The Solo Blue Ridge Parkway Expedition (With 17 Photos)
Friday night before last, when I discovered that I'd be able to take a planned trip to Northern Virginia after all, I decided immediately to go with my original plan: travel from Roanoke to Front Royal by way of (1) the Blue Ridge Parkway and then (2) the Skyline Drive, both of which would carry me along the crest of the Blue Ridge, across the mountaintops all the way to the northernmost end of the Shenandoah Valley.
I hadn't travelled the northern stretch of the Parkway past the Sunset Field overlook since 1994--and that wasn't exactly a happy trip, as my car sprung a gas leak and on that cold November night I ran out of gas some thirty miles from Roanoke. So naturally, I wanted to make a happier memory of that stretch. And this would be my first-ever trip on the Skyline Drive.
In the process, I filled a memory card with pictures and videos, along with filling the camera's memory as well. Some of the videos I've posted already; now I want to start posting a sampling of the pictures too. I took in the neighborhood of 75 pictures on the stretch of the Parkway from Roanoke to the northern terminus at Waynesboro, and have a few of my favorites here.
Purgatory Mountain, by the James River near Buchanan.
I used to live in a farmhouse built into a cliffside above the James
about four miles upriver from this mountain.
The James River again, at Harry Byrd Bridge between Buchanan and Buena Vista,
looking downriver.
The James, looking upriver.
James River farm idyll.
(A few minutes after crossing the James, my "Celtalachia" tape started playing Andrew McKnight's song "Where This River Runs", which is about the James River. My trips often work out with little musical coincedences like that, and this wouldn't be the last one.)
Looking down on Buena Vista.
At the Big Spy Mountain overlook.
Twenty Minute Cliff:
So called because when corn-chopping time came in the summer, the folks in the local
community below (White Rock) would know that when sunlight hit the cliff, they had
twenty minutes before dusk fell.
Shades of blue.
From the Rock Point overlook.
A sea of green:
The mountains open up into the southern end of the Shenandoah Valley.
Humpback Rocks.
View from the visitor center and farmstead museum
built around Parkway Milepost 5.
The farmstead museum's log cabin,
an original 19th century home reconstructed on the site.
Continue on to the Skyline Drive.
I hadn't travelled the northern stretch of the Parkway past the Sunset Field overlook since 1994--and that wasn't exactly a happy trip, as my car sprung a gas leak and on that cold November night I ran out of gas some thirty miles from Roanoke. So naturally, I wanted to make a happier memory of that stretch. And this would be my first-ever trip on the Skyline Drive.
In the process, I filled a memory card with pictures and videos, along with filling the camera's memory as well. Some of the videos I've posted already; now I want to start posting a sampling of the pictures too. I took in the neighborhood of 75 pictures on the stretch of the Parkway from Roanoke to the northern terminus at Waynesboro, and have a few of my favorites here.
Purgatory Mountain, by the James River near Buchanan.
I used to live in a farmhouse built into a cliffside above the James
about four miles upriver from this mountain.
The James River again, at Harry Byrd Bridge between Buchanan and Buena Vista,
looking downriver.
The James, looking upriver.
James River farm idyll.
(A few minutes after crossing the James, my "Celtalachia" tape started playing Andrew McKnight's song "Where This River Runs", which is about the James River. My trips often work out with little musical coincedences like that, and this wouldn't be the last one.)
Looking down on Buena Vista.
At the Big Spy Mountain overlook.
Twenty Minute Cliff:
So called because when corn-chopping time came in the summer, the folks in the local
community below (White Rock) would know that when sunlight hit the cliff, they had
twenty minutes before dusk fell.
Shades of blue.
From the Rock Point overlook.
A sea of green:
The mountains open up into the southern end of the Shenandoah Valley.
Humpback Rocks.
View from the visitor center and farmstead museum
built around Parkway Milepost 5.
The farmstead museum's log cabin,
an original 19th century home reconstructed on the site.
Continue on to the Skyline Drive.