the, what, 32nd or 33rd day of Spring? The temps are in the low 40s, the wind has been howling a couple days and it looks like late January or early February, except that the trees have little leaves on them. Or did when this blow started.

About a month ago, there were a lot of daffodils and various other bulbs pushing up and blooming. Then a Saturday afternoon hailstorm shredded the blossoms, made salad out of the leaves and stripped even our tough old mountain laurels of leaves that had been there since, I don't know, the first Mills Godwin administration.  Perhaps I exaggerate.  But that storm was nasty.

Today's is nasty and cold. We hardly had a fire in March because the weather was so warm; I've fetched firewood five times from the woodlot down by the barn in the last couple days, and it looks like I've got four more trips ahead of me before we return to Spring in another day or so.

Should have known, of course, but we got spoiled by the mild weather. Driving down Belcher Mountain Road the other day I spotted the first firepinks, some impossibly red little starburst blooms near a burned-out shell of a house.  And I succumbed to the allure of some bright blooming rhododendron over at Felecia Shelor's Poor Farmers Market. I filled up the back of my pickup truck with five-gallon tubs of those beauties; now they're huddled against the wind at the back of the garage, shivering in the gale and looking doubtful about life up here on the ridgetop.

We'll look back with fondness at days like this in July, when the sun's out and flogging the daylights out of our hides while we scrabble at the weeds in the tomato patch or something,  but right now it seems like light-years away.  A man's got to believe in something, and I believe I will go fetch another cup of coffee and maybe a dollop of that snakebite potion we keep around for emergencies.  You just never know up here.

New Travel Website for Cumberland Plateau

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Planning a trip to the Cumberland Plateau for a little hiking, biking, canoeing, or any other outdoor pursuit you can think of?

The folks over at the Alliance for the Cumberlands recently launched a brand new website to help tourists and outdoor types find almost any type of adventure in the region.

The website, called Edge Trekker, is an online platform for exploring the possibilitites of travel in the Cumberland Plateau region. The purpose of the website is to provide a resource for the creation and sharing of trips, and is a part of the Alliance for the Cumberlands' effort to build a nation-wide interest in the Cumberland Plateau region.

Did you know that Tennessee's Cumberland Plateau contains over 500,000 acres in publicly owned recreation lands, including:

• 3 National Park system units

• 15 State Parks

• 14 State Natural Areas

• 7 State Forests

• 23 Wildlife Management Areas or Refuges, including one of only two elk herds in the southeast (the Smokies being the other, of course!)

• 1 National Scenic River and 3 State Scenic Rivers

The Cumberland Plateau also boasts:

• 122 natural bridges and stone arches.

• 22 chimney formations, including 14 over 20 feet in height and one 200 feet high.

• Hundreds of miles of sandstone cliffs up to 120 feet tall, including four of the finest rock climbing sites in the southeast.

• 164 waterfalls, including 39 over fifty feet and 10 over 100 feet. The list includes the highest waterfall east of the Mississippi.

• 280 caves, 21 of which are described as "extensive," including Cumberland Caverns, Big Bone Cave, and Wonder Cave.

• Many wild and spectacular gorges, including Savage Gulf State Natural Area (11,000 acres), containing one of the nation's most significant remnants of virgin cove forest.

• 1200 miles of rivers and streams

For more information, please click here.


Jeff
Hiking Trails in the Smokies

Temporary Closure of Tremont Gravel Road

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Great Smoky Mountains National Park officials have announced that the gravel section of Tremont Road beyond the Great Smoky Mountains Institute will be closed on May 15 and 16 to allow crews to clean ditches, culverts and grade the road while using heavy equipment and dump trucks. Workers will also be adding gravel to the road and removing standing dead trees along the shoulders. The closure of this narrow road is necessary for the safety of visitors and employees during this much needed road work.

During the closure periods there will continue to be access to Great Smoky Mountains Institute at Tremont and the West Prong and Lumber Ridge Trailheads. The Middle Prong Trailhead will be inaccessible.


Jeff
Hiking Trails in the Smokies

Do hikers need to carry a gun now?

