MOUNT GUYOT (GREAT SMOKY MOUNTAINS)

'Mount Guyot' is a mountain in the eastern Great Smoky Mountains, located in
the southeastern United States. At 6,621 feet above sea level, Guyot is the fourth-highest
summit in the eastern U.S., and the second-highest in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park[2]. While the mountain is remote, the Appalachian Trail crosses its south slope,
passing to within 300 feet of the summit.
Mount Guyot lies on the Tennessee-North Carolina border, between Sevier County and
Haywood County. While the border traverses the summit, Guyot is typically considered
a North Carolina mountain. There are two peaks atop the mountain, appx. one-half mile apart,
with the southwestern peak being the true summit. The mountain rises 3,600 feet above its
eastern base near Walnut Bottom[3] and 4,000 feet above its western base near Greenbrier Cove. Ramsay Cascades, one of the park's most spectacular waterfalls, spills down a sandstone cliff near the bottom of Guyot's western
slope.
A dense virgin forest surrounds Guyot for miles in all directions. Human settlement
never expanded deep into the eastern Smokies, so the area around Guyot and adjacent
peaks suffered substantially less disturbance than the mountains in the western or
central parts of the range. A long hike and a challenging bushwhack are required
to reach the summit.

Contents

Geology

History

Access

References

External links

Geology

Mount Guyot is comprised of Precambrian Class II rocks of the Ocoee Supergroup, formed
from ocean sediments approximately one billion years ago.^[1] The mountain is underlain by
Thunderhead sandstone, which is common throughout the Smokies. The Thunderhead sandstone
was thrust over Roaring Fork sandstone several hundred million years ago.^[2] Mt. Guyot itself
was formed during the Appalachian orogeny over 200 million years ago, when the North American and African plates collided, thrusting the rock upward.^[3]

History

Mount Guyot was named in honor of Swiss geographer Arnold Guyot by Guyot's friend, Samuel
Buckley. Buckley was a naturalist who accompanied Thomas Lanier Clingman on a survey
expedition to the crest of the Smokies in 1858.^[4] While Buckley's measurements were often wildly inaccurate, Guyot himself
conducted an expedition the following year, recording more accurate elevations and giving
preliminary names to various peaks along the crest.^[5] Guyot measured the elevation of Mt. Guyot at 6,636 feet, missing the modern
measurement by just 15 feet.^[6].
Regarding the Eastern Smokies, surveyors and authors alike agreed on one
thing: the region was very remote and isolated. Guyot himself said of the area, "neither the
white man or the Indian hunter venture in this wilderness."^[7] For Horace Kephart, who wrote extensively on the Smoky Mountains in the
early 1900's, Mt. Guyot was the climax of a dense, virtually-insurmountable wilderness:

The most rugged and difficult part of the Smokies (and of the United States east of Colorado) is in the sawtooth mountains between Collins and Guyot, at the headwaters of the Okona Lufty River. I know but few men who have ever followed this part of the divide...^[8]

Kephart goes on to relate the account of James Ferris and his wife, two naturalists who
bushwhacked their way across the crest of the Smokies to Mt. Guyot in 1900. According to Mrs.
Ferris:

The Tennesseeans seem afraid of the mountains, and the Cherokees of North Carolina equally so; for, two miles from camp, all traces of man, except surveyors' marks, had
disappeared.^[9]

Mt. Guyot remained isolated until the CCC constructed a segment of the Appalachian Trail across the mountain's western slope in 1935.^[10] Although the trail opened up the heart of the Eastern Smokies to backpackers, access remained relatively difficult. According to author Laura Thornborough, who climbed Guyot in the late 1930's:

My first of three trips to the top of Mt. Guyot remains sharply etched in my memory. It was the hardest, roughest and most exhausting of all the trips I have ever made in the Great Smokies.^[11]

Thornborough followed the route out of Greenbrier that ascends Guyot's western slope. She recalled that "there was no trail to Guyot, not even a dim one, but our guides knew the way." The party followed Ramsay Prong until it became "a mere trickle of water," and emerged near modern-day Guyot Spring. From the state line, they found a "dim trail" leading to the summit. Thornborough concluded her report by saying, "if it is wilderness you want, then go to Guyot."^[12]

Access

The Appalachian Trail and the Balsam Mountain Trail intersect just south of Guyot
at Tricorner Knob. They are the only maintained trails to traverse the mountain.
From the Cosby Campground (specifically behind Campsite B51), the Snake Den Ridge Trail
winds 5.3 miles to its intersection with the Appalachian Trail at Inadu Knob. From this
intersection, it is approximately 2 miles to Guyot Spring, on Mt. Guyot's west slope.
A 15-mile section of the Appalachian Trail stretches from Newfound Gap to Tricorner Knob,
near Guyot's south slope. The Appalachian-Balsam Trail intersection is approximately 13 miles from Balsam Mountain Road, a gravel road
that begins near Cherokee, North Carolina.
While Guyot's eastern slope is very steep, its western slope, known as Guyot Spur, descends gradually for nearly five miles to the Little Pigeon River. A well-known bushwhack follows the creek
on the north side of Guyot Spur, starting at Ramsay Cascades and emerging on the Appalachian
Trail near Guyot Spring (probably the same path Thornborough's guides followed in the 1930's). This route is approximately eight miles from the Ramsay Cascades Trail parking area, four miles of which are maintained trail.
While the summit is less than a half-mile from the Appalachian Trail, the thick forest makes any bushwhack a challenge. A faint manway rises from Guyot Spring to the northern summit, although the manway is heavily overgrown. Dead fraser fir blowdowns and low visibility complicate navigation from any direction.

References

1. Harry Moore, ''A Roadside Guide to the Geology of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park'' (Knoxville: University of Tennessee
Press, 1988), 32.
2. Harry Moore, ''A Roadside Guide to the Geology of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park'' (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1988), 66.
3. Harry Moore,
''A Roadside Guide to the Geology of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park'' (Knoxville:
University of Tennessee Press, 1988), 23-27.
4. Michael Frome, ''Strangers In High Places: The Story of the Great Smoky Mountains'' (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1994),
103-104.
5. Michael Frome, ''Strangers In High Places: The Story of the Great Smoky Mountains'' (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press,
1994), 101.
6. Robert Mason, ''The Lure of the Great Smokies'' (Boston and New York: Houghton-Mifflen, 1927), 54-55.
7. Daniel Pierce, ''The Great Smokies: From Natural Habitat to National Park'' (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press,
2000), 19.
8. Horace Kephart, ''Our Southern Highlanders'' (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1976), 58.
9. Horace Kephart, ''Our Southern Highlanders'' (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1976), 59.
10. Sherrill Hatcher, "The Appalachian Trail In the Smokies," ''Smoky Mountain Historical Society Newsletter'' 20, no. 3 (May-June 1994): 2.
11. Laura Thornborough, ''Great Smoky Mountains'' (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1942), 121-122.
12. Laura Thornborough, ''Great Smoky Mountains'' (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1942), 122.

External links

★ Great Smoky Mountains National Park Trail Map - Large file in .pdf format.

★ Mount Guyot - Peakbagger.com

★ Tricorner Knob Shelter - Information on the back country shelter near Mt. Guyot's southern slope.

★ South Beyond 6000 in the Eastern Smokies - Information provided by the Carolina Hiking Club for climbing Mt. Guyot and other nearby high peaks.