After 229 miles in Pennsylvania, the Appalachian Trail (AT) spends a relatively brief 41 miles running through Maryland, mostly following the lengthy ridgeline of South Mountain. While thru-hikers will breeze through the state in 2-3 days, day-trippers can complete the Maryland portion in seven discrete sections. (Note: This is the breakdown outlined in the excellent …
Montgomery County’s Seneca Creek State Park offers quiet isolation in one of Maryland’s most densely populated areas, particularly the park’s wild southern section. Here two moderate paths—the Seneca Greenway Trail and Seneca Bluffs Trail—snake through the Seneca Creek stream valley between Highway 28 and the Potomac River; combined, the two make for a long day …
Continue reading Seneca Greenway – Seneca Bluffs Trail Loop (Seneca Creek State Park, MD)
- Civil War Series - Spanning more than 200 years of history, Maryland’s Fort Washington is situated on a picturesque hill overlooking the wide and placid Potomac River, within sight of Washington, DC. The 19th century fort today lies within Fort Washington Park, protected and administered by the National Park Service. Around the brick structure, …
Continue reading Fort Washington Loop (Fort Washington Park, MD)
- Civil War Series - The history of Maryland’s Fort Washington spans several of America’s wars, from the War of 1812 through the Civil War and the two World Wars. The first fort on this site, a stone structure constructed in 1809, was short-lived: it was burned and abandoned by its own garrison as the …
- Civil War Series - One of 68 forts protecting Washington, DC during the Civil War, Fort Foote was built by Union forces to defend the nation’s capital from a potential Confederate naval attack on the Potomac River. Completed in 1863, this battery atop Rozier’s Bluff on the Maryland shore boasted eight 200-pound Parrott rifles …
Live and Let Hike hit its stride in 2016, nearly tripling the number of visitors and page views seen in 2015. I also passed a new milestone—my 200th blog post—and greatly expanded the geographic breadth and depth of hike descriptions, including posts from Colorado, Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, Washington, DC, and Quebec. Taking a break …
Maryland’s Sugarloaf Mountain, the area’s best known example of a monadnock, features a network of zigzagging trails, just an hour’s drive from Washington, DC. While climbing Sugarloaf itself is the park’s key attraction, the Blue Trail (a.k.a. Northern Peaks Trail) triples the fun with rocky climbs to three nearby summits, plus a short detour to …
Continue reading Northern Peaks Trail & White Rocks (Sugarloaf Mountain, MD)
The Deer Creek Trail is, without a doubt, not the best trail in Maryland. It’s probably not even the best in Susquehanna State Park. But there is at least something soothing about the surroundings on this largely wooded loop hike, situated just off the Susquehanna River in northeast Maryland. Here lofty trees, many devoid of …
Continue reading Deer Creek Trail (Susquehanna State Park, MD)
Most DC residents who know the Billy Goat Trail brag of completing the iconic Section A—a rugged and challenging hike in Maryland’s Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park. While Section A’s Potomac vistas and rocky traverses make it one of the area’s most popular hikes, there are in fact two other sections of the …
Continue reading Billy Goat Trail – Section B (Chesapeake & Ohio Canal National Historical Park, MD)
Perched at the southern tip of South Mountain, more than 500 feet above the Potomac River, Weverton Cliffs in central Maryland is easily one of the state’s most scintillating viewpoints. It is also relatively easily accessible—less than a mile’s hike up the famed Appalachian Trail from the small community of Weverton, which in turn is …
Continue reading Appalachian Trail to Weverton Cliffs (South Mountain State Park, MD)
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