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Do hikers need to pack heat when venturing into the wilderness? I raise this question after reading about several violent acts in the wilderness within the last year. Allow me to list a few of these in chronological order:

* The FBI continues to search for the person(s) who murdered Scott Lilly on the Appalachian Trail in central Virginia. His “partially buried” body was found on August 12th of last year. The FBI recently announced a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the perpetrator(s).

* Last August, during a violent rampage, an Indiana man stabbed and killed a 76-year-old assistant Boy Scout leader while hiking with three others on a rail trail near Bunker Hill, IN.

* On September 25th, 2011, a female driving in the Nantahala National Forest stopped to render aid to a person she believed was incapacitated, while lying beside the road. At that time a firearm was used to subdue the victim, and then she was forcibly raped. As far as I know this case has not been solved.

* Last October an avid hiker was found dead on a trail in the San Luis Obispo area with severe trauma to his head and face - presumably murdered.

* Back in March there was the highly publicised case of two men disappearing in the Smokies - five days apart - without a trace. In both cases, officials dealt with conflicting clues and details. Did they commit suicide? Did they try to disappear without a trace? Were the two incidents in anyway connected - by someone who possibly kidnapped them and/or murdered them? No other clues in the two cases have emerged.

* Perhaps one of the most shocking incidents I've seen related to this subject is learning of two teenagers who were arrested in Utah this past April, after constructing booby traps on a popular trail near Provo.

* The most recent incident, which happened within the past week, and prompted this posting, was this:

It was a little before midnight Monday when Hensley said Unicoi County 911 received a call stating an individual was holding several hikers hostage at the Beauty Spot lookout on Unaka Mountain. Hensley, who took the call, said the caller stated the man had approached the group of five hikers with a handgun drawn, told them that he was a game warden, and ordered them to get down on their hands and knees. The 911 call, Hensley said, came from one of the hikers allegedly being taken hostage.

Two of the hostages happened to be U.S. Coast Guard officers, who were able to take the gun away, and then proceeded to hogtie the assailant!

In addition to these particular incidences, National Parks and the USFS have issued warnings from time to time about drug traffickers using parks to transport drugs, set-up meth labs, and even cultivate marijuana within park boundaries.

So in the words of the immortal Marvin Gaye: What's going on? Are these isolated incidences, or is there a trend we need to be aware of? Other than hiking in groups, taking self-defense classes, what else can hikers do to protect themselves while out on the trail?






Jeff
HikingintheSmokys.com

Gizmos are great, except when they aren't

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Every now and then the phone rings and the call sounds familiar. It'll be an installer from Lowes, or a truck driver from Grand Furniture, or the deliveryman from Costco, or maybe the FedEx motor freight driver.

And they have pretty much the same question: Where are you?
 Does this look like a road a delivery van would travel on?

It's especially important to people who make their livings finding you and giving you what you've paid for. One fellow pulled up in front of our house after coming up the wrong end of Belcher Mountain Road and having to work his way around some turns as tight as a paper clip.  He shut off the engine, rolled down the window and asked, "Mister, is there another way off this mountain?"  When I told him the Blue Ridge Parkway was just about three miles east and Black Ridge Road just a bit farther, he sighed. "You got to be kidding. I was on Black Ridge two hours ago, before the GPS lost its mind and told me to go down to Woolwine and up the east end of Belcher Mountain Road.

This farm is at the same place it's been for, oh, a century or so. But the problem is that people have lost their ability to read topographic maps or follow directions. They just want to trust the GPS and the computer.  Bad idea.

We learned about this years ago way down on the Neuse River, where we kept a 37-foot cutter with the latest Garmin chartplotter and a computer chip containing the latest maps.  When we ran aground in the river below New Bern, we realized that trusting the GPS also depended on our trusting that the chartmaker years ago put the channel on the correct side of the daymarkers.  But someone had fouled up, putting the channel about 30 feet southeast of where it ought to have been. It took us a while to work our way off the shoal and find the channel.

