Rocktop at Crowders Mountain State Park

Visiting a North Carolina State Park in this episode. We made a loop starting at the Sparrow Springs Access then using the Rocktop Trail, the Crowders Trail, and the Backside Trail. I expected this to be a busy hike. It was a Saturday in May and the park is pretty close to Charlotte. We mostly saw people at the top and bottom of the trail. Along the way we able to mostly keep to ourselves.
Another thing I was expecting and excited for were the broods of cicadas. Turns out they weren't all that plentiful at this location. We only saw one and you could only hear them near the parking lot. I thought it would be so much louder. The sound they make is different than our local Florida Cicadas. I'm glad I got some audio. We're thinking the cold front that caused the rain at the zoo may have dropped the temperatures enough to quiet the bugs for a couple days.
I didn't choose this hiking route for the insects though. I was looking forward to climbing over some rocks. There wasn't a lot of scrambling but it was still a cool landscape.
Other wildlife we found included birds , lizards, and a black widow on the back of one of the signs!

[@spellsforsale6871]

I can tell that was a challenging hike! Very cool - looks like fun!

[@AlafiaHiker]

Yeah, lots of fun. There were ways around most of the scrambles for those that weren't into that sort of thing... and I'm glad we took the steps down instead of up.

[@martincarbajal5943]

keep going Boss 🫡!!

[@AlafiaHiker]

Up and up and up! Was a big hill. lol