Kitt’s Hole on Lower Howard’s Creek

January’s snow and ice dis­cour­aged Clare and me from tak­ing our reg­u­lar week­ly hikes.  We enjoy walks in the win­ter because one can see so much more of the land­scape when the leaves are gone.  And snow-hik­ing is the best, as ground fea­tures show up so much bet­ter.  But the ice under the snow made walk­ing risky, and at our age we can ill afford to fall.

Last Sunday, with the snow begin­ning to retreat and the tem­per­a­ture a balmy 45 degrees, we decid­ed to give it a try.  Our des­ti­na­tion was the Lower Howard’s Creek Nature and Heritage Preserve.  Clare is on the board there and likes to vis­it reg­u­lar­ly and in all sea­sons.  What she par­tic­u­lar­ly want­ed to see were the giant ici­cles on the cliffs at Kitt’s Hole, a deep pool on the creek about three-quar­ters of a mile from the Kentucky River.  (The ori­gin of the name is a mys­tery I have not been able to solve.)

Her pre­dic­tion that the snow and ice was most­ly gone looked promis­ing as we hiked down Bush Mill Road into the creek valley. 

Upon veer­ing off toward Kitt’s Hole, how­ev­er, we noticed that the north- and east-fac­ing hills were still sev­er­al inch­es deep in snow with a crust of ice under­neath.  We found a deer trail to fol­low, and since the path was on lev­el ground, we decid­ed to go on. 

The views were incred­i­ble in all direc­tions.  I could have spent the whole after­noon tak­ing pic­tures.  The one below shows a stone fence head­ing straight up the side of a hill that looked much steep­er than it does in the pho­to­graph.  My stops to haul the cam­era out had to be brief—after get­ting a pic­ture or two, I would find Clare almost out of sight.

At this point we were still fair­ly high up.  The nice view of the creek bend below dis­guis­es how the trail (along the left side of the pic­ture) was dete­ri­o­rat­ing.  The path was nar­row and below it, the hill descend­ed steeply.  I knew if I slipped here, I could end up slid­ing all the way down and end­ing up in the creek.

We final­ly reached the val­ley floor safe­ly.  The snow-cov­ered hill­side, icy banks and boul­der-strewn water made the creek scenes here quite lovely. 

After anoth­er three or four hun­dred yards, we reached our des­ti­na­tion:  Kitt’s Hole.  The scene was spec­tac­u­lar.  Gigantic ici­cles lined the cliff, some dip­ping down into the water, their shapes mir­rored in the still pool below.  Magnificent!

This view (below) catch­es the ice on three sep­a­rate bench­es.  And, in the fore­ground, that’s my beloved fetch­ing her­self a drink of water. 

Below, Clare pos­es in front of an icy wall.  On close inspec­tion, the ici­cles had unex­pect­ed­ly asym­met­ri­cal shapes, and many had knob­by pro­tru­sions on them.  At the base, a pile of fall­en ice blocks tes­ti­fies that the frozen ice shapes cling­ing to the wall were not sta­t­ic.  All views at Kitt’s Hole were pic­ture wor­thy.  I took dozens of shots, then put the cam­era away, and we start­ed back. 

The return trip was a night­mare for me.  We decid­ed on a short­er route and head­ed straight up the hill to save time.  The phys­i­cal demand of the climb was no prob­lem.  But at every oth­er step, my boots slipped on ice or mud on the steep hill­side.  Clare did not admit to any prob­lems.  Whether she had grip­pi­er boots or bet­ter bal­ance com­bined with a low­er cen­ter of grav­i­ty, I can­not say.  I can say that it was a huge relief to reach lev­el ground again.

I do agree with Clare:  We got to see some gor­geous sights and ‘twas a heck of an adven­ture to boot.