Mark's Photo Travels

With some extra free time this week thanks to the holiday, I went up to northern Greenville County for some adventures. Tracing the Swamp Rabbit - December 2013 edition First I stopped by McCarson Road in Riverview  to investigate a possible trestle ruin I had spotted sometime back on Google Earth. Turns out it wasn't a trestle ruin at all, but a storage tank of some kind. But below it, I found a cutting heading toward the Middle Saluda River, an area previously explored . This matched up well with my map of the Swamp Rabbit. Nice. The path of the railroad crossed McCarson Road heading south toward Cleveland. Rainbow Falls The bulk of my time this day was hiking to and from Rainbow Falls. Rainbow Falls is located on property of Camp Greenville, but it also accessible from Jones Gap State Park . To get there, follow Jones Gap Trail (blazed blue), then follow Rainbow Falls Trail (blazed red) to the waterfall. This part of Jones Gap Trail is rocky and wet with a few i...

Delayed, but not denied. I wanted to visit Glenn Springs after visiting Whitestone Springs two weeks ago, but I ran out of daylight. My second attempt failed last week because of misty, rainy weather on my available days. This week on my third try I finally made it. But between my first and second attempts, my adventuring friend Tom Taylor briefly stopped here to explore on his way to Pacolet where he then explored the ruins of a hotel (which I'll have to check out sometime). He recounts this most interesting adventure in The Allure of Old Masonry . Glenn Springs, like Whitestone Springs and Chick Springs , was a resort spring touting water that could supposedly cure many ailments. Like these other resort springs, Glenn Springs featured a large hotel where capable of housing many guests. Glenn Springs also had its own railroad for a time to transport guests to and from the hotel. The Glenn Springs hotel operated well over 100 years before fire destroyed the hotel on July ...

Part 1 was a trip report. This part is about  the newspaper coverage of White Stone spring and hotel. I've grouped together newspaper items by subject in rough chronological order. Chronicling America provides no way to link to a part of a page like Google News does, so may have to do some hunting to find the article I link to. Sorry. Beginnings In 1901, J. T. Harris (1855-1928) bought the spring (named Kirby Spring) and renamed it White Stone Lithia Springs after selling his first successful springs, Harris Springs in Laurens County. The first reference to the springs I could find comes the July 10th, 1901 The Watchman and Southron where some members of the South Carolina Press Association, meeting in Glenn Springs,   traveled over to White Stone Springs for a picnic . A $50,000 hotel and other improvements are promised. A June 25, 1902 article in The Manning Times , originally from The State , about the new summer resort  gives an excellent information ab...

from the July, 23rd 1902 edition of the Anderson Intelligencer A few weeks ago while searching Chronicling America for something else, I came across a newspaper story about a place I had never heard of before, Whilestone Springs near Spartanburg, SC. Whitestone Springs is now obscure, but from 1901 to 1906 the spring and the associated hotel was a major success until the hotel burned down and wasn't rebuilt. I visited the spring on a sunny, cold day last week to see if any ruins were still around after all this time. Whitestone Spring is now part of Croft State Park  on land that was a military camp  from 1940-1947. The official way to get there is to hike there from within the park, but there's also an old road you can follow from Whitestone Spring Road, located on the park's eastern edge. I went the official way, so the park gets their admission fee and because I haven't been hiking inside this part of the park before. I arrived at Croft State Park later t...

With temperatures falling, it's a perfect time get out and explore. This week, I took an extra day off to explore Camp Buckhorn and North Lake in  Paris Mountain State Park , located a few miles north of Greenville, SC. I parked at the trailhead for Brissy Ridge Trail, a 2.4 mile loop trail around Brissy Ridge. I started out at the end of the parking lot and descended down a steep series of switchbacks and tree roots serving as natural steps. I found just one area along this part of the trail where I could show off the fall colors. The trail eventually  intersects with the road leading to Camp Buckhorn. I left the trail at the intersection and followed the road up the short distance to the camp. A trail from the road leads to a platform... ...where there isn't much to see. A bit beyond is Buckhorn Creek. I backtracked to the road where another trail follows the shoreline of Buckhorn Lake to the lodge. The lodge was unoccupied, thank goodness.  I cou...