Shenandoah

Monday we hit the road for the, I think, 13th time, packing up the rig in the pouring rain. By the time we were hooked up and ready to roll, however, the rain had stopped, and we opted to drive part of our way north on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Hilly, curvy and narrow, yes, but on a rainy Monday, we figured it would be sparcely trafficked. Plus, the road that we'd take over to the interstate would also be hilly and curvy, but heavily trafficked. It was a good call. I think we saw three other cars during the hour or so that we drove on the BRP, and it was very pleasant. We stopped at one of the countless overlooks for lunch. The clouds were breaking, but some of the lower ones still lingered in the valleys, which was beautiful:


Toby has a knack for finding wildlife, and flushed out this pretty little turtle:


We continued on, picking up the interstate and shooting the rest of the way up to Greenwood, Virginia, at the southermost tip of Shenandoah National Park. The campground has some close areas, and some nicer, more quiet areas. We were assigned to the denser, but luckily on the end of a row, with a nice little creek flowing nearby. We need to be better about specifying our desires to the campground hosts, who always assume that we want "full hookup" sites (water, electric and sewer), when we really only need water/electric most of the time. Often the nicest sites are not full hookup ones. Anyway, we took a ride down the BRP to a waterfall we'd heard of called Crabtree Falls. The water cascades over 1000 feet from top to bottom, not in one uninterupted fall, but in a back-to-back series, the tallest being 400 feet. But it is known as the tallest east of the Mississippi, and we had a nice hike up the steep switchbacked trail that follows it. There were hundreds of big millipedes on the trail, so we had to watch our step. Toby also found a small black snake with an orange belly and a yellow ring around its neck. Here are some photos from our hike:



And, we went into Shenandoah, driving on Skyline Drive up onto the ridge, for about 40 miles to the next gap. The overlooks provided spectacular views of the countryside. If we hadn't seen views like this recently, we would have been blown away, but we just came from the Smokies, and we just drove the Blue Ridge Highway, so these equally impressive views were not as shocking or unique as they would be if we were from Kansas, and had just woken up here, having parachuted in at midnight, and weren't hungry, but I digress...The views were awesome, but I didn't take many photos, is all I'm saying...




Now the campground population has turned over a bit, and it seems every rig has at least one, and as many as seven dogs aboard. With the constant parade of canines going by, its become a miserable job keeping our two quiet, and we are eager to be away from this mayhem. Really, what kind of a nut has seven dogs and takes them camping? Two dogs are two too many. Figures, though, that none of the seven make so much as a peep, whereas our two sound like rabid starved wolves when they see other dogs. Ugh. I'm going to pack up now...