Coker Creek Falls Trail

This beautiful 3.0 mile trails leaves from the falls parking area and quickly descends to the main falls, then parallels the creek all the way down to close to where the creek enters the Hiwassee River. The entire 3 miles of the trail gives constant views of cascade after cascade after cascade. This is a very scenic hike. The best way to hike this trail is to leave a car at the bottom of FS 228 where the trail ends, then go back up to the falls parking area. Then hike the trail downhill. Otherwise the return trip uphill is a real bear.

Tuesday, November 3, 2009: Rick Harris and Steve Biatowas (Trails Tech for USFS Ocoee/Hiwassee Ranger District) logged out the 3 miles of trail from the top to the bottom. In total we removed 55 trees from the trail. The trail is now completely log free, but needs brushing out. But it is very passable at this point. Volunteer and USFS employee hours for this trip are as below:

Monday, December 21, 2009: Coker Creek Falls Area, BMT Section 13e - Four Coker Creek Ruritans (Marc Bernatti, Rick Pease, Steve Simmons, Garry Long) cleared up the FS road from Duckett Ridge Rd leading down to Coker Creek Falls parking lot. There were a number of blow downs, fall downs, and broke downs obstructing the roadway which we cut up or pulled down and removed off the road and sides. Also a large fully branched pine had twisted off near the trail head and was blocking the trail and drainage of the 'camping' and fire pit area. We put in 8+ hours total( 2 each), including travel; about an hour.

Thursday, April 22, 2010: Coker Creek Falls Trail - Marc Bernatti and his Ruritan friends scoped out a link from the area of the falls to the BMT up the side of the hill. They found an old logging road from above the upper falls which indeed did connect to the the BMT about 2-3 miles up the BMT from the Coker Creek Bridge. They also did some clearing along the Coker Creek Falls Trail and removed a tree from the road to the falls parking area. Volunteer hours are as follows:

May 5, 2010 Wed - Coker Creek Falls Trail - Five of us put in another 20 hour working on the Coker Creek Falls trail today. We removed a number of long dead falls from across the trail and cut out a lot of brush that was covering or growing into the trail. The 2 sets of Ruritan Chain Saw PSE gear got broke in properly. Ken wields a mean machete.

Marc Bernatti, 1 hour travel, 3 hours work

TOTAL VOLUNTEER HOURS = 20 hours (Hiwassee-Ocoee Ranger District)

Wednesday, November 10, 2010 - Coker Creek Falls Trail - Five Coker Creek volunteers performed trail maintenance work on the Coker Creek Falls Trail and the upper picnic area. Hikers had reported last month that a large tree had fallen and was blocking the hiking trail. As it turned out, there were 5 more trees now that had fallen across the trail. They and a couple of dead leaners were cut up and removed off the trail. Some brush cutting and limb removal was also performed. A couple of dead pine leaners were taken down at the picnic area as well. That wood was cut and stacked for the next lucky picnicker. In all, 25 volunteer hours were donated. Volunteers and their times are:

Gary Long--- 4 hrs work, 1 hr travel

Tom Felton--- 4 hrs work, 1 hr travel

Rick Pease--- 4 hrs work, 1 hr travel

Ken Dalton---- 4 hrs work, 1 hr travel

Marc Bernatti 4 hrs work, 1 hr travel

Monday, May 9, 2011 - Unicoi Turnpike Trail and Coker Creek Falls Trail - Two members of the Coker Creek Ruritan Club cleaned up (weeded and policed) the Unicoi Tpk trail trailheads and walked the upper portion from Unicoi Gap to the CCC camp and out to Hwy 68. That portion of the trail is clear. They cleared the road into Coker Creek Falls parking lot and stacked the cut up as firewood for campers. Then, they weeded and policed up the parking area picnic area there. Rick Pease and Ron Eishman put in 5 volunteer hours each. Count 2 hours for driving and 8 hours working. You split up what you want for each District. Next, we'll take a look at what the lower portion of the Unicoi Gap Tpk trail looks like, what the loop at Doc Rogers Field needs doing, and work the Coker Creek Falls trail top to bottom.

Wednesday, October 26, 2011 - Coker Creek Falls Trail - Five of us worked on clearing the trail on Wednesday, 26 October, 2011. We worked two chain saw crews; each starting from one end of the trail and worked to the middle. In all, we picked off limbs and branches and sawed off a dozen good sized trees, 1-2 foot diameter, that had fallen across the trail. One large blow down was too much for our saws and expertise. That one is over 3 foot in diameter and lays suspended by a root ball next to the trail and branches way down hill. The FS needs to send in a work crew with proper equipment to remove it safely. We did remove a smaller tree next to it which shared the root ball and rebuilt the trail path under it so hikers can knee walk or limbo under it until then. That tree is approximately 1 mile in from the bottom of the trail (the walking bridge end). The crew going in from the upper parking lot cleared brush and small blowdowns off the FS road from Duckett Ridge Rd to that parking lot and picked up any trash there. Other than that one tree across the trail, that Trail is now again in excellent condition.

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Marc Bernatti	2	3	5
Ron Powers	2	3	5
Ron Eshman	2	3	5
Tom Fulton	2	3	5
Rick Pease	2	3	5
Volunteer Totals	10	15	25

Friday, Janurary 20, 2012 - Coker Creek Falls Trail - Marc Bernatti and Rick Pease cleared small blow downs and branches off the FS road to the upper parking lot, picked up road side trash, policed up the parking lot area, and cleared some branches and got trash off the trail to the Falls. They came back out with a large trash bag full.

*Name*	*Travel Hours*	*Work Hours*	*Totals*
Rick Pease	1	3	4
Marc Bernatti	1	3	4
Totals	2	6	8

Friday, February 9, 2013 - Coker Creek Falls Trail - Marc Bernatti and Rick Pease cut up and removed a large blow down right at the Falls' guardrail, removed a dead snag hanging over the trail and cleared a few branches on the trail i/a that access area. The upper parking area has been seriously vandalized. Three of the treated picket 8x8 have been pulled up, one is half burned, one waiting to be and the 3d is missing. I hope whoever burned that one in the fire pit was sitting close enough to get the benefits of it's smoke. The wood cross brace on one of the concrete picnic tables is destroyed and both seating boards are removed; thankfully they are still there. Miraculously, the sign facing Duckett Ridge Rd marking the Coker Creek Falls turnoff is still intact. Sometime soon, we'll need to police up the FS road going down to that parking lot. There are many small tree trunks and branches along the road way sides; they are barely removed off the road. It's passable, but looks crappy bad.

*Name*	*Travel Hours*	*Work Hours*	*Totals*
Rick Pease	1.5	1	2.5
Marc Bernatti	1.5	1	2.5
Totals	3	2	5

Monday, January 20, 2014 - Coker Creek Falls Trail - Members of the Coker Creek Ruritan Club cleaned off and picked up trash on the FS road leading to Coker Creek Falls, the upper parking/picnic area and down to the Falls. That road and trail segment are ‘clean’.

*Name*	*Travel Hours*	*Work Hours*	*Totals*
Rick Pease	2	1	3
Ron Eshman	2	1	3
Ron Powers	2	1	3
Totals	6	3	9

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Marc Bernatti	1.0	5.5	6.5
Garry Long	1.0	5.5	6.5
Ken Dalton	1.0	5.5	6.5
Rick Pease	1.0	5.5	6.5
Volunteer Totals	4	22	26