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Hikers walk along Ramsey Creek during a dry time. Tennessee Citizens for Wilderness Planning has assembled land to be turned over to the National Park Service to expand public lands at the Obed Wild and Scenic River. Chuck Estes/Tennessee Citizens for Wilderness Planning
There’s more room to roam in the Cumberlands thanks to Oak Ridge-based citizens group
WARTBURG — As East Tennesseans and tourists alike enjoy summer fun on the wild Obed River, enthusiasts are growing its amount of federally protected land.
Part of the U.S. National Park Service system, the Obed Wild and Scenic River in Cumberland and Morgan Counties on Tennessee’s Cumberland Plateau offers swimming, hiking, picnicking, kayaking, fishing and climbing at the federally protected park. It currently includes about 45 miles along streams like the Obed and Emory Rivers.
Residents of Oak Ridge, a little less than an hour’s drive away, created Tennessee Citizens for Wilderness Planning (TCWP) and lobbied to create the federally protected area in 1976. Now, the same group, through fundraising and land swaps with anonymous private individuals, has gained 30 acres on which it plans to build a trail connected to the federal land.
The new trail loop will let visitors hike through a forest and into a gorge and they can follow Ramsey Creek to a small waterfall.
TCWP’s Chuck Estes said the property is not open to the public yet. The organization plans to finish building the trail first before giving the area to the National Park Service. Estes said TCWP still has some paperwork to do before the transfer is final.
“It will provide a high-quality experience to hikers walking the small gorge, protect a mature forest, and ensure continued excellent water quality in Ramsey Creek,” Estes said, adding that moisture in the canyon supports supports salamanders, including hellbenders, and other amphibians along with other distinctive plants and animals.
“Surveying the property may find other interesting animal and plant species and some may be species of concern that will be protected through purchase of the property,” he said.
