“Like all great travelers, I have seen more than I remember and remember more than I have seen.” ―Benjamin Disraeli
After getting settled into our rental, which will be home for the next four weeks, we did a little exploring close to home. Hickory Run State Park is literally at our doorstep and has 40 miles of trails to explore. The most unique place in the park is the boulder field. Hickory Run Boulder Field is a product of glaciation, believed to have formed 20,000 years ago. The boulder field is about 16 acres in size and measures approximately 400 feet by 1,800 feet and 10-12 feet deep. It’s said to be the largest boulder field of its kind in all of the Appalachian Mountains.
The boulders in the field range from one foot to nearly 30 feet in length. There are places where the field is almost all the smaller boulders and spots where it is primarily the larger rocks. The boulder field is extremely clean, in the sense that there is no fine material such as sand or clay filling the space between the boulders. And if you listen closely, you can sometimes hear water flowing beneath the rocks.
Looking back to the parking area from the boulder field.
This is the lone tree that grows in the boulder field.
