Laurel Gap Trail
At A Glance
7 mi one-way
Difficulty Rating: 7 
Steepness: Few Hills
Tread Condition: Few Obstacles
Trail Number: 184
Rides That Use This Trail: Douglas Falls (Big Ivy South Tour), Big Ivy Tour (Coleman Boundary)
Description
A long, grassy old road (FS 5548), running parallel to (but higher than) FS 74 through the Big Ivy area. At its highest point, the road is just below the Blue Ridge Parkway. Intersects four other trails for loop options. High elevation, dense northern hardwoods and patches of spruce-fir forest. Rolling climbs and descents and nothing technical. Comprises part of the Big Ivy Tour ride when combined with the Bear Pen trail.
Long stretches of this trail are overgrown in summer with a grassy and mossy surface, making the ride challenging at times. But the forest is starting to grow back over the road and shade out the ground cover in other places, making for a discernible path available along at least the southern half of its length now.
Intersecting Trails
This trail is located in the Big Ivy (Coleman Boundary) area. For a list of all the trails in that area, see the Big Ivy (Coleman Boundary) trails list page.
All Photos from the Trail
GPS Map
Map Information
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Data Formats
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About the Map
Copyright
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Base layers provided by OpenStreetMap, the US Geological Survey, the US Forest Service, and NC OneMap. Base layer images are subject to the respective copyright policies of their owners. Base layers may not be available at all times due to system maintenance or outages.
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Trail and Marker Overlays
Trail layers and downloadable data are all original works created by WNCOutdoors with guidance from a variety of sources, including ensembles of our own GPS tracks, user contributed GPS tracks, official maps and GIS data from government agencies, and field observations. WNCOutdoors data is made freely available under the Open Database License - you are free to copy and use it for any purpose under the terms of that license (summary).
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Trail Segments
Trails are often made up of several connecting paths which may have different characteristics, allowed uses, and seasons. This trail is divided into multiple segments as follows:
Laurel Gap - Start to Bear Pen
- Allowed Uses: Hiking, Mountain Biking, Horseback Riding
- Length: 2.6 mi
Laurel Gap - Perkins to Little Andy
- Allowed Uses: Hiking, Mountain Biking, Horseback Riding
- Length: 2.43 mi
Laurel Gap - Bear Pen to Perkins
- Allowed Uses: Hiking, Mountain Biking, Horseback Riding
- Length: 2.02 mi
Total Calculated Length: 7.04 mi
This value is derived from our underlying map data, and it may not match officially published information.
Feedback
Ratings
Average Rating: 3.0 (rated 11 times)
Rate It Now:
Bob said: Again, very overgrown with no maintenance first week of July 2017. Unfortunate as it the connector for several stem trails up from Big Ivy Rd. BUT, stunning amount and diversity of wildflowers!!
Rockhound said: Super overgrown. Slow trail. Riding on grass. Lots of stinging nettles!! These conditions as of August 2016. Needs maintenance.