In March 2026, the Town of Lake Lure officially reopened Buffalo Creek Park, providing local residents and visitors alike with 8 miles of quality hike and hike-bike trails right in Lake Lure! See the below map denoting which trails are open.
The following trails in this area are now open to the public:
Please note that the parking area on Shumont Rd. is closed. You can access Weed Patch via Buffalo Creek Park. Conserving Carolina is working with the Town of Lake Lure and NC State Parks toward a solution that will provide access to the northern endpoint of Weed Patch Mountain Trail.
The Weed Patch Mountain Trail is the newest trail in Hickory Nut Gorge! It opened in May of 2018 and is on property owned by the Town of Lake Lure. The trail connects Buffalo Creek Park to Eagle Rock.
Buffalo Creek Park has expanded to more than 1,500 acres allowing for the new trail to be built.
The Weed Patch Mountain trail is 8.6 miles extending from the near the highest point on the Buffalo Creek Park blue loop up the Eagle Rock where you get an incredible view of the surrounding mountains. The trail is a backcountry experience with no other connecting trails on it’s entire length. This trail should only be used by experience hikers and bikers.
The trail is open to mountain biking though it is a narrow singletrack design without banked curves or any specific mountain bike features.
The main access point for the trail is the Buffalo Creek Park trailhead. You must hike 1.5 to 2 miles on the blue
loop at to reach the start of the Weed Patch Trail.
There is also a provision for limited parking at the western end of the trail which is on Chimney Rock State Park land. A few parking spots are available
there on a first come, first served basis. A reservation is no longer required.
For much more details about the trail and how it came to be see Conserving Carolina’s trail page at the link below:
https://conservingcarolina.org/weedpatch
The trail is part of the newly designated Hickory Nut Gorge State Trail System. That system is envisioned to be more than 100 miles of trails throughout
Hickory Nut Gorge. To read more about the plans and see a map of the current and proposed trails see the link below:
https://conservingcarolina.org/hickory-nut-gorge-trail/
WHERE: Lake Lure, NC
DIRECTIONS: 2191 Buffalo Creek Road, Lake Lure 28746 (For Buffalo Creek Park side) End of Shumont Road 1911 Shumont Road, Black Mountain, NC (For Eagle Rock side)
Keep your maps in a plastic bag to protect them from the rain and know how to use them. GPS units are great, but they are not substitutes for knowing how to use a map and compass.
