(Note: The Red X side trail system was revised in 2004-05.  The Red X trails described on this page are still blazed, but the numbering in the latest LT guide may differ.)

This was the second of three consecutive weekends in fall, 1996 that we did an LT hike. Having about 12 miles left to complete the trail, we were hoping for good weather to allow us to finish most of it that fall. We drove about a mile beyond the LT trailhead on PA Route 87, from which we had begun our Sock Rock hike the previous weekend, then turned right onto Little Bear Creek Road and traveled about another mile to park at the ranger station at mile 4.81.

The LT started by doubling back along the road for a few hundred feet, then turned right and began a sharp ascent of about 200 ft in about 0.1 mile, moderating into a continuous climb of an additional 600 ft until we reached a junction with White Trail W-1 at mile 5.54. The scenery must have been of some interest, as Mike snapped the shutter on the camera about seven or eight times. By this point, we had reached Laurel Ridge. This ascent was equal in elevation to climbing Sock Rock, but it was spread over a longer distance.

The ridge top meant flat hiking for the next 2/3 mile. At mile 6.16, the LT turned right on a woods road as Blue Trail B-1 intersected from the left. At mile 6.24, the LT turned left and steeply uphill to begin climbing Smiths Knob as Red X Trail RX-2 continued along the road. The summit of Smiths Knob was at 1912 ft, near mile 6.60, and the Smiths Knob Vista at mile 6.65 gave a view of Loyalsock Creek to the north and east.

It took us a minute or so to find the trail markers for the descent immediately following the vista. The trail dropped so suddenly that we almost thought we were heading over a cliff instead of following it. We descended 250 ft in 0.29 mile to DER View at mile 6.94, but the first 100 to 150 ft of descent must have come in no more than 300 to 400 ft. Mike thought this was the most difficult descent in terms of steepness along the entire LT. It wasn't as long as the descent from Sock Rock, for example, but it was extremely steep. We don't know how we would have gotten back up this segment if we had needed to double back. (Fortunately, RX-2 allowed us to bypass Smiths Knob on the return.)

We had relatively flat, slightly downhill hiking from DER View, past the RX-2 junction at mile 7.28, down to a crossing of Painter Run at mile 7.92, past intersections with White Trail W-2 and Red X Trail RX-3, then a recrossing of Painter Run at mile 8.15, elevation 1480 ft. The trail began to climb again, reintersected the other end of W-2 at mile 8.19, and followed an old woods road that moderately ascended along the headwaters of Painter Creek for most of the remaining distance to mile 9.10, where we stopped for lunch at the RX-3 junction. The return trip followed the same route, but substituted a flat 0.73 miles along RX-2 for the 1.04 mile segment up and down Smiths Knob. Considering that we'd hiked up 1140 ft, down 480 ft, then up again 570 ft to get to our turnaround point, we needed a break! 

On their 2002 fall break vacation in Pennsylvania, Mike and Maria hiked a portion of this segment, as far as the RX-2 junction after the descent from Smith's Knob vista.  The total distance for the roundtrip circling back via RX-2 was about 4 1/2 miles.  Combined with the nearly 6 1/2 mile hike the previous day near World's End, Maria completed about eleven miles on her own two feet in two days.  That's a pretty good effort by a just over 7-year-old.

In 2006, Mike and Maria again hiked this segment.  This time they did it in the east to west direction at the end of a 10.3 mile hike which began at mile 15.45 at Mountain Road.  The cause for celebration occurred when they reached mile 7.28, the junction of RX-2, which was as far as they had gotten on the 2002 hike.  At this point, Maria had finished the last segment she needed to complete the entire LT on her own two feet -- a pretty good accomplishment for an 11-year-old.  She did it on a series of nine day hikes between 2001 and 2006, beginning with a 6 1/2 mile hike from Double Run Road to World's End State Park when she was only six.

On a beautiful sunny fall day of hiking close to six hours on the trail, surprisingly we encountered only three other hikers -- a solo hiker near mile 8 and a couple near mile 5.

One thing we did notice on this trip was that the segment between mile 8.1 and mile 7.3 was quite affected by an ongoing logging operation.  The trail meandered on and off a logging road that Mike did not recall from the prior hike.

Footnote: On the 1996 trip, Aimee commented that the camera sounded strange when Mike and Maria posed for a photo at mile marker 5. Shortly after that, Mike concluded that we had been pressing the shutter but there was no film in the camera. We were in no position to return to the car to get any, since we had already climbed several hundred feet. Mike did get his wish to return to take the missing photos on the 2002 hike with Maria.  Aimee got her wish as well; she stayed in Williamsport.