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The view from up here
From the new 360-degree viewing platform atop Sassafras Mountain, the state’s highest peak, visitors have an unrivaled view of South Carolina’s 32,000-acre Jocassee Gorges, North Carolina’s Pisgah Mountain and Georgia’s Currahee Mountain.
Photo by Matthew Franklin Carter
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Totally worth it
Visitors can access the new viewing platform on the Foothills Trail from Oconee State Park to Table Rock State Park, or follow F. Van Clayton Memorial Highway until it ends at the site’s gravel parking lot. Either way, the view is worth the trip.
Photo by Matthew Franklin Carter
Eight times, Heyward Douglass has hiked the 77-mile Foothills Trail from Oconee State Park to Table Rock State Park. Along the way, he crossed Sassafras Mountain, always wondering what the view might offer if it weren’t covered by a thick bonnet of trees.
“It was frustrating. You could go out on those rocks right over there,” Douglass says, pointing to a spot on the western corner of South Carolina’s tallest peak, “and there were a few little cubbyholes; you could get a glimpse here and there, but it wasn’t much.”
A better view was offered on the eastern slope of the peak, where a fire tower once gave adventurous climbers a small viewing window just above the tree line. But the tower was removed in 1993.
“A lot of people cried when they took that down,” says Douglass, now the executive director of the Foothills Trail Conservancy. He’s been hiking in the western corner of the state since graduating from Clemson 48 years ago, which made the April dedication of a new observation platform atop 3,553-foot Sassafras Mountain a long-awaited treat.
“We’ve been trying to get them to build a new fire tower ever since that one was taken down,” Douglass says on the day the new tower was officially unveiled. “Thank goodness we didn’t get that done—they might not have built this.”
The platform, 21 miles north of Pickens, is in a remote location but easily accessible by car. From U.S. 178 in the Rocky Bottom community, visitors can make the five-mile drive up F. Van Clayton Memorial Highway to a parking lot that is only about 50 yards from the platform where a spectacular view awaits.
The 44-foot-wide platform rests on the North Carolina border and offers inspiring views of North Carolina’s 6,000-foot Pisgah Mountain to the north and Georgia’s Currahee Mountain to the south. Hartwell, Keowee and Jocassee Lakes, as well as most of South Carolina’s tallest mountains, are part of the silent scenery below.
The breath-grabbing views are just what wildlife biologist and forester Mark Hall dreamed about 15 years ago, when he took the observation post idea to South Carolina Department of Natural Resources colleagues.
Hall, a 24-year DNR veteran who serves as land manager of the 32,000-acre Jocassee Gorges, knew that the trees on Sassafras were not valuable (timber had once been logged extensively in the area), but views of the state’s scenic western corner would be. He first pitched the idea of tree reduction and a viewing station in 2004, seven years after the state bought most of those acres from Duke Energy. But additional purchases had to be made, some of it involving six acres in North Carolina.
The property acquisitions made the project seem unlikely at times. And with no water lines on the mountain, the task of building a concrete structure at the top of a narrow, twisting road presented major problems.
“Getting things up the hill was the biggest problem,” Lazar Construction CEO Ken Hicks says of a 16-month construction period that included record rainfall and three snowstorms. “It’s a steep grade, and we had a lot of days when we couldn’t move anything because of the (persistent) rain.”
The $1.1 million tower was financed by a combination of public funds and private donations. Access is free and open to visitors 365 days a year.
Remote or not, the unusual view is likely to bring visitors. North Carolina native Peter Barr, part of a Highpointers Club whose quest is reaching the high points of every state (he’s made it to 40), says visitors who hiked to the Sassafras summit in the past would not recognize the new setting. “The view into North Carolina from the tower is particularly stunning,” Barr says.
The view puts South Carolina on par with several southeastern states—including North Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee and Alabama—that offer platforms at their highest points.
The tower is expected to spur more general interest in the Jocassee Gorges, which, in 2012, was included in National Geographic magazine’s list of “50 of the World’s Last Great Places.” Yet thanks to the rugged terrain and remote setting, the area remains a relative secret, even to South Carolina residents. South Carolina Rep. Jeff Duncan is among those who believe the tower will change that.
“This will be an education spot for students, and it will bring people to Pickens County,” Duncan says. “I’ve always called South Carolina ‘God’s Country.’ And from up here, there’s no question that it is.”
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Get There
Sassafras Tower is located 21 miles north of Pickens. From U.S. 178 in the Rocky Bottom community, follow F. Van Clayton Memorial Highway five miles until it ends at the parking lot.
Hours: Open year-round. The tower can be accessed one hour before official sunrise until one hour after official sunset. Alcohol, ATVs, skateboards and camping on the site are not permitted.
Admission: Free.
Details: For more information, see the websites of the SC Department of Natural Resources (dnr.sc.gov), the Foothills Trail Conservancy (foothillstrail.org), and Visit Pickens County (visitpickenscounty.com).