Shenandoah and the Appalachian Trail

 Hello again,

After our rainy day Tuesday, we woke up to sunny skies yesterday morning as we headed south to Shenandoah NP.   This time we set our GPS to avoid toll roads.  We traveled through Baltimore and Washington DC.   Baltimore drivers win the prize for the the worst we have seen so far on the trip.  They make unsafe freeway exits (waiting until the very last second to exit), tailgate, zip in and out of traffic and drive very fast.  Definitely made us nervous.

We arrived in Shenandoah mid-afternoon and decided to take a hike that afternoon since we were leaving the next morning.  Beautiful park - we were there just before the leaves changed color and can imagine it will be quite spectacular in a couple of weeks. 

These two photos are from the overlooks in the park.  The top on is to the east, primarily trees and the bottom one is to the west with the Shenandoah Valley in the distance.

We hiked the Appalachian trail!!!  We did over one-tenth of a percent of it!  It feels pretty cool to hike even a tiny piece of something so famous and that we have read so much about.

This was the waterfall we walked to on the AT.  Unfortunately, after a 1,000 foot descent, we were still at the top of the waterfall and couldn't really see the waterfall, just some of the water flowing into it.  But it was on the AT so that made it all worth while.  

I took this photo on our drive out of the park this morning.  Liked the clouds and the dead tree in the foreground.  The park is over 100 miles long and we were camping in the middle of it so it took us a long time to wind (and I mean wind) our way out of it this morning.  We stopped at the Blue Ridge Parkway and took a short hike before heading to West Virginia this afternoon. This was our fourth travel day in a row and we will finally have a much needed break.

This is for all you baseball fans.  All of our kids got me "season tickets" to the Giants' games this year.  This is a picture of my cardboard cutout that was in the stands all season and where my seat was.  This was the coolest gift!  Apparently I was in the same section as Joe Montana.  And, no I don't need a reminder that the Giants did not make the playoffs and the Dodgers won the division.