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Local student clears trail between Pinnacle Park, Waterrock Knob

By Lynn Hotaling
Near Waterrock A local student's volunteer effort should make it easier for hikers to navigate the trail from Sylva's Pinnacle Park to Waterrock Knob on the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Steven Gentile, 17-year-old son of the Rev. Frank and Allison Padgett of Cullowhee and Art Gentile of Charlotte, donated 60 hours of his summer to clearing and re-marking sections of the trail that connects Pinnacle Park and Blackrock to Waterrock Knob. The high school senior undertook the project to satisfy a community service requirement of his school, the N.C. School of Science and Math in Durham.

Gentile became interested in Pinnacle Park and its trail system last summer when he hiked to the Pinnacle. When he found he was required by NCSSM to complete a community service project, he contacted Jay Coward, president of the Pinnacle Park Foundation, about donating time to improve the park.

"I enjoyed being outdoors," Gentile said of his experience. "I liked working for the community and feeling that I was connecting nature to the people."

Gentile's efforts have significantly improved the trail, Coward said Monday.

"You can actually hike the trail without worrying so much about briers," Coward said. "It takes annual maintenance to keep them cleared out."

According to Coward, Gentile cleared and painted the trail from the Blue Ridge Parkway down the east fork of Fisher Creek to the Pinnacle Park parking area. Beginning at Fisher Creek, the trail is marked with purple and gold paint.

The trail head at Waterrock Knob is not yet marked, Coward said, because negotiations with the National Park Service have not been finalized. Signs identifying the trail are not yet in place, he said, but the route from Fisher Creek up to Waterrock is now clearly marked.

Trails connecting Sylva's Pinnacle Park to the Blue Ridge Parkway were made possible through the 1997 acquisition by the Nature Conservancy of the 1,594-acre Krauss-Stansbury tract, which stretches from Blackrock near Addie community to Waterrock Knob. The tract, which shares a 2-mile boundary with the Blue Ridge Parkway, was turned over to the Park Service by the Nature Conservancy.

The headwaters of Fisher Creek, Buff Creek, Parris Branch and North Fork are all located on the former Krauss-Stansbury tract.

The town of Sylva created Pinnacle Park on the Fisher Creek property that provided the town's water until the Tuckaseigee Water and Sewer Authority constructed its treatment facility in Cullowhee.

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