July 15-17, 2013 Down the Skyline Drive and Blue Ridge Pkwy.

We headed down the skyline drive on Monday the 15th. We stayed at Big Meadows campground, in the Shenandoah  National Park. I said before that this trip is kind of a reprise of an earlier trip, made 20 years ago with a pop-up camper, a days old mini-van, and our two little girls. Liz doesn't remember staying here at Big Meadows. I do remember staying here, but I have to go back about 45 years or so. My parents took us on a trip down this road then. I remember standing out at the Big Meadows sign at the park entrance for the required picture.
Any National Park is an unatural environment, and deer have no predators here. They are as ubiquitous and as tame as "y'all" down here. This is a shot out of our trailer door. I think they'd let us pet them.

If you've been with us for these in the past years, you'll know one of our favorite things to do are the ranger programs, and our National Parks are great at these. The picture here is of our ranger on a meadow walk one evening. The ranger was talking about the indigenous animals and their sensory awareness, especially as dusk was approaching. We attended another outdoor slide program, where the ranger addressed some of the major storms that have occurred here in Shenandoah NP. In this one deer sauntered right through the audience!

 I could have taken a thousand pictures of vistas from the mountain tops. It reminded me of the task my dad and I had editing slides. It always seemed so hard to throw away a perfectly exposed, and composed slide just because it was similar to dozens of other ones. It seemed easier to put them in a box to take down to the store where my dad worked for use in their demo projectors. So now as an adult, I've got to apologize for the exposure and the composition of my mountain vista shot! And look at that huge piece of dust that installed itself on the top of my digital sensor! That is a beautiful little town in the valley below.

We visited Masseutten, a replica of a cottage that George Freeman Pollock built  in the late 1800's before Shenandoah was a National Park, and there was a Skyline Drive. George had acquired the property out of bankruptcy from his father who thought there was copper in the area He developed a vision for this area as a retreat for his wealthy and kind of eclectic friends, and called it Skyland. It was anything but luxurious at first, but George kept at it with enthusiasm. His friends built their own cottages, to the Pollack spec, which included no kitchen nor dining area. They all ate family style, with George, wearing a matador's outfit,  announcing the meal by blowing a trumpet.  It became clear that Skyland did not have mass appeal, and George started to look for someone to bail him out. Addie, his wife and George joined the group in favor of turning Skyland into some kind of park or recreation area, and lobbied the government and finally the Hoover administration to create the park. Hoover was taken on a couple of fishing trips, was impressed,and built his own cabin called Rapidan in the future park.
Shenandoah National Park and the Skyline Drive was actually built by the CCC boys. We noticed the difference between the work done by  hand that the CCC did and the later Blue Ridge Parkway with excavating equipment, even as primitive as it was.
The locals were extremely upset by these newcomers who came in, and started talking Park on property these folks considered Home. When Pollock's operation went bankrupt, the locals burned the cottages! The climax came when FDR, forcefully evicted the residents from land that the park wanted. The demeaning and condescending language used by FDR and his people in describing the mountain inhabitants was amazing.

We stayed in the park for a couple of days then headed south. Liz has a past vacation we decided to revisit. She went to Natural Bridge when she was a child, and I've never been there. It is a huge example of limestone eroded by water that created a  bridge. The highway actually goes over on top. This one was never acquired by the park service so it is a "pay for". The owners are trying to hold on to the 50's tour mentality, combining this attraction with others, such as a wax museum, This held no interest to us, so waited till after 6 when you could buy just a ticket to walk down to the Natural Bridge. It was a pleasant walk and for me, with my geologist wife as a guide, it was another chance to learn more about inclusions, sedimentary, and igneous rock formations. This was at the end of the Skyline Drive and the beginning of the Blue Ridge Pkwy, still in VA.`