Camp at Crabtree Falls, AT and the Ridge

It was a very fun weekend, three nights camping and travel. We went to the George Washington national forest and camped at the foot of Crabtree Falls. Met lots of very healthy folks, it must be the mountain air. Temps were great, upper 80's daytime and into the 60's at night.

The truck was overflowing, tents were only a tiny part of the package. We took a few coolers in what seemed perfect sizes. One was for reserved for clean ice, another had milk, butter and open condiments, and the third was dedicated to meat and nothing else. But I did learn that frozen orange juice canisters are cardboard and once defrosted make a very pretty colored ice!
Eating was not a problem, we had plenty to gorge ourselves. The first night were boho dinners, aluminum puches with cut potatoes, carrots, 'shrooms and chix breasts heavily seasoned in a garlic and herb mix and tossed into the coals to steam for 30 minutes or so. Grilled bbq chix and beef stew too. I was doing bfasts so we had sausages and eggs and silver dollar pancakes and syrup. Had the fixings for french toast but never got to it. My new griddle was really nice.


We did go up the mountain path, a 1.7 mile hike up to Crabtree Falls. It was a pretty good climb, lots of switch backs. At the top we met this group of guys and a couple of them went on with us to the top of the mountain and the Appalachian Trail. It was another two miles uphill and took quote a lot of heavy work to get to the ridge line of the mountains, but we did it.

On Sunday we just relaxed in the campground watching the comings and goings. Very relaxing July 4th celebration, though we couldn't find an open area for any fireworks. At one point the puppy and I were rock scotching across the river making our way downstream. It was a game of jumping rock to dry rock and the only way to do that is bare footed and lots of balancing.

The return route was out of the way by way of the Blue Ridge Parkway. Six hours on the parkway through to Fancy Gap because I wanted to see Pilot Mountain from the mountains like I had from I-77 for so many years. It was sort of anti-climatic :(

It was a lot of fun and a lot more happened too. More pictures on my facebook page.