In the same fashion, the computer-based map services such as Mapquest and Google Maps depend on some mapmaker from long ago to have put the right things down on the topo maps. But neither of those computer services has a brain to ask such questions as: Can a tractor trailer maneuver around those hairpin turns?  Is that dotted line through the woods really a passable road? Is it wide enough for a delivery truck?  Is that dotted line even in the right place?


The answer we've found is sometimes no. Somebody fouled up the maps a long time ago, and the computer -- trusting the old input and without the ability to reason its way through reasonable questions -- assumes the old maps are right and that everything's okay.

A month or so ago an installer was coming out to measure for a new storm door. Well after the appointed hour he called from down in Woolwine.  "Lookahere," he said, "I'm trying to get up to your house and the computer says I'm just a couple of miles away, but I can't find Brammer Spur Road."


 No wonder. Brammer Spur Road isn't a passable road, not for traffic, anyway.  Sure, there's a paved Brammer Spur Road out of Woolwine that turns into a dirt farm road at the base of the mountain and then seems to peter out in the woods. But it's a rocky, rutted track for most of its length, in places well sunken andf badly eroded and narrow, a jeep trail that's passable by foot, horseback or ATV.  And it's blocked off at the Belcher Mountain end by the property owners who don't want folks gallivanting all over the mountainside on a road that is little more than an old trail.

The second problem is that some of the map services I've seen have confused Brammer Spur with another trail that runs along the Blue Ridge Escarpment a ways. It's the Connor Spur Road, but it hasn't been a passable road to motor traffic since Moses was in third grade.  We walked down it 20 years ago, occasionally losing sight of where the trail went, backtracking to find and follow the trail down the hill.  It too sometimes shows up on the computer maps as a passable road.  It isn't.

And the third problem is that even with all the sophisticated gizmos that can figure out latitude and longitude, the computer services can't seem to figure out exactly where we are.  They seem to think we're over near Barnie Day's property, when in fact we're about a mile east of there.

This ought to be easy to fix. But I've spent several hours trying to send email to Google and trying to use its online fix-a-mistake page.  No doubt I've made a mistake trying to use it properly.  Somehow we haven't connected.

But I have to give credit where it's due: the U.S. Postal Service doesn't have any trouble finding us. Whenever there's a bill to be paid, that notice will be on time and in the right box.

Best ham you ever ate. Scout's honor.

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It had been a miserable day -- soggy, dark, mercury fixing to plunge, inhospitable, mud ugly -- when Barnie and Debbie Day walked in with a big ham, a big pot, a big saw and big hearts. They have taken us under their wings up here in the Blue Ridge and have been making sure we know what to do, especially when it comes to good eating.

Barnie has taught Jim Newlin and me how to skin a deer and where to get the meat butchered and wrapped. He has shown me his favorite early-morning hunting spots, introduced me to people who know how to fix a tractor or rive a shingle or get a small engine running again, and brought me books from his library in the century-old house where he and Debbie live.

On this night Jim and Silvie Granitelli joined us for a session in how to wrap-cook the ham.  We turned it into a party. And it turns out to be fairly easy for an old guy to cook the best ham you ever tasted.It works like a charm. I should mention that all three of us are married to wonderful cooks, so it's a delight to me to discover I can do something in the cooking category that doesn't involve making a pot of chili or firing up the grill or tending the smoker all afternoon.

I wrote about Barnie's instructions for wrap-cooking a ham about a year ago on a  blog I was writing for The Charlotte Observer, and I had tasted a wrap-cooked ham, but hadn't cooked one. Barnie says he got the instructions, by the way, from a fellow named Robert Crumpton Sr. of Roxboro and Oxford, so he always gives credit where it's due.

Detailed instructions follow, but here's the short summary: Get a Clifty Farm ham if you can find it (Barnie gets his at the Piggly Wiggly in Danville) and cut off the hock. Save it, but you won't need it to cook the ham.  Put the ham in the big pot and cover it with a couple of inches of water. Turn it on and bring it to a boil. While you're waiting, drink some Irish whiskey and tell some outrageous stories. It won't help the ham cook but it'll fill the time while you're waiting for the pot to boil.  When the pot boils, immediately take it off the stove, wrap the pot in some heavy insulation such as a sleeping bag, tie it all together, and leave it for about 12 hours. The next morning, pull the ham out of the still-hot water, remove the tough outer rind, score the fat in a cross-hatch or diamond pattern, rub in plain old American sugar, and bake it for two hours in the oven at 275 degrees. When it comes out, the flavor will just about knock you down it's so good.

