On Sunday we took the drive up into SNP with the goal of taking a walk on the Limberlost trail, the short 1.2 loop that is one of the oldest "designed" trails in the Park, having been laid out by the founders of Skyland and established with a grove of hemlock trees.
As anyone who's been on this trail the last 10 years or so knows, those trees all succumbed to illnesses in the last decade and those that are left have a ghostly look - shown here is one of the stands of dead hemlocks. 
It was quite pleasant to have the walk out there in the winter - we had the little trail to ourselves and were able to note some of the things that are different during this time of year. In contrast to the hemlocks, for one thing, I noticed a number of these little fir trees gamely getting started, this one near another fallen tree that almost looks like fence rails in the background.
As far as trail conditions go, there were soggy spots where the trail was mushy from melt, and there were at least two blow downs that lay across the path. This pine looks like it was damaged in an ice storm, as it was broken off pretty high up the trunk, and lay there snapped off on the ground. There was one other tree that completely blocked the path, but it was easy enough to step over it.
The stream that eventually becomes the White Oak Falls crosses through this area, and it was swollen with melt, gurgling happily down the hill. Mary and I need to make a winter's outing over to the lower falls and check them out, hopefully with light crowds.
For a compare and contrast exercise, here is a post on Limberlost I did last summer:
Here is a link to the Easy Day Hikes at Amazon, you can also usually pick it up at Evergreen Outfitters in Luray.
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