Stream Crossings

the junkets mobile is over there!

Our goal to hike every trail in the park is becoming more difficult because a lot of what is left is kind of long (10 miles or longer), are really short, or are one ways that require car juggling. We are saving the short ones for colder weekends, are avoiding the one-ways for now, and are trying to plan ahead for the looong ones. To do the long ones, we need to actually get up and go - so no sleeping in. That and the weather should be nice. Last weekend, Aaron I tackled a 10mile loop on the Brown Mountain- Rocky Mountain- Big Run Loop in the southern section of Shenandoah National Park. A few weeks ago, we had done another 10 mile loop from the same parking lot that we had enjoyed immensely.

Snow Patch

The hike followed the ridge line out and away from Skyline Drive traversing two peaks before dipping down in to the valley. The views were expansive and autumn leaves beautiful. Although long, the trails were no steep and there wasn't a lot of up and down. The issue was stream crossings in the valley. Normally our book does a good job of outlining trail conditions and what to expect, but not this time. We think October's early snow may be to blame because the park got anywhere from four to eight inches of snow - maybe more. There were still patches of snow along the trail in shady locations.

Looking majestic in the Autumn Glow

Attempting Crossing 1

The trail through the valley paralleled the stream, so crossings were expected, however the water was just high enough and the rocks just far enough apart that even with our newly purchased waterproof hiking shoes there was no way to safely cross and stay dry. Aaron gave it his best effort, but eventually we took our shoes off and waded across.

The was was shockingly cold and my feet hurt by the time I made it across. Aaron crossed across the tops of as many rocks as he could; I was resigned to wading and went for the slightly deeper, but less likely to slip and fall in straight path. Some might argue to just keep your shoes on, but I am not hiking in wet shoes - the first crossing was at about the halfway mark so it would have been 5 or so miles with wet shoes. Yuck. Plus I think our feet stayed warmer because at least they were mostly dry going back into socks and shoes (I had an extra pair of socks with me that we used to dry off with).

Number2

Then we came across a second crossing. Again, there was no way to safely cross. So off came the shoes again. Aaron was not happy and refused to put his shoes back on after crossing until the path became too rocky to continue barefoot. I was laughing and Aaron was worried that I was laughing because it was better than crying, but no, I was laughing because I thought this whole situation was hilarious. At this point I remarked that chances were if there was another one, then there was probably another two. And there was.

Number3

The third crossing was the most painful because it was so close to the second crossing that our feet hadn't really warmed up yet so our feet ached even more. Number 3 was also the widest with a dry patch in the middle - this didn't make it any easier because you dreaded round two! Notice how I strapped my shoes to my bag - I'm not taking any chances. I wanted my hands free to put down onto things if I slipped or lost my balance.



At the fourth crossing, Aaron tried really hard to find a dry way across, but it was not to be. The fourth crossing was probably the quickest, but by then we were tired of cold feet. I look pretty awesome in this set of photos though. Thankfully this fourth crossing was the last where we had to take our shoes off and wade through subzero waters. Total, we had seven stream crossings.

Drying off after #4

What I thought was so amusing about this hike was that in November, after the first snow of the year in October, we had to take our shoes off and wade across four streams. The water would normally be cold in November, but was probably even colder because of the early snows and snowmelt. I am thankful the day was warm (look Aaron's in a tee and shorts (because he zipped his legs off because he was tired of rolling them up everytime we got a stream crossing)) and beautiful. If it had been cold it would have been pretty miserable - and we would have had to turn around, therefore we couldn't mark this trail off the list. We like this hike and are going to try it again next summer.