Here's the longer set of instructions. Print 'em out, cook your ham, and remember where you read it first:

This is the world’s best way to cook a country ham.  Guaranteed.  Period.  Scout’s honor.  Cross my heart and hope to die.  And it’s not original.  Of course, I stole it.  And, as luck would have it, it is also the easiest.  Often the case.  We overcomplicate a lot of things.  Cooking a ham is one of them.


Let’s start with the ham itself, and how it was cured. 


There are lots of run-of-the-mill brands, some of them old and famous but still run-of-the-mill, brands that owe their reputations more to glossy catalogues and clever and expensive marketing campaigns than they do to judge-by-eating juries. 


Many of these hams are cured “inside out,” needle-embalmed with nitrate injections.  They are not the best hams -- often more expensive -- but not the best.


Still, these hams eat okay -- unless you’ve eaten ham cured like your granddaddy cured it, ham cured the old way.


He cured his hams “outside in.”  He didn’t know about nitrate injections.  (And if he had, he wouldn’t have done it to his hams!)  He simply packed his fresh in plain salt for six to eight weeks, took them up, washed and dried them, maybe smoked them a little, maybe not, probably peppered them, hung them in cotton sacking in a cool place, out of reach of the dogs, and aged them for several months. 


A note here:  don’t be flummoxed by the term “sugar cured.”  Often salt is mixed with sugar, with pepper, with molasses, with honey -- all kinds of stuff -- and labeled some fancy “cure,” or another, but these things -- including smoke -- be it apple wood, hickory, whatever -- only flavor hams.  What cures, or preserves, a ham is the salt that it absorbs during the curing process. 


Buy whatever brand you want.  For my money, the best country ham in this part of the world, the one closest to what your granddaddy cured, is a Clifty Farm ham, processed for 60 years or so by the Murphey Family, in Paris, Tennessee.  They’re usually available, and reasonably priced, across Southside Virginia around Christmastime.  ($1.79 a pound at the Piggly Wiggly in Danville.)


Okay, now let’s cook that bad boy!


Unwrap the ham and wash it.  Yeah, they all have a little mold.  No big deal.  Really.  It would cause me some concern if it didn’t have mold on it.  Just palm it off with a little warm water.  Two minutes, tops. 


Put the ham in a pot that you have a top for.  I always have to cut the hock off so it will fit the pot I use.  They’ll cut the hock off for you at the grocery store.  If I have to tell you what that hock is good for, stop reading this and move on.  You got no business with a country ham.  Either that, or you’re a Yankee, and threw the ham out when you saw the mold.


Fill the pot with water until the ham is covered with 3-4 inches, put the top on, and bring it to a boil.


Now here is the trick to this:  As soon as it begins to boil, you take it off the stove.  That’s right.  Off the stove when it begins to boil.  Set it somewhere where it will be out of your way. 


Now we’re going to wrap that puppy up.  Pot and all.  You can use most anything -- towels, an old blanket, a quilt, a sleeping bag.  The patio lounge cushion works well.  That’s what I use.  The idea is to insulate the pot so that it holds the heat.


I put an inch or so of newspaper under the pot, the same amount on top, wrap the patio cushion around it, and tie the cushion in place with baling twine.  This doesn’t take five minutes.  Just make sure it’s insulated good.


When you get it wrapped, leave it alone.  Walk away from it.  Forget about it for 12 hours.  Just let it sit.


After 12 hours, remove the wrap, and take the ham out of the pot and put it on a baking pan.  Careful here—even after sitting 12 hours, the water will be too hot for you to put your hands in.


