Category: Hiking/Running/Caving/Zip Lining

Expedition Team: Dave Miller, Rosie Miller

Expedition Date: 2017

This .6 mile gorge trail and the rock house are awesome.  You have to be careful on the gorge trail which has stone steps and slow going but once inside the rock house the experience is fantastic.  The rock house has , amazing curving colored rocks, natural gothic type windows and incredible views.    Small recesses in the back wall were once used as baking ovens by native Americans and settlers living in the cave.   Troughs in the floor were believed to hold water.  Legend has it that the cave was once used as a hideout by thieves who stole from people who traveled the nearby roads. 

Back at the parking lot there once stood, around the 1900’s, a hotel called “The Rock House”.  We then hiked the  .2 mile rim trail which was overgrown with few views.  The next to last photo below is a new archeological find made by Dave – it is called “Butt Crack Rock”.

Expedition Team:  Rosie Miller, Dave Miller                                                                                    Expedition Date:   2017

We hiked this one mile rugged trail full of moss covered cliffs and over an A-Frame metal bridge to a large waterfall.  The remains of a grist mill built in the mid-1800’s is above the falls which was a moderate climb.  We saw a snapping turtle and lots of Monarch butterflies.   We stayed the weekend at a cozy cabin at Ravenwood Castle.

Expedition Team:  Rosie Miller, Dave Miller                                                                                    Expedition Date:   2017

This .5 mile trail leads to the beautiful cascading waterfall seen in many magazines.  We hiked the Gorge Trail to the waterfall and took the Rim Trail back.  Along the trail are towering hemlock trees and a wide access cave.  We stayed two nights in a cabin at Ravenwood Castle which provided excellent meals and dozens of board games.  This was one of the five major trails in the state park that we hiked.  As we exited the park we saw bison grazing on one of the nearby farms.

Expedition Team:  Rosie Miller, Dave Miller                                                                                    Expedition Date:       2017

A beautiful day for a hike as we took the one mile Narrows Trail along the edge of the Little Miami Scenic River.  The water was high and fast due to the previous nights rain.  Looking up we could see the cliff overhangs and bedrock as we stepped around many fallen slump rocks scattered across the valley floor.  The gorge is an example of interglacial and post glacial canyon cutting.  Coming back we ascended and hiked the Rim Trail where we had wider views of the river racing through the gorge.  Along the trail we came across a eastern green turtle (Photo#6) and a very friendly large rabbit (Photo#7).  My favorite was a rock shaped like a scary face (Photo#8).

Expedition Team:  Jacque Kelly, Nick Kelly, Rosie Miller, Dave Miller
Expedition Date:   July 30, 2017

We visited Natural Bridge State Park and hiking the 3.5 mile trail to view the famous sandstone arch. Natural Bridge measures 78 ft. long, 65 ft. high, 12 ft. thick, & 20 ft. wide. We squeezed through the narrow passage and climbed the stone steps to the top of the arch where you can walk across it and continue on the trail for miles. We stopped for lunch at Miguel’s Pizza, a popular spot for rock climbers and hikers, where we ate pizza outdoors.  We then drove a few miles into Daniel Boone National Forest. There we hiked the 5 mile Auxier Ridge Trail , a strenuous hike with many great views of the countryside plus high ridges with long dangerous drops. With dozens of hiking trails we plan to return soon and also bring our four kayaks to kayak the Red River Gorge.

Expedition Team: Rosie Miller, Dave Miller
Expedition Date: July 2017

After a day of hiking in southern Kentucky we spent the night at a Bed & Breakfast up a hollow south of Irvine, Kentucky. Rosie and I woke early and hiked up the hollow trail in the morning mist and fog expecting a deer or sasquatch to cross our path any second.  Saw hundreds of the most beautiful, large spider webs glistening in the morning sun.  We came upon a small family cemetery in the fog.  A mile later we came upon a small pond with the fog magically swirling as if alive.  I filmed it burning off as the sun rose over the foothills.  I imagine heaven being as beautiful as this.

