Virginia

Virginia, a southeastern U.S. state, stretches from the Chesapeake Bay to the Appalachian Mountains, with a long Atlantic coastline. It’s one of the 13 original colonies, with historic landmarks including Monticello, founding father Thomas Jefferson’s iconic Charlottesville plantation. The Jamestown Settlement and Colonial Williamsburg are living-history museums reenacting Colonial and Revolutionary-era life.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia

Cowpasture River

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Cowpasture River

"The Native Americans had named the river Walatoola, which means "winding waters", describing the great bends in the river. However, when British settlers arrived in the 1720s they named it the Cowpasture."

"There is an interesting story about how the Cowpasture and neighboring rivers the Bullpasture River and Calfpasture River came to be so named. It is said that the Indians once had stolen a herd of settlers' cattle and were driving them westward into the mountains. The calves naturally tired first; they were left behind at the river which is now the Calfpasture. The cows were driven on farther, but they, too, had to be abandoned, the valley in which they were left became the valley of the Cowpasture. The bulls, being somewhat hardier, were still able to continue westward; they finally were left at the river which is known as the Bullpasture."

Shenandoah Valley – Not that Exiciting

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Probably the greatest disappointment of my October road trip was driving through the Shenandoah Valley. I expected a lot more of the Lee-Jackson Highway, although I probably shouldn’t have because it’s US Route 11, and is historically quite built up from the time before Interstate 81 bypassed it.

Don’t get me wrong, there are some definitely scenic sections of the Lee-Jackson Highway, but much of it is the same used car dealerships, Walmart’s, big boxes and same small towns that you see across America. There are some truly wonderful sections but in many cases housing distracts from the otherwise scenic rolling farm country.

Haybales Along Lee-Jackson Highway

It was probably my fault for taking US 11. I was originally planning a route in the the western, more remote part of the valley, but I miss placed my Virigina map, so I ended up taking US 250 all the way to Stauton. I guess I didn’t realize what a big city Stauton really is — it’s big enough to warrant a ring road expressway around it — and endless residential sprawl seems to extend in all directions from it. The chicken barns and turkey farms aren’t nearly as scenic as the dairy farms that more common in Upstate NY. There are some cattle farms, and I passed at least one dairy farm, but the land has a distinctively different character then what I had previously experienced in Upstate NY.

The Blue Ridge between Stauton and Buchanan is less impressive then Imagined. Looking up the ridges look more like hills then mountains. I think the ridges in the high country of West Virginia are much higher and more pronounced then Virginia. Certainly the Shenandoah Valley is much wider then most of the valleys in northern West Virginia.

Buchanan Swinging Bridge

I guess I really didn’t know what to expect from driving through the Shenadoah Valley. I just hated how trapped I felt when I was in Shendoah National Park — there are only limited exits from the park due to the need to have paybooths at every entrance. Even the Blue Ridge Parkway seems disconnected from the lands below.

Maybe I should have instead gone to Shenandoah National Park for a few days so I could have been spending my time looking down, rather then up from the valley. Or better yet spent more time in West Virginia. There is a lot of the Monongahela National Forest that I have yet to see. Maybe I should have drove up Spruce Mountain again, so I could say I was at the top of the Mountain State. But I did that already.

US 33 Heading Back To West Virigina

At any rate, I don’t think I will be visiting the Shenandoah Valley anytime soon again. It’s pretty to look down at from the mountains, but it hardly inspires me looking up at the surrounding ridge lines.