On the way to Virginia, crossing the Allegheny Mountains, we caught just a glimpse of some nice Appalachian scenery as we detoured along a few miles of the Blue Ridge Parkway. We'll definitely keep it on the list for a future extended bicycle tour.
We arrived at Jill and John's place mid-day on a very hot Fourth of July. After spending a long day-and-a-half in the car we were anxious to get out and walk. So anxious that we forgot to bring our camera or any water as we started walking a lengthy gravel road through the farm. After walking through a recently cut field, we stopped to explore one of the creeks that runs through. The water in the creek was cool and clear, with smooth cobble underneath, and had less algal growth than one might have expected on a cattle farm. A quick survey of the macroinvertebrate fauna on the underside of a few rocks suggested a diversity of critters in a healthy stream, although John mentioned the existence of a fish consumption advisory.
Some of the girls and Quinn and I took off our shoes and waded in the stream. The water was deep and swift enough that Quinn required my hand to stay upright. We followed Sarah, Jaeden, and Abbey into deep water, under the limbs and roots of tree hanging over an undercut bank. Sarah seemed to have the toughest feet - she moved quickly and seemingly painlessly. The bottoms of my forty-year old feet found the round, tennis-ball sized rocks quite painful, so I moved slowly and carefully. Perhaps I had more pounds per square inch of foot. Jennifer and Dakota chose not to cross the stream in their bare feet, but tested the waters and then wisely chose to stay along the shore, skipping rocks. We had to say no to Abbey and Sarah's scheme to put in upstream and float the river alone in a raft the next day.
After we'd dried, we walked the rest of way to the chicken egg layer house, where we were greeted by at least 10,000 friendly free-range chickens running about their range. Most of them were inside a huge, fenced yard. Some of them were outside the fence, apparently trying to defend the flock by attacking potential intruders and passersby. Again, too bad we didn't have the camera; some were quite persistent! John gave us a tour of the egg collection and packaging facility, but the days eggs had already been collected so the building was empty of other people and the machines weren't running. It was very impressive, and it would have been really interesting to see it collecting and packing eggs.
After dinner that night, the five girls and Quinn spent the evening trying to burn down the farm or perhaps kill each other with sparklers, and then we turned in for a nice quite night in the comfy guest house.
The next morning, rain was falling hard. Not a Seattle mist, and not a short, hard Michigan shower, but something much more heavy and enduring. It never even hinted at letting up. The only photos we got at the farm were of the Farm Store in the rain.
We'd planned a Sunday morning walk up to Crab Tree Falls, but with the rain falling as it was, we probably wouldn't have been able to tell the falls from the road. After a bit of mulling about the house, we decided that it could be nice and dry -- or a least merely damp -- in a cave. So it was off to Luray Caverns.
Prior to leaving on the ETRAT, we'd picked up a nifty little Argus Bean camera for Quinn. It's a not-too-expensive little somewhat armored kids camera that has a handle like a carabiner so it can be clipped to stuff. There'll probably be a picture of it on a future post. The camera went everywhere with Quinn, and he took something like one picture every minute. It's a good thing it holds thousands of images. Walking into Luray Caverns, Quinn had the camera clipped to his wrist and was taking photos of cars, our butts, and the entrance to the cavern. Once inside, after we paid the outrageous entrance fee, each of us was given a little MP3 player-style personal headset that gave information at designated locations within the cavern. However, we saw a bathroom, so we had to use it before we descended hundreds of cold stone steps into the cave. Then, once into the cavern, Quinn realized he no longer had that little camera. He began to melt on the spot. His flow of tears threatened to destroy 7 million years worth of stalagmites. He must have left the camera in the bathroom, but I couldn't remember ever seeing him with it there. Did he set it on the sink to wash his hands? Clip it to a urinal? It wasn't in his pocket, or my pocket, or Cindy's purse, or Abbey's pocket, or Abbey's purse. Quinn and I hopped over a rail and ascended the steps to the surface to search the bathroom. No camera. We returned to the ticket counter, tears flowing, and left a description of the camera and our phone number. It was crowded at the cavern, we thought someone must have found it in the bathroom and kept it. We went back into the cave, but Quinn was devastated. Cindy was saddened to learn that we had not found the little camera, but put on her headphones to begin the tour. And then immediately found the camera in her pocket. It had been hidden in Cindy's pocket by the Luray Cavern MP3 Audio Tour Device. He must have passed it off to her before we went to the bathroom. Everything in Quinn's world was immediately OK, and the image capturing resumed.
After a rough start, we had a nice tour through the caverns. It was certainly no wilderness spelunking expedition, but it was an interesting and informative tour, and all of the kids seemed interested and were very well-behaved. Quinn took more than 150 pictures in the cave. Some of them even worked. It was fun.
After the cavern, it was off to Baltimore...
I love the picture of all the cousins. Thanks for sharing it!
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