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Our last two hikes in Virgnia have been in very popular spots so have been much more crowded than our usual haunts.  Both the Natural Bridge State Park and Crabtree Falls (separate post) were impressive though very different.  The Natural Bridge State Park is a little over an hour drive from Charlottesville in Natural Bridge, VA.  The town and state park are named for the natural stone bridge that everyone comes to see and which has ties to 2 former presidents. Thomas Jefferson purchased 157 acres of land, including the Natural Bridge, from King George in 1774.  See below for the 2nd president associated with the site.

The $8/person entry fee gives you access to a main trail which takes you under the bridge, through a replica of a Monacan Indian village, into a saltpeter cave, and ends at a falls.  The state park also has a couple of other trails that you can currently hike for free.  Also in the town of Natural Bridge, to take advantage of the tourist traffic, is a hotel, caverns, a zoo, and some kind of amusement park.

After walking the popular trail, Bob and I drove up the road a bit to walk the much quieter Monacan Trail. As is more typical for us, we had the 3.3 mile trail to ourselves.

After our hike, we had a look through the Visitor Center gift shop and them walked under the street to the Natural Bridge Historic Hotel and Conference Center.  A space for people to come and stay after visiting the site has been in existence on the property since Jefferson built a guest cabin there shortly after buying the land.   While it is a beautiful hotel, we saw photos of the lovely original wooden structure built on the current location (built in1890) with wrap-around porches that burned down in 1963 (cause unknown).

On our way out of town, we stopped at the local amusement park for a quick photo op with a big head.



Bob and I welcomed our family home from Mexico Monday night before heading off for West Virginia for a short break before our next house sit.  We will miss our menagerie of pets, some of whom are captured below. 

The following are some photos of other places we visited during our stay.  One of the most unique may have been the Waltons Museum in Schuyler, VA, home of Earl Hamner, Jr., creator of the television series.  The series was based on the Hamner family.  You can pay to tour the museum ($8) and separately to tour his family home (which appears to be for sale).  We just visited the museum.

Other sites in the area that we visited included some of the many, many wineries, distilleries, and breweries in the area .  We never did get to any of the hard cideries.



Cheers to Charlottesville!

Friday we did a hike in Albermarle County right outside of Charlottesville’s city limits.  It was in the Ragged Mountain Natural Area, which is a 980 acre forest with 2 lakes.  We did an out-and-back hike to see the main lake as well as the “sights” indicated on the trail map.



Last weekend Bob was able to meet up with another college colleague.  They met in a town, Harrisonburg, half-way between where we are staying and where Barry (the college friend) and his family live.  See below for photo of the meet-up.

On the way to Harrisonburg, Bob saw a sign for the Woodrow Wilson Museum in Staunton, VA.  We checked out the website and decided we needed to go.  Staunton (now pronounced Stanton) is a city of about 24,000 in nearby Augusta County.  It is about a 30 minute drive from Charlottesville.  It is super cute and can claim more than Woodrow Wilson as a famous son.

Woodrow Wilson was born in Staunton and lived there for about 2 years while his father was the pastor of the First Presbyterian Church. While he grew up in Georgia and South Carolina during the Civil War (which led to his hatred of war and desire to stay out of WWI), he visited Staunton often to see family.  He was the 28th president, a Democrat, and the first, and only, president to earn a Ph.D.  The museum cost $8 per person and included a 30 minute tour of the Wilson home, a film on his life, as well as the museum. 

The docents were very friendly and informative.  We learned the origins of some common sayings from them (put it on the back burner, keep your irons in the fire, and mind your beeswax) as well the fact that the 3 “servants” (slaves) that supported the Wilson family were rented from their owners.

 

We also learned from the docents that because Staunton was not burned by the Yanks at the end of the Civil War it still has many of the original buildings from when it was in its hey day as the intersection of 2 railroads.  

 

On the drive back to Charlottesville, we stopped at a memorial for Department of Transportation workers who have been killed while on the job for a unique Big Head photo op for Bob.



On Tuesday, we spent $25 to enter the Shenandoah National Park (good for 7 days) which runs north of the Blue Ridge Parkway once you cross interstate 64.  The road through the park is known as “Skyline Drive.”  The speed limit on Skyline Drive is 35 mph except when it’s slower.  We entered Shenandoah National Park at the Swift Run Gap Entrance Station and did 3 short hikes and stopped at a couple of overlooks as we drove south back towards Interstate 64.  The park was established in 1935 and has over 500 miles of trails.  Skyline Drive follows the crest of the Blue Ridge Mountains for 105 miles and has 75 scenic overlooks.

We hiked the South River Trail, the Frasier Discovery Trail, and the Blackrock Summit Trail.

Photos from the South River Trail (mile 63) —

Rocky Top Overlook View and scenic drive —

Our second hike was the Frasier Discovery Trail which was a fairly steep trail through a forest to an overlook at the the top of Loft Mountain.

Photos from the Blackrock Summit Hike —

We ended our day out by splitting a glass of wine at the lovely Afton Vineyards.

