3rd Annual Foothills Trail: Backpacking with a Sunset Boat Tour: Lake Jocassee

This trip is NOT full, please join the wait list and then we will move you to the going list after you've paid for the boat tour. See details below.

Please join us for a 2 night backpacking trip along the Foothills Trail to Lake Jocassee. We will meet at Laurel Valley Parking area at 4:00pm on Friday, June 9th. This is a large gravel parking area.

Day 1: Backpack 2.8 miles of the Foothills Trail to the Flat Rock Campsite. This is a large campsite area that has bear cables and a water source.

Day 2: Backpack 5.5 miles to the Laurel Fork Falls campsite. The sites are flat and have fire rings. There is plenty of room for tents and plenty of trees for hammocks. Saturday we will be able to go swimming in the lake as well as just relax at camp by the waterfall. I suggest bringing a blow up float for the lake!

On Saturday late afternoon/evening, I have arranged a pontoon boat lake tour incorporating sunset through my friends, Brooks and Kay Wade at Lake Joccasee Tours. They will pick us up a short distance from the camp site and give us an evening tour of different fascinating parts of the lake. They will then return us to our site. The price of the boat tour is $55 per person. It is definitely worth it as the lake is beautiful and has many water fowl and swimming opportunities and water falls and much more nature viewing and Brooks/Kay are both informative boat captains.

You also have the choice not to do the tour but preference will be given to those who want to do the boat tour since we've already paid in full.

On Sunday, Day 3, we will hike out the 5 miles back via the Virginia Hawkins spur trail to the cars at the parking area.

So please join us on an amazing trip to the Jocassee Gorges!

I have the boat tour reserved and you can pay for tour by Venmo to me. Message me for the Venmo payment address.

See y’all there!