These are the views of Chimney Top, a Tuscarora quartzite outcropping at the end of the North Fork Trail on the similarly named mountain in West Virginia. Pictures don’t do this place justice – besides the immensity of scale that my photographic skills couldn’t capture, its beauty was enhanced by the wind and the solitude. The North Fork Mountain’s rocky features extend back in time to the Silurian period from about 443-419 million years ago. The tough, erosion-resistant quartzite layers bend vertically up here, and the mountain’s relative dryness encourage pine trees and Mountain Laurel.
