by Marcus Wohlsen

“Getting to know you, getting to know all about you. . . .” Larry can’t carry a tune, but he’s carried a backpack more miles in the North Carolina mountains than anybody I know. To give you an idea of how much he hikes, he brags that last winter he took 33 snow hikes. I’m not sure where he even finds 33-days’ worth of snow in these mild climes. But if anyone spends enough time tramping around the Blue Ridge high country to find it, it’s Larry.

Lately Larry has devised a new game to amuse himself on the trail. He calls it “What Can I See from Here?” The rules are simple: Climb to somewhere with a sweeping view and try to name as much of what you can see as possible. It helps if you bring a map and compass (which you should have with you anyway, natch).

I’ve played this game myself informally on hikes. Sometimes my wife makes fun of me for it. She claims it represents some residual male urge to lord over the natural landscape. Maybe so. Still, when Larry mentioned his new pastime, I said, “Let’s go play.”

We headed up to the Parkway on one of those sparkling 70-degree days we had at the beginning of March and parked in the Courthouse Overlook parking lot just west of 215. Even from here, the view was enough to get started. “Is that Mount Pisgah?” I asked hopefully, pointing to a sharply angled peak just far enough away that I thought its telltale radio tower might be obscured in the haze. Larry scoffed.

“You’re all wrong. Have you heard of the Saluda Grade? I-26 runs down past the foot of that mountain. It’s got a rocky summit you can see from the highway. Get a clue.”

I knew I’d need more than a clue this day. What I hadn’t told Larry is that I’d really come up here with him to pilfer his hard-earned knowledge, to get that instant gratification my generation craves. Instead of figuring it all out on my own, map in hand, I’d just ask “What’s that?” We headed down one of Larry’s “secret trails,” which led out of the parking lot and along the ridge for some prime southern exposure. As we walked, the spruce thinned out and moss-covered granite gave way to a shaded forest lawn of wild grasses.

Around the bend, we came to an outcropping and, because the trees were still leaf-free, our first full-on vista. Peaking over Pilot Mountain’s ridgeline, Looking Glass Rock formed an ideal point of reference. From here we spied Cedar Rock. Beyond that, Larry pointed out the fields along Crabtree Creek. Beyond that, a length of horizon stretching from the radio tower atop Richland Mountain to Stone Mountain that formed the boundaries of DuPont State Forest. With these way points, I could nearly triangulate where my little house in Brevard might sit.

“For me, it’s about how deeply I can know a place,” Larry said. “When I lived in northern California, it got to where I could look out and know every peak for 200 miles. And I probably climbed them all. That’s when I knew it was time to leave.”

Though I love to hike, I can hardly conceive of how much time it would take to know the Blue Ridge that well. Every time I go out, a new cove or waterfall or clearing makes me feel like I barely know these mountains at all. Yet having just learned what lay between home and the ground where I stood gave me a sense of belonging to everything in between. For now, that was good enough for me.

Marcus Wohlsen is senior editor of Blue Ridge Outdoors. He can be reached at marcus@blueridgeoutdoors.com.