Shuckstack trail or training to be a Navy Seal at 47

The link above provides you with the Parks description of this trail as hiked as an out and back. We hiked it as a 12 mile loop. The first 3.7 miles are uphill. I can't stress that enough UPHILL. Here's a couple of photos of Archie and I dressed for the hike which was on July 3, 2009. He looks like he is headed for the beach, I on the other hand am dressed for maximum protection from BUGS, sun and anything else that might touch me on a trail. Camelback, camera, binoculars, fannypack for first aid kit, gaiters over hiking boots to keep bugs out, long sleeve shirt over a tank top ( the long sleeve shirt never came off I can tell you) big pocketknife. Just before we went to the trailhead we walked down to look at Fontana Dam from below the dam. Fontana is the tallest dam East of the MS river and was built during WW2. So on we go with our goal being Shuckstack tower an old firetower that hasn't been used since the 30s maybe 40s. It is not maintained, its about 85 feet tall and on top of Shuckstack mountain. The views were supposed to be amazing. The trail certainly was. I'm not sure you can see just how steep this trail is from the photos. At one point about 2.5 hours or so in Archie said I'm taking a power nap and he did for about 5 minutes on a log like a raccoon or some sort of wild creature. Now for someone like myself who is deathly afraid of ticks, and other bugs, this sort of thing is just not possible. Please note I am having problems with this damn blogspot today as it is not letting me reposition my photos as usual so they appear at freaking random. There were some wildflowers along the trail including lots of trillium and rhodendrum. The only wildlife we saw on the trail were these two toads. The red one is I believe a Fowler's toad
The paler one is I think an Eastern American toad which is a little more common. Next post will be more on the actual tower.