Length: 20.5 miles (Uwharrie Trail); 9.5 miles ( Dutchman's Creek Trail)
Recommended Season: Year Round
Use: Medium to Heavy
Difficulty: Easy to ModerateTrail Beginning:
Trailhead parking on Highway 24/27, 10 miles west of Troy.
Trail End:
Trailhead parking on SR 1306, 2 miles east of Ophir.
Access:
Three main trailhead parking lots provide access to the trail. These include the beginning and ending points, and one on Highway 109, eight miles west of Troy. Other roads also cross the trail.
Description:
The Uwharrie National Recreation Trail offers a variety of scenery, streams and rocky climbs. The trail can be hiked in long or short sections, as the trail crosses several access points. The trail is marked with white blazes.
Attractions And Considerations:
Dutchman's Creek Trail, marked with yellow blazes, starts at the same point as the Uwharrie Trail, at the parking lot on Hwy 24/27, and was constructed as a loop system to be used as an alternate route when hiking the southern portion of the Uwharrie Trail. Dark Mountain, on the northern portion of the trail offers an excellent western view. Camping areas along the trail include Woodrun Camp, Yates Place Camp, West Morris Mountain Campground and other primitive camps. Old home sites, cemeteries, and gold mines exist along or near the trail.
Hikers can thank an old-time trapper's son, Joe Moffit of Asheboro, for this trail. He blazed it 25-plus years ago. Moffit grew up in the Uwharries during the Great Depression and learned to live off the land at an early age. Moffit was a Scoutmaster when he started the Uwharrie Trail project in 1972 to help his Boy Scouts earn their Eagle rank. They completed the now well-known path in 1975 and founded the Uwharrie Trail Club.
There are plenty of streams in the forest, but all drinking water should be treated with a water purification kit to prevent trail diarrhea. Ticks plague the forest and can be kept at bay with repellent or the new mesh clothing on the market. Always keep a watch for the trophy timber rattlesnakes and copperheads that live in these woods.
For more information, contact: Uwharrie National Forest, 789 NC Hwy 24/27 East, Troy, NC 27371, (910) 576-6391
Uwharrie National Recreation Trail & Dutchman's Creek Trail Map Hiking Trail Links Home
UWHARRIE NATIONAL FOREST
NORTH CAROLINA
