Duplin County Highpoint Trip Report
Date: March 1, 2008
Author: Shannon Dillmore
I've placed LiDAR data in the files section of the cohp-yahoo website (areas
outlined in red – 174 feet). These are in jpg format, which is in some cases
lower resolution than the pdf files I have. The pdf files were too big to
upload to the yahoo group site, so if you plan on visiting these areas and would
like pdf files, let me know. In most cases the contours are overlaid on a
composite satellite photo/USGS topo map.
We met at the Pure gas station (follow signs from exit 355 off I-40) at 7 am in
the hamlet of Faison, NC just east of the intersection of I-40 and NC 403.
From there, we traveled a short distance south on US 117 to a right turn onto Eddice
Taylor Road. After a right onto Warren Road, we traveled a short distance to a
left on David Bright Road and went roughly a mile or so to the section of road
where five 174-foot contours appeared on the LiDAR map. These areas correspond
to area 1 on the cohp.org site and are in the Faison quad. These areas are
numbered in the order in which we visited them.
We parked at the westernmost area (1) first, a gravel track to a fenced antenna
in a field. This area is shown as pretty large but we thought the highest area
was north of the fenced antenna. We next proceeded east on David Bright Road a
few hundred feet to another sandy dirt track on the left. We followed that past
a few trailer homes and parked just before the road was posted. The high area
in this contour (2) looked to be the field east of the road or on the road itself.
Entering into posted area was not necessary.
From there we proceeded east to a long dirt driveway trending southwest.
There wasn't much noticeable rise on the road where area 5 was; the high point of the
large area in the field (3) looked to be near a telephone pole. We also walked
into a brushy area near an abandoned dwelling (area 4), where we thought we
located the highest area of the three southernmost contours. We would have
built a cairn but a trash pile marked the spot nicely.
To get the small area in the Mount Olive quad, we then proceeded north on US 117
then east on NC 403 a few miles to Summerlin Crossroads, where we turned right.
After proceeding 0.8 mile, we parked in the driveway on the east side of the
road in the driveway of an abandoned home. We crossed the surprisingly busy
street and headed for a visible path into the woods. This trail led straight to
the small 174-foot contours. This area looked to have been cut in the not-too-
distant past and the area may no longer exist. A trashed satellite dish was near.
This small area is contained in area 9 on the cohp.org site.
In total, Duplin County took us about 90 minutes.