Devils Fork State Park

Date: Saturday, June 5, 2010
Map: Link
Trails: Oconee Bells Nature
Distance: 1 mile
Time: 1 hour
Rating: 3 out of 5

On a nice Saturday morning, we headed to Devils Fork State Park. From Clemson, we took Hwy 133 north and turned left onto Hwy 11. From there we followed the brown park signs to the park. We arrived around 10:45am and it was already a busy place. Our plan was to hike the 1-mile Oconee Bells Nature loop trail, followed by some swimming in Lake Jocassee and a picnic lunch. There was nowhere to park next to the trail head (lots of boat traffic), so I dropped Kerri and the kids off and parked over next to the pavilion and Bear Cove trailhead instead.

The trail goes into full tree cover right away, and heads downhill. We took the left fork (i.e., clockwise on the loop) and soon reached the "bottom." There were several nice bridges to cross, and a meandering stream. I'm not so good at identifying trees, but I know there was lots of mountain laurel, sourwood, oak and hickory. There are a couple of nice signs along the way, identifying plant life. There was also a rather large pond that we passed, and a couple of small waterfalls.

Just past the pond was a nice bench, and we took a break here. I got a photo of the kids. They look very excited in the picture, but maybe this doesn't accurately represent their general mood on this hike. Kerri and I had to carry them most of the way. Basically, they just wanted to go swimming (James) and eat lunch (Andy). The trail seemed a little longer than 1 mile, and with lots of ups-and-downs, it is not a particularly easy trail. But overall, the kids did pretty well. Near the end, I scouted ahead to see how much of the trail was left. It turned out just to be a few more minutes, and we all returned to the parking lot, and went swimming in the lake!