Today was a very foggy day! The drive to Shenandoah National Park was pretty clear, but as we approached the mountains, we could see clouds sitting on the very top of them. It was pretty treacherous with the visibility so low, but we made it to the trail head safe and sound. As we got out of the car, we stepped into the clouds, which we could see moving past us. Now it was time to start our hike down to the falls of Doyles River and Jones Run.Doyles River consisted of two water falls by definition (Fun Fact! Falling water must be 14 feet tall to be considered a waterfall.) (one was 63 feet and the other was 28 feet) but even the smaller drops were beautiful. Walking through the woods with the clouds made us feel like we were in Sleepy Hollow, but luckily we didn’t see any headless horsemen. The hike was a bit dangerous at times due to the wetness of everything which made the rocks extremely slippery. (Jamie did quite a bit of yelling at Alex to prevent accidents.) The danger was well worth it because of the wonderful scenery! (says Alex)
After hiking past Doyles River Falls, it was just a few more miles to Jones Run Falls! We weren’t quite sure as we were hiking where the real falls actually started because it seemed that the whole river was steep enough to be considered falls. But when we got there, we knew it! The falls were amazing!! If it hadn’t rained the day before and if we weren’t in a cloud, we would have been able to get closer, but as usual Jamie made sure we kept a safe distance to make sure we didn’t slip on the wet rocks into the river!
Once we hit Jones Run, the hike switched to uphill, so thank goodness Jamie’s coffee (from the strange 7-11 in Elkton) did the trick. It was about 1.7 more miles to the Skyline Drive and then 3.5 miles back up the Appalachian trail to our car. It was pretty cool how the A.T. crossed the Skyline Drive twice on this part of our hike. The A.T. also crossed through an overlook, which had some great views of the scenery.
From there, it was just a short hike to the parking lot. It was an awesome experience to do this hike in a cloud but we were happy to be done with it! It was a bit cold and wet! :)
Total Hike Time: 3.5 h
Difficulty: Moderate to Difficult
| Distance: | 7.97 miles | |
| Elapsed Time: | 3:28:07 | |
| Avg Speed: | 2.3 mph | |
| Max Speed: | 10.3 mph | |
| Avg Pace: | 26' 07" per mile | |
| Min Altitude: | 1,556 ft | |
| Max Altitude: | 2,924 ft | |
No comments:
Post a Comment