On Monday, we traveled about 45 minutes southwest out of Charlottesville to the Sherando Lake Recreation Area.  This is a beautiful park in the Blue Ridge Mountains where you can swim, hike, picnic, and/or camp.  There were a number of families enjoying the lake, but Bob and I had a great 3+ hour hike by combining a number of trails.  It was $8 per car to enter.  We have had lovely hiking conditions — temps in high 80s or low 90s with LOTS of shade.

Just down the road from where we are staying is Walnut Creek Park, a 525 acre Albermarle County park with 2 great swimming areas and 15 miles of hike and bike trails.  It’s disc golf course is also quite popular.  Bob and I spent a couple of hours on Thursday hiking around about half of the park.



The estates of three former presidents — Jefferson, Monroe, and Madison — are all in the Charlottesville area. They are not cheap to visit. Monticello, the one we were most interested in visiting is $25 per adult.  We weren’t $50 interested.  However, there are trails on and near the estate that you can access for free.  The Saunders-Monticello Trail is a 2 mile, mostly boardwalk, trail that runs along the parkway to the estate.   We hiked that trail to see  the Visitors Center and gift shop.  After that, we hiked a second trail for some views of the area.

(Side Note:  I hadn’t previously mentioned this, but our homeowners are allowing us the use of their Prius.  This is  awesome, as there is not much within walking distance of their home and public transportation is iffy for many of the sites.)

 Ash Lawn-Highland is the name of the official residence of James Monroe, the 5th president of the United States.  it is just down the road from Monticello.  It is a 535 acre estate.  While this was only $14/adult to visit, we decided to pass but hope to return in early August as it will be the site of the Abermarle County fair.

 

Also along the road we were traveling is the Carter Mountain Orchard, famous locally with apples, peaches, and Thursday evening music nights (mostly bluegrass).  It also has a great overlook of Charlottesville and the surrounding area.  


Another famous landmark along the same route is Michie’s Tavern.  This is a historic tavern with a restaurant serving Southern fare plus a gift shop and tours.  We again skipped the tours and food (having just had a lovely picnic at the orchard).  We did walk around the property as much as we could and perused the gift shop.

Finally, we veered off of the main road to check out Blenheim Vineyards which had been recommended to us by the homeowner of an upcoming house sit.  On the way, we passed the Trump Winery.  (You can decide whether or not we stopped there.  We’d tell you, but it would be claimed as fake news.) Blenheim Vineyards is owned by Dave Matthews — yep, that one.  He can do more than sing!  The wines were yummy .  We especially liked the whites, and he does the artwork for the labels for two of his wines each year.

One of our first days out in Charlottesville was spent walking the campus of the University of Virginia.  The university, opened in 1825, was built according to Jefferson’s vision of an “academical village.”  One of its unique characteristics is that it was built to include separate rooms for students rather than dorms.  Also, there were pavilions for faculty which included both classrooms and living quarters.  The university is still seen as one of Jefferson’s greatest architectural achievements.  It currently has about 21,000 students and 2,200 faculty.

The official mascot for the university is the Cavaliers; however, their unofficial nickname (though you see it all over, including on t-shirts and signs at the football stadium) is Wahoos, or Hoos for short based on one of their cheers.  



Bob and I are currently almost a week into our Charlottesville (locally C’ville), Virginia, house sit.  It is a beautiful area — lots of trees, very clean, and surrounded by former presidential estates, and lots of orchards, wineries, breweries, cideries, and distilleries. The city itself has a population of about 50,000.  It is the county seat of Abermarle County and is home to the University of Virginia.

(Side Note:  In local news, the city has recently changed the name of one of its downtown areas from Lee Square to Emancipation Square.  In addition, they have decided to remove their large statue of Robert E. Lee and this has sparked some contentious demonstrations from the KKK and the alt-right movements.  We missed the one in July and will miss an upcoming one in August, for which we are grateful.)

On a happier note, we met our homeowner family — mom, dad, and two precocious little girls on the eve of their departure for a Mexican vacation, part of which will include swimming with sharks.  We are caring for their 2 dogs and 6 indoor/outdoor cats (to the extent they want to be cared for) while the family is gone.

The two dogs are quite easy — a couple of walks, some food, and equal amounts of attention, and they are good.  Both feel free to let you know if they feel you are not paying attention. 

 

The cats are all mixed-breed rescues.  They come and go at their leisure with one pretty much living next door.  Some tend to be more inside and others happier outside.  Five are male and one is female.

There is also a cat named Miles that we caught a fleeting glimpse of on our first night here with the homeowners.  He was on his way back to the neighbors.  Per the home owners, he has apparently decided there is too much activity in the house with the family so has adopted the neighbor but comes back every so often to eat.

Downtown Charlottesville is lovely and has lots of reminders of its connections to 3 former presidents — Jefferson, Monroe, and Madison  — as well as reminders of its participation in the confederacy during the Civil War.  It has a lovel pedestrian-only mall with unique, local shops and restaurants.