Our Son Blake in the Blue Ridge Mountains

After our half-day trip to Antietam Battlefield, it was time to get on the road to our next destination. So we took off the parking brake on the motor home, and rolled out of our boondocking spot at the Charles Town Casino. We like the ease of moving into and out of boondocking spots. Our next camping spot was about an hour down the road in Front Royal, Virginia. It is the gateway town to the popular Sky Line Drive. So we headed to the visitor center at Shenandoah National Park soon after we arrived.

It's a little confusing, but the Skyline Drive, Shenandoah National Park, and the Blue Ridge Parkway are all in the same area, and all related to each other. The Skyline Drive is the 35 mph road that travels along the ridge of Shenandoah National Park. The Skyline Drive is also the northernmost section of the Blue Ridge Parkway. More specifically, after the 105-mile-long Skyline Drive, the Blue Ridge Parkway immediately starts its 469-mile-long road along the mountain ridge. We've visited several different sections of the Blue Ridge Parkway this year; and we love seeing the mountain ridges that run parallel, forming blue ridges out over the horizon.

Our new home town is Front Royal, Virginia, and it can be seen from one of the first view points off the Skyline Drive. We think it will be a great place for exploring this area. We also got a recommendation for a place to get our hair cut while we are here. It takes guts to walk into a new shop just opening up on Main Street, but we're both glad to say we will look less shaggy in all the pictures now.

As we drove out of the mountains on our first evening, we were greeted by this buck along the road. He was flashing that white tail right before he disappeared into the woods.

But the most important reason for our move to Front Royal, is that it takes only one hour to drive to Washington DC's Dulles Airportn DC from here. That's where we picked up our son, Blake. He flew out to join us for an autumn vacation, and we are so excited to see him! On the way back from Washington DC there was this unusual cloud formation in the sky, welcoming Blake to Virginia.

He hit the ground running, as we took him on his first Virginia hike as soon as we got back to Front Royal. We drove through the first 20 miles of the Sky Line Drive, and then started a loop hike.

Mark thinks it's great to have another long-legged-boulder-hopper on the trail with us!

We didn't see any other hikers during the first part of the loop. We decided that it wasn't a well-traveled route when we found trees and logs over the trail in several places. Unlike Mark, Denisa doesn't usually climb over trees unless she has to.

This tree was still standing, but we're not sure how long that will be true. It has a large hole that went all the way through.

We tried pulling Blake through the hole, but he was too big.  

The second half of the loop was on the Appalachian Trail (AT) that we have visited so many times before. So it was fun to show a little piece of the AT to Blake. In this section of the Shenandoah National Forest, concrete posts are used as trailer markers. That funny symbol on this posts is the stacked letters "AT" to point the way on the Appalachian Trail.

Our hike took us to several overlooks that gave Blake his first view of the blue ridges of the Blue Ridge Mountains. There are hints of fall foliage out there, but we are a little disappointed that things are still looking so green. Usually, mid-October is the peak time for finding the best color along the Blue Ridge parkway, but everything seems to be a couple weeks behind this year.

Blake also got more views of his crazy Father jumping onto boulders and climbing trees. He now agrees that Dad must be part mountain goat.

Blake also spotted the subject of this wildlife picture. We decided this walking stick would use his camouflage skills much better if he hung out on a tree, rather than a boulder.

He also spotted these crazy mushrooms. We are used to finding mushrooms on the ground, but this bunch was growing high up on a tree trunk.

Here's a picture of the whole community of mushrooms. From the large number of them, they were obviously liking their high altitude home.

By the time we got to the second overlook point, we were getting tired. We had been climbing up and then down the ridge and it was getting cooler as the sun was sinking lower in the sky. We thought this was a 5 mile loop when we started, but somehow we were tricked into an 8 mile hike.

By this time, Denisa was wishing for a coat like this furry caterpillar was wearing. We are seeing lots of these guys, but we're not sure if they are a sign of the fierce upcoming winter, or if they will morph into some beautiful butterfly.

By the time we got back to the car, we had hiked over 8 miles, instead of the scheduled 5 mile hike for this afternoon. Welcome to vacation with Mark and Denisa! The sun was lighting up the ridges of the Skyline Drive as we headed back to the motor home.

We had just enough energy to eat some apple crisp and ice cream when we got back to the motor home. Then we got to introduce Blake to Denisa's new birthday present. He grew up playing piano duets with Mom, so we played our way through a whole book of duets this evening. Have we mentioned how much we enjoy having Blake visit us?