Trail Rider Magazine

Shawn Furman and Todd Dunlop at the first overlook. This one looks out of the Gorge and into Chattanooga. Trail Report – Pren ce Cooper State Park, Tennessee "Jugs and jars from shiners, these old boys here they ain't miners They came from the twenty-niners It didn't take a hole in the ground to put the bo om in their face" Drive By Truckers – Where The Devil Don't Stay Those mountains around Cha anooga, Tennessee did indeed produce their share of shine back in the day. They s ll do but it is more of a novelty these days (and they are s ll quite good at that). Peer up in the woods at one of the many mountain stream crossings and you can o en see remnants of the old s lls. Take a walk around the cemetery in the middle of Pren ce Cooper State Park. As you marvel at some of the Highlander-esq names on the tombstones you just know that those old rough and tumble folks that migrated down to lower Appalachia did not hold a high re- gard for the revenuers. The mountain ac vi es these days are s ll as colorful as they were back in the old days but they have expanded to cover some really nice offroad riding. We have everything from mild to wild in these mountains. Pren ce Cooper State Park is approximately 25,000 acres situated on top of what locals call Suck Creek Mountain outside of Cha anooga. These mountains are mostly plateaus so it is indeed mostly on top of the mountain. That does not mean you will not cross your share of micro gorges that are carved out by streams (or creeks as we call them here) that careen off the mountain. Suck Creek runs down the side and got its name from whirlpool feature where it meets the Tennessee River. The whirlpool or "Suck" was a naviga onal hazard for steamboats in the 1,800's. If Pren ce Cooper was a ski mountain, the trails would rate mostly green and blue or easy and intermediate. If you know a few of the fun places to go there are a few short difficult or black trails. Like most of the public land in Tennessee, you get to share most this with OHV's, Jeeps and horses as well as hunters. Plenty of single track as well as terrifying extreme terrain can be found nearby on places like Aetna Mountain but this trail system makes for a great easy going family ride. The total number of trail miles is around 120 miles. It is a moving target because the TWRA (Ten- nessee Wildlife Resource Agency) Rangers are always opening and closing trails. There are two primary loca ons to access Pren ce Cooper. One of those is at the top of the mountain by the gate and TWRA Sta on. That is the primary access and we will use this one as the focal point for this report. The other is at the bo om of the mountain at the end of Haley Road. August 2016 33

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