Hiking Billy Goat Trail A of Great Falls Park

It’s a warm sunny day in the middle of April, when spring was in full bloom. After weeks of being confined at home, my friend and I took a hiking trip of Billy Goat Trail A in Great Falls Park.

It came as a lucky complement that, while I was here a year ago, Billy Goat Trail A was closed from flooding but B was open. This time, the B part was closed for trail damage, but A was open.

With the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the parking lots in Carderock and Great Falls Tavern were all closed, leaving Anglers the only available lot along the popular Billy Goat Trails. Parking was tight for the day, many cars had resorted to (possibly illegal) roadside parking. But luck was on our side again as we arrived at the lot just as another car was leaving. 😁

Here’s GPS tracking:

It’s hard to believe that a “dirty swamp of water” Chesapeake and Ohio Canal (above) turned into a wide open lake (below) just hundreds of meters apart.

The southeastern end of Billy Goat Trail A was just by this lake called “Widewater”. However, we decided to follow the towpath and hiked Billy Goat A in the southbound direction, thus climbing the most difficult rockface instead of descending from it.

After that, we started our hike of Billy Goat Trail A. And it didn’t take long before we were at the first rocky overlook.

That’s also when I got to test out my newly acquired Sigma 20mmF1.4 lens.

The entire Billy Goat Trail A traversed some very rocky terrain. For the easier portions (above) one would be navigating between rocks, and for more technical portions (below) on them.

Then there’s the famous cliff that encapsulated Billy Goat Trail A. I did stow my camera and use all limbs for that, but it’s not nearly as difficult as I expected. I even saw a toddler tackled it on his own (under watchful hands of his dad though).

Then it’s the final overlook of a turning Potomac River.

A most amazing sight was that two souls were enjoying life sunbathing in the center of an island (above), yet there was no obvious accessible routes onto it. While being the envy of a group of onlookers, they pointed to us the path they took to the island (below).

After that, we got back to the towpath, which marked the end of our hike.

Conclusions

Given its proximity to Washington DC, the rock scrambling opportunity afforded by Billy Goat Trail A should certainly appeal to outdoor enthusiasts. And the trail, roundtrip from parking lot, was under 4 miles, making it a rather introductory-level scrambling to the public.
While the official Billy Goat Trail A was made of mostly rocky surfaces right along Potomac River, there were paths made of more accessible surfaces like dirt farther inland. Probably to protect the wilderness landscape, there were signs instructing people to stay off these byways. But the sheer number of visitors meant not everyone obeyed the rules, especially when those byways were much easier to set foot on.

As for the season, while spring had rejuvenated most trees in the city, here with infertile rocky soil, some Photoshopping was still required to bring the brownish leaves to lively green. Nonetheless, I was pretty content for the day.
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