Trim the skin off, score a diamond pattern on the thin layer of encasing fat, rub into it a cup of white sugar, put the ham -- uncovered -- in the oven and bake it for 2 hours at 275 degrees.  And that’s it.  You’re done.  Let it cool before slicing. 


Merry Christmas.  And best to you and yourn


Barnie K. Day
Meadows of Dan, VA

Snowed in today? Drive the 'Digital Blue Ridge Parkway'

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It snowed a couple inches overnight up here at 3,100 feet -- not nearly enough to snow anyone in  -- but for those who appreciate the Blue Ridge Parkway yet can't get there as often as they'd like, there's good news: Anne Mitchell Whisnant has done it again.  The author of "Super Scenic Motorway," a myth-busting history of the parkway published in 2006 by UNC Press, and, with David Whisnant' "When the Parkway Came," a 2010  children's book that adults will also appreciate, Whisnant has collaborated with libraries at UNC-Chapel Hill, the N.C. State Archives and the National Park Service's Blue Ridge Parkway, among others, to produce an online digital history with maps, photographs and satellite view of the region through which the Blue Ridge Parkway runs.





  Like her previous works, the new project is reflective of her meticulous approach to what many of us believe qualifies as a modern wonder of the world. It's called "Driving Through Time: The Digital Blue Ridge Parkway."

In a note she sent the other day, Whisnant said, "Although the grant funding for site development has ended, we will be continuing throughout spring to publish  more and more of the NC digital photos online, as well as creating more and more interactive, georeferenced maps.  As we can, we will also be adding more of the short narrative essays we call “overlooks”.

Here's part of a news release from UNC:

The history of the Blue Ridge Parkway, America’s most visited National Park System site, is now online. The new collection, “Driving Through Time: The Digital Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina,” was created through a collaborative project based at the library of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. “Driving Through Time,” available at http://docsouth.unc.edu/blueridgeparkway/, presents photographs, maps, news articles, oral histories and essays documenting development and construction of the parkway’s North Carolina segment. The site invites users to explore parkway history chronologically, geographically or by dozens of topics from access roads and automobiles to wildlife and workmen. An interactive maps feature layers historical maps atop current road maps and satellite images. The comparisons provide insight into the parkway’s development and its impact on pre-parkway towns, farms, roads and topography. The 469-mile parkway radically altered the landscape of 29 Virginia and North Carolina counties when it was built between 1934 and 1987, and its construction sparked intense controversy, said Anne Mitchell Whisnant, adjunct associate professor of history at UNC and the project’s scholarly adviser. Whisnant, author of the parkway history “Super-Scenic Motorway” (UNC Press, 2006) and the children’s book “When the Parkway Came” (Primary Source Publishers, 2010), was often frustrated as she combed archives and historic documents and tried to translate conflicts about routing and land rights into words. “I found myself thinking, ‘If only I could see and show what and where they’re talking about, it would be so much easier to explain the arguments,’” she said. “‘Driving Through Time’ makes the park’s history visible and accessible to historians, planners, local communities, landowners and anyone who wants to know more about this American landmark.” At the heart of the project are thousands of items from three institutions that collaborated to create the site: The Wilson Special Collections Library at UNC; the Blue Ridge Parkway headquarters (a division of the National Park Service, located in Asheville); and the North Carolina State Archives. Materials in the online collection include: Historic photographs showing construction of the parkway and images of communities it passed through; Maps depicting private land parcels purchased for the parkway, proposed alternate routes, landscape planning and the completed parkway; Letters and documents pertaining to the community of Little Switzerland in McDowell and Mitchell counties, which sued the parkway; Oral histories from parkway designers and laborers; Images by the late N.C. photographer Hugh Morton, depicting the parkway as it passed Grandfather Mountain, which he owned. Eleven essays share more insight into the building of the parkway and its impact. Whisnant and her students wrote about issues including competition between the tourism and logging industries, the parkway’s impact on the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians and selection of the parkway route.  Also included are K-12 lesson plans that faculty from the School of Education developed to help students use the site’s extensive primary source materials and interpretive essays. “Driving Through Time” was made possible by a $150,000 grant from the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services under provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act, as administered by the State Library of North Carolina.