For Sewanee students, the Perimeter Trail is more than a hike. It’s a tradition | WPLN News
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By
Cynthia Abrams
October 9, 2025
Cynthia Abrams
WPLN News
The Perimeter is a 20-mile loop that encompasses the University of the South's campus.
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Roughly 100 miles outside Nashville, at the southern tip of the Cumberland Plateau, sits a small, picturesque college campus. The buildings are old and built of sandstone, castle-like.
This is the University of the South, known as Sewanee. It’s often noted as one of the
most beautiful college campuses in the country
One reason for that distinction? While campus is just a one-mile radius, it’s surrounded by 13,000 acres of forests, waterfalls and wildlife.
And it’s easy to access — the campus is fully encompassed by a 20-mile loop known as the Perimeter Trail.
Map of the 20-mile Perimeter Trail. There are 65 miles of trails surrounding Sewanee.
Lookout from Green’s View, another entrance on the Perimeter Trail.
The War Memorial Cross at University View is one of the entrance points along the Perimeter Trail in Sewanee, Tenn.
On a warm evening in late September, 12 students gathered to hike a couple miles of the P Trail, as it is affectionately known. It’s the early days of autumn — the leaves are just beginning to yellow, and the brush is brimming with life.
While it is an ideal time of year to be on the trail, it is not the most popular season. That would be the spring — which is aided by a Sewanee tradition for graduating seniors to hike the trail in its 20-mile entirety before receiving their diplomas.
“The week before graduation every year, I’ve noticed the trail is packed with people,” Leyden Schelke, a senior at Sewanee, said. “I was so confused my freshman year. I was like, ‘Why is this happening?’ And then someone explained to me, ‘Well, you’ve got to hike the P Trail before you graduate. That’s how you know that you’ve closed your time out at Sewanee.’”
Schelke has already completed the full hike but said she plans to do it again as graduation approaches.
But it’s not the only time students are getting outside. Classes often hold labs out on the trail. The
Sewanee Outing Program
is constantly hosting hiking, biking and climbing trips along it. And sometimes, students just go out on their own.
Cynthia Abrams
WPLN News
Julia Nelson and John Benson run the Sewanee Outing Program at the University of the South.
“When I’m thinking about going on a run in the afternoon, I kind of almost go through the entire Perimeter Trail in my head and think about, ‘OK, what section do I want to do?’” Sarah Grace Burns, a senior, said.
Hannah Barrow, also a senior, said the trail has been a source of consistency throughout her time at the school.
“I feel the P Trail has seen a lot more of me than I’ve seen of it,” Barrow said. “Even going on the same trail every time, it’s different because, like, I’m different every time.”
For some students, outdoor access is a big part of why they came to the school in the first place.
Cynthia Abrams
WPLN News
Sewanee students hiking along the Perimeter Trail in late September.
Sanjana Priyonti grew up in a suburb of Dhaka, Bangladesh. Sewanee was the only school she applied to after seeing it in a YouTube video.
“In the place I grew up, we never really had access to like places like this,” Priyonti said. “It is city all around. And the first time I remember getting onto this trail for a two-mile hike — it was a section of the P Trail. And I was like, ‘Whoa, this is the best thing ever.’ I loved it instantly.”
But Priyonti said, for her, the trail is about more than just beauty.
“When you are in a country where women are not allowed to do whatever they want to do and you always need to have someone to protect you, you don’t really get to do all the stuff you want to,” she said. “So, coming here, it was more about getting my freedom.”
That feeling of freedom is not just for the Sewanee community. The Perimeter Trail is open to the public. Later this month, the
Nashville Running Company is hosting a race
along the full trail.
So, even though it’s not the most popular season for Sewanee students to fulfill their rite of passage, the crunch and changing of the leaves makes fall an inviting time for anyone to head out on the trail.
This story was produced by the Appalachia + Mid-South Newsroom, a collaboration between
West Virginia Public Broadcasting
WPLN
and
WUOT
in Tennessee,
LPM
WEKU
WKMS
and
WKU Public Radio
in Kentucky and NPR.
Cynthia Abrams
WPLN News
A group of Sewanee Outing Program leaders with SOP Director John Benson on the Perimeter Trail.
Correction
: Sewanee’s campus buildings are built of sandstone. A previous version of this story misstated the type of rock used in construction.
Cynthia Abrams
Cindy Abrams is WPLN’s metro reporter. She grew up in Eugene and Portland, Oregon and moved east after graduating from Whitman College. Cindy comes to Nashville from central Virginia, where she covered the courts at Rappahannock News. She was WPLN’s digital news intern in 2021 before joining the station full-time as a newscast and digital producer last year. She started covering the Metro government in the fall of 2023.
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