Picks and Pans – Shenandoah Valley/Skyline Drive

Shenandoah River State Park

This idyllic little spot was a perfect introduction to the Shenandoah Valley. On arrival, we went for a short hike and listened to the happily croaking frogs….that is, until they realized we were there, and, being the modest Southern frogs they were, stopped their little frog orgy and protected our virgin Northern ears. We ate dinner at our campsite right on the river, got a good night’s sleep and awoke to a beautiful spring morning. Sean and Ian enjoyed a jaunt up to Wildcat Ledge and I went for a jog around Bluebell Loop (alas, no bluebells just yet). Oh, and the hot showers here were just blissful!

Bearfence Mountain Hike

A short hike uphill followed by a little bit of rock scrambling and we got the best view from our time on Skyline Drive.

Jones Run Hike

Nice hike down to a classically mossy waterfall.


PANS
Skyline Drive in March

Driving along, we couldn’t help remarking how beautiful this route would be in October (barring the hoards of people mentioned in our guide books). However, in March, the bare trees with few break for views of the Shenandoah Valley made us regret the $15 entrance fee.

Dark Hollow Falls

Not the most interesting hike in the world, and, given that the difficulty level was low, the view was obscured by a crowd even in the middle of March. Boo.

Leave a Reply

You can use these HTML tags

<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>