Expedition Team:  Jacque Kelly, Dave Miller, Rosie Miller
Expedition Date:   July 2017

Jacque and I ran the “Run to the Moon 5K Run” in Wapakoneta while Rosie cheered us on.  This was my fourth race since being in cancer remission and I am glad Jacque slowed her pace that last half mile.  The race began and finished at the Neil Armstrong Museum. NASA Astronaut Buzz Aldrin (the second man to walk on the moon after Armstrong) was the race starter.  Aldrin gave a two hour lecture about the mission to Mars later that afternoon at the local high school which was fascinating.  We talked to the other guest Mike Mallory, the Navy frogman who was the first diver in the water to add flotation devices to the space capsule after it splashed down coming back from the moon.  Dave got to talk scuba with Mallory for a while.  We toured the Armstrong Space Museum, viewed the unique exhibits and took lots of photos.  People dressed as Star Wars characters were everywhere.  We attended the evening Wapak Moon Festival downtown and listened to bands, saw a pig race and ate chocolate covered bacon.  We camped at the Wapak KOA. 

Hiking Team: Rosie Miller, Dave Miller

Hiking Date:  November 5, 2016

This place is similar to the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles that I visited in 1991 when I went out to run in the Los Angeles Marathon.

HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE:  In October 1803, while traveling down the Ohio River to meet William Clark for an expedition to the Pacific, Meriwether Lewis visited Big Bone Lick. He was to gather fossilized bones for President Thomas Jefferson. In September 1807, Clark supervised a three week dig for bones at President Jefferson’s request (over 300 bones and teeth were sent to him). Scientists consider William Clark’s dig at Big Bone Lick in 1807 as the birthplace of American vertebrate paleontology. Found here by Clark were prehistoric native American artifacts and bone from the mastodon, wooly mammoth and giant sloth. Big Bone Lick became the talk of the scientific world.

FINDINGS: The ice age mega-mammals listed above including herds of bison visited these bogs satisfying their natural taste for salt and minerals. The tremendous weight of these creatures made them vulnerable to sink in the unstable marshy ground surrounding the springs. Thousands were swallowed up, the salty ooze sealed their remains from air and preserved their bones. As climate warmed and the bogs dried up, bones were discovered. American and foreign museums have acquired tens of thousands of bones from this park.

Rosie and I hiked the park, observing that many of the springs and marches consist of brine: water mixed with salt (the smell reminded me of the sulfur pits at Yellowstone Park). In the 1800’s, Big Bone Lick was used for salt manufacturing (it took 500 to 1,000 gallons of brine to collect one bushel of salt) and was a fashionable tourist attraction for the southern wealthy as they bathed in the sulfur-salt spring water for medicinal purposes.

The park had a nice display showing sloth and wooly mammoths in a fake bog. However, the real gem of the park was a herd of American Bison, the largest land mammal in North America, re-introduced into the park a few years ago. Wild bison had last been seen in Kentucky in the early 1800’s

Expedition Team:  Jacqueline Miller, Holly Miller, Dave Miller, Javier Riesco Gonzalez, Shane Miller, Justin Eller, Kei Haguchi

Expedition Dates:  2006 & 2012

Mammoth Cave is the longest recorded cave system in the world with more than 348 miles mapped and explored. It is three times longer than any other known cave and geologists estimate there could be 600 miles of undiscovered passageways. Two guides led our group each time on a 7 hour, 5 ½ mile exploration to little explored areas that regular walking tours do not go on.

THE EXPLORATION:  Our group was supplied thick coveralls, hard hats, head light, gloves, knee pads and a small pack for our lunch. We supplied ankle high hiking boots. Due to a cave fungus that kills bats, the National Park Service collect and wash the gear after usage to prevent the fungus from spreading. We descended 300 to 350 feet below the surface and spent the day walking, crawling, climbing, rolling or wiggling acrobatically through seemingly impossible openings or challenging climbs. We saw cave crickets, cave beetles and bats. On many rocks we saw charcoal autographs from the 1800’s and early 1900’s from early cave guides. There is a reason a person with a chest size of over 42 inches is not allowed to participate. You can get stuck. My hips barely made it through several tight holes. Many times the squeeze was so tight that you had to lay on your back, relax and control your breathing so that your chest sank enough to wiggle across long stretches. This trip is not for anyone who is claustrophobic. The exploration was starkly beautiful but physically demanding as everyone was pooped by the end. We all ate very well that evening around the campground campfire. Since photos were difficult to take, I included photos from previous trips in which we took our foreign exchange students, Javi from Spain and Kei from Japan.