Great Falls Loop with Difficult Run (VA side of Great Falls)

Aaron and I have Kate, a friend of ours who wanted to go hiking with us.  We are always happy to hike!  And we had planned a large loop at Sky Meadows on Sunday, but Kate hasn't been hiking in a while, and so we decided to start out with something easier, but with known beautiful views and thereby rewards for the hard work.  Great Falls is close to home, and it was a gorgeous day, so we set out there.

We began down by Difficult Run.  Our intent was to follow Difficult Run to where it loops with the Ridge Trail, then to River Trail and then the Visitors Center, Old Carriage Road and Swamp Trail and Ridge Trail and a jog back to the parking lot.  This would have worked out to be a nice easy hike of 5.1 miles - except for the river washing out the path.  With our detours it was harder and 5.7 miles.

We were walking by an adorable family with two kids half-climbing a cliff that was half roots and half Virginia red dirt and much rock.  The dad said to us, "This is the easy way."  We laughed and then looked around the bend ahead.

He was right.  That was the easy way.  We investigated continuing - and then I thought of Kate.  I thought even Aaron would have a hard time going down then back up on these craggy rocks that had no actual path anywhere nearby and it looked like you had to hand over hand it across a section.  I thought, hey.  Up's easier than down.  We headed back to the place the little kids, who must've been part mountain goat, were still working on.  Up I went, then Kate and then Aaron. 

According to Kate's fitbit, approximately 170 feet elevation later we stopped climbing it.  She said, "Man we should've taken photos.  Nobody's going to believe we did this."  There was an unmarked unofficial trail, but clearly well worn, up to Ridge Road.  We took it, then went right on the road.  We should've gone left - but we met a nice group of friends who were hiking as well, and the view of the Potomac is breathtaking, really, from most of Ridge Road.  We corrected our course and kept on going.

My rating of the hike is sub-optimal because there were approximately 9,673,223,100 people who decided today was THE DAY to go hiking at Great Falls.  I prefer my nature with a good dose of quiet and peace and focus.  Andy, the poodle we met in our travels that day, didn't agree - he seemed to be having a grand time running around and meeting people.   (Approximately 1/4 of those people brought their dogs, you see.)

But the views of the river were gorgeous, and it was fun to watch people from our vantage point of the VA side scrambling up the Billy Goat Trail on the MD side.  I decided I don't actually want to hike it - the challenge wouldn't be really anything harder than climbing the path-that-was-not-a-path, and there was literally a line that looked ten minutes long to continue up a section we were watching.  Not my thing.  But everyone was dressed so colorfully!  And it was like watching cars on a highway from the overpass above - an endless stream of people - which has a beauty of its own.

I loved the valley of trilliums we passed through after the Visitor's Center.  I did love people-watching, during snack break - I love to try to imagine everyone's back-story and just how did they come to be where they are now?   I love that each of these people has a full story, and events that shaped them, and that to them?  I'm as much a crowd face as they are.  That's part of the beauty of hiking, actually - when you're out in the woods, you are a small thing - and you feel the world as a large thing.  Sometimes in our city lives, we get caught up in work and friends and just our own process of everyday living, everyday decisions, everyday framing of the ordinary.  The extraordinary can get overlooked.  When you're hiking, and you've been working to get to that ridge, up there, the view from there seems to be somehow more - more amazing from being earned, and more coveted from being attended fully.  It is a reminder to pay that sort of attention to things in our non-hiking lives - to fully attend each thing and try to be a participant in its beauty.

I guess that's why the scores of people on the trail don't bother me much at all, in retrospect.  That was their moment to work for and appreciate beauty.

Time spent on trail: 3.5 hours (including a long stop for snack and many photos)
Difficulty:  The planned hike was easy.  The executed hike had a very difficult 15 minutes, and the rest was easy.
Bonuses:  The view is stunning, the photo opportunities endless.
View:  See above.
Kid-friendly:  Yes, though you'll have a heart attack when they climb the cliffs of insanity.  Maybe start out NOT at Difficult Run.