Devies Mountain, Quebec Run Wild Area, Forbes State Forest

Devies Mountain looms behind the trees like a veiled nun behind the rood screen--except maybe slightly more ominous.  Devies Mountain is no slouch when it comes to height, standing at 2,753 feet.  But it's virtually unvisited; there's just no easy way to get there.  This peak stands in the southwest corner of the Quebec Run Wild Area, which is 7,441 acres of protected land within the Forbes State Forest.  That's to say, this mountain is completely protected from drilling and fracking and timbering.  I've always wondered why there's no trail out to it.  By the way, Magazine Mountain, the highest point in Arkansas, is exactly the same height as Devies Mountain, which is the 34th highest peak in Pennsylvania.

This is the leftward, westerly half of the Wild Area.  The black line at the bottom of the map is the Mason Dixon Line.  Devies Mountain stands in pristine isolation just two miles north of the West Virginia line.  I've been hiking and backpacking Quebec Run for over a decade, but I'd never crossed over into the trackless area west of Skyline Drive.  I've always wanted to venture out there, but it takes a lot of commitment and preparation to go where there are no trails.  Also, without trails, you really need to go when there are no leaves on the trees.  

Here's the clearest view of the mountain that I was able to get.  Its so-called "prominence" is 420 feet, which is respectable...as long as you don't start comparing it to the Adirondacks or the Rockies.  Comparison is the thief of joy, no?

I followed a variety of old forest roads in the direction I needed to go, but mostly I bushwhacked.  My goal was to claim this unknown peak on my peak-bagging site, which I had not updated since the summer of 2023.  These old roads are overgrown and littered with fallen trunks and limbs in varying states of decay.  No vehicle comes here now.  Before you begin the ascent, you first have to descend into the valley of Laurel Run, where it's hard to see the mountain that you're trying to climb.  You can see a mountain from afar, but not when you're standing at its foot.  At the foot of a mountain, all you see is a rise in the terrain.  I just headed uphill, crossing over many leafy old roads that zigzag up the mountainside.  

The views from the top were modest, as I knew they would be.  As with so many of these wooded mountains, there'd be nothing to see at all in the summer.  That's what I like about Central Pennsylvania; the mountains have rocky ridges that offer broad vistas and give the illusion of rising above the treeline.  Here in the southwestern part of the state, broad views are harder to come by.  There's a windmill on the opposite ridge that I used as a guide to navigate my way back the way I'd come.

It would be easy to get lost out here, so it's important to mark your way at crucial junctures.  I found my way back down the mountain by leaving sticks stacked against trees at unnatural angles in those place where it would be easy to lose my way.  Devies Mountain is surely named after the family that owned it long ago, 18th century Scotch Irish settlers, no doubt.  It's a place of sweet solitude, and it feels like an achievement to get there without trails, even on an eerily balmy February day when the upland trees are prematurely budding.  I haven't posted in a while because I've been spending my days off working on my new hunting camp up north (though I don't hunt).  It was good to get back in the forest.