Camping in the Clouds

From Washington DC it was back into the woods for Ryan and me. Luckily Shenandoah National Park is an easy two hour drive from the city with plenty of eye popping views to get us back in the mood.

Shenandoah resulted from the desire to preserve at least one of the tree dense ridgelines of the Blue Ridge Mountains for a scenic drive, and with the help of the CCC, the Skyline Drive and national park was born. The northern part of the drive is also the narrowest part of the park, so views to the east and west overlooked fertile farmland and thriving communities in picturesque valleys. Not a bad place to settle, and undoubtedly many of the families there have tilled the land for generations.

Ryan and I did a short hike to see more of the views before heading to our first campsite of the two nights we had in the park, but unfortunately as I was fighting a cold, we couldn’t do more than a few miles.

The next day however, I felt up to a longer hike and so we headed down the ridgeline alongside a pretty creek to a scenic waterfall. Leaves carpeted the floor and the air was crisp and cool, suddenly it felt more like fall than ever before.

The rain that started down softly as we made the ascent back up to the trailhead hindered us from hiking a second hike, but made stopping for a quick load of laundry at the campground more attractive to avoid what was becoming a deluge. Fortunately it let up in time for us to set up camp and cook dinner, though the temperature stayed (probably) in the upper 40s.

Our campground was on the side of Loft Mountain, alluding to a lofty elevation as far as this part of the country is concerned, and the rain cloud that had doused us sat snugly over the mountain like a cap. Our campsite felt a bit eery as the fog turned the trees into grey shadows around our tent, and our headlamps’ beams could be seen like a lighthouse’s warning. A deer walked by camp while we were cooking, adding to the overall other-worldly effect.

Sure enough, as we drove out of the park the next day, it didn’t take long for us to descend from our cloudy quarters to the sunny views of the valley below. Sometimes there’s a plus to camping in the rain, our cloud had a silver lining.