Cumberland Gap National Historical Park: Cumberland Gap Loop (Blog Hike #148)

Trails: Object Lesson Road Trail and Wilderness Road Trail

Hike Location: Cumberland Gap National Historical Park

Geographic Location: southeast side of Middlesboro, KY (36.60908, -83.67782)

Length: 1.7 miles

Difficulty: 5/10 (Moderate)

Dates Hiked: June 2004, May 2017

Overview: An unforgettable journey to one of the focal points for America’s pioneer history.

Park Information: http://www.nps.gov/cuga/index.htm
Hike Route Map: https://www.mappedometer.com/?maproute=940322
Photo Highlight:

Directions to the trailhead: From Middlesboro, take US 25E south 0.3 miles to the exit for Cumberland Gap National Historic Park.  This is on the Kentucky side of Cumberland Mountain before entering the tunnel.  Exit and turn left in front of the visitor center onto Pinnacle Rd.  Take Pinnacle Rd. 0.7 miles to the paved Thomas Walker Parking Lot on the right.  Park in this parking lot.

The hike: A visit to Cumberland Gap is like a trip into a time machine.  Long before white settlers saw the gap, Cumberland Gap featured the route of Warrior’s Path, an Indian path that connected the Potomac River to the east and the Ohio River to the north.  In 1750, Thomas Walker became one of the first white explorers to traverse the gap.

            Over time, man continually found better and faster ways to navigate through the gap.  The gap’s mark in American history began in earnest in 1775 when Daniel Boone blazed the Wilderness Trail, a route that is included as part of this hike.  This trail opened the state of Kentucky for settlement.  It would take only a few years for settlers to come pouring through the gap into the hills of Kentucky and, eventually, into the Bluegrass.

            In 1908, the road through Cumberland Gap became one of the first paved roads in America.  This road became known as the Object Lesson Road, and when the federal highway system was designated, this strip of pavement became part of US 25E.  1996 marked the opening of the Cumberland Gap Tunnel through Cumberland Mountain (the mountain that forms the southern wall of the gap), and the tunnel replaced the old, winding route of US 25E.  Today, the pavement that created US 25E’s old route through the gap has been removed to allow the gap to, over many years, return to its natural state.

            In 1940, Cumberland Gap National Historical Park was established to preserve the gap and surrounding lands for all people to enjoy.  The Visitor Center, located on the Kentucky side, offers many informative exhibits expanding on the timeline given above.  A unique location in the park is Hensley Settlement, a restored subsistence farming community located on top of Brushy Mountain, which is located east of the gap but still within the park’s current boundary.  One can hike to the Settlement, but a more relaxing method is to take the van-shuttle offered daily from the Visitor Center.  Also while at the park, you should drive to Pinnacle Overlook, which offers stunning southward views of the surrounding valleys on the Tennessee/Virginia side of the gap.

            In addition to the long, uphill gravel trail to Hensley Settlement, Cumberland Gap offers numerous hiking opportunities.  The Ridge Trail is a long, difficult route heading east from Pinnacle Overlook along the crest of Brushy Mountain.  The Cumberland Trail traverses a similar route along Cumberland Mountain to the southwest.  The short route described here gives you the shortest route to the gap itself and a little taste of history on the way down.

Start of Object Lesson Road Trail

            From the parking lot, pick up the Object Lesson Road Trail, a coarse-gravel trail leaving from the southeast corner of the parking lot.  You will probably find numerous people hiking this trail, as it represents the shortest, and in some sense, easiest route to the gap.  The trail begins climbing immediately at a moderate grade.  The trail darts in and out of sunny grassy and cooler, shaded forested areas.  If you notice the pattern of the sunny areas, you will be able to connect them into a curve heading uphill.  Although efforts have been undertaken to erase the effect of old US 25E, even the untrained eye will guess correctly that the swath cut into the vegetation of the gap represents the old road bed.  Keep watching this area in the coming years to watch nature slowly reclaim its ground.

Looking up former US 25E toward Cumberland Gap

            0.4 miles into the hike, the Wilderness Road Trail, our return route, enters from the right.  The gap is now visible uphill straight ahead, and 0.2 miles and one final stint in the woods later, the gap is reached.  Standing in the gap 240 feet above the trailhead, you stand where generations of great, brave, and pioneering people have stood before you.  Imagine you are a settler coming up from Virginia and, for the first time, you glimpse the unclaimed and ungoverned territory of Kentucky.  Unfortunately, the views from the gap are not all that impressive, as trees block much of the view on both sides.  This problem will get worse as trees reclaim the route of US 25E, which now provides your best opportunity for a view down either side. 

Arriving at Cumberland Gap

            From the gap, you can continue straight ahead downhill into Virginia or turn right for a trip to Tri-State Peak, the common point of Kentucky, Virginia, and Tennessee.  The trail to Tri-State Peak, which is described elsewhere in this blog, is an interesting but steep 0.75 mile hike that also marks the beginning of the Cumberland Trail mentioned in the introduction.  This description reverses course at the gap and heads back down the Kentucky side, starting with the route you came up on.

            On your way down, for a change of scenery and more of a true nature hike, take the left fork and begin following the Wilderness Road Trail as an alternate route back down.  This dirt trail quickly passes Indian Rock, a large piece of sandstone with faint inscriptions on it, and then leaves the old route of US 25E for the mixed hardwood forest.

Monument to Daniel Boone

            Now you are seeing Cumberland Gap much the same way early travelers on the Wilderness Road would have seen it.  The route is narrower and rougher, passing over some exposed bedrock and many roots; it is also longer than the gravel trail.  Curving to the right, the trail passes twice through a power line swath before negotiating two steep-sided ravines.  The second of these ravines is choked with a dense understory of rhododendron.  1.1 miles from the gap, the Wilderness Road Trail ends at the Thomas Walker Trail, a well-worn route connecting the visitor center and your parking lot.  A right turn and 200 feet of level walking will return you to the parking lot, thus completing the hike.