Old Rag

Aaron and I have both heard that Old Rag is one of the best hikes in Shenandoah and Aaron can see it from his garage apartment on top of the little mountain he lives on. We decided we were going to do it, and I had heard that it was supposed to be sunny. Apparently the forecast changed and I never checked again. Saturday was most definitely not sunny and Aaron had heard it was supposed to rain. We went anyway. Aaron his jeans and tee, giving his gatorade bottle to me and me in my hiking gear, loaded with water and snacks. The ride there is kind of random on a country back road that winds its way all over - much like the roads Aaron and I like to drive on anyway, but this time there was a destination in mind and I had forgotten my map and any of my hiking books. Good thing for the internet and googlemaps.

The first part of the hike was uphill, but not too strenuous with a wide path so we walked side by side. Everything was lush and damp and exploding with green vibrance. Slowly it got steeper and narrower as it zig-zagged up, but not too bad. Harder because it was more uphill, but we chugged and chugged our way up stopping for only one break (after seeing an asian guy pull out corn on the cob to gnaw on). Then we got to the "rock scramble." I envisioned the rock scramble to be like clambering over table sized boulders - kind of like some the hikes I have done that are along streams. Um... no.

The "rock scramble" is rocks as big as houses all jumbled together with fissures and cracks that you have to climb up over and through. There are blue arrows painted on the rocks directing you left, right, up, and sometimes down. It was AWESOME. None of it was really that hard except for this one part where the use of the rope was necessary (which is now removed due to trail maintenance (though I do not understand why)), but we got logjammed behind a family with small kids and a mom that was going to psycho crying and a group of college kids with some wussy girls wearing inappropriately short shorts (and mad about scraping their legs on the rocks). That and it started to drizzle. With the drizzle and clouds rolling over the mountains, you couldn't really see much, but it totally added to the effect. Like I said it was AWESOME.

Somewhere near the top at a perched boulder, we stopped for lunch - sandwiches I packed and monster strawberries. Aaron at least appreciates that I feed him :) Maybe he'll start to think about planning ahead for that sort of thing. Turns out we were not at the top and we had more rock scramble (or "rock assault" as we decided it should be called) to go. Still awesome.

The very top was sort of anticlimactic in the end (though we did make the best of it - see photo). It was drizzling and actually starting to rain and the clouds were so thick, there wasn't much to see. We both enjoyed the hike so much though that we are going to go back and do it on a nicer day.

The hike down is easy-peasy. Even when its pouring. We were the only ones we saw without raincoats or ponchos and it was raining pretty hard. We decided we were hard core and as long as there were some dry spots we would be alright. Anyway - the hike down was pretty cake and most of it was along the fire road which is wide enough for like six people to walk abreast, downhill, and a gentle grade. By the time we got on the fire road it was back to drizzling. A nice finish to a fairly strenuous hike up and rock assault.

As we wound our way back into town, we discussed hot showers or dinner first. We were both wet and cold and hungry. After sitting in the car for fifteen minutes I decided that we had better go eat first because once I took a shower there was no way I was going to want to do anything else. Halfway up the mountain I had decided we needed Five Guys for dinner - particularly the fries. I was kind of joking, but was excited to learn there was actually one in Culpeper. After scarfing down large (!) fries and two cheeseburgers it was back to Aaron's for hot showers and a little Life. We watched Plants and then I fell asleep during Insects (before 9pm).

Conclusion - Old Rag Rocks! (literally) and it will be worth it to get up early to beat the crowds one sunny day in the future.