Distance: ~12mi (5.6 mi out and back on Ace Gap + a short walk to a cave near the trailhead)
The Ace Gap trail is a trail along the park boundary near Townsend. On this day, I hiked with the GSHAG Meetup group. We met at a the Back Porch in Townsend and carpooled to the trail head. The road to the trail ends with a small gravel parking area. There is probably room for 15-20 cars at the most.
The trail is smooth and well maintained. It has several up and down sections with only a few hundred feet of total elevation change. We reached the end of Ace Gap after about 2 hours of hiking. There were a few nice views along the way and a few small stream crossings. We did pass several very nice houses which were very close to the trail, yet outside of the park. Being so close to the edge of the park, I had cell phone service for nearly all of the hike.
At the end of the trail, there are a couple trails from Blackberry farms that meet up at the trail intersection. There were no marking, but there were purple blazes showing the trails. The leader of our group knew that the trails were associated with Blackberry Farms.
In the trail head parking lot, a small trail leads off to the left of Ace Gap to a deep sinkhole and a cave. It was worth the walk down to look at it. A guy in our party indicated that the cave has a drop in it of over 400'.
