Camping Adventures in the Mountains of West Virginia
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My husband and I love to camp and have made quite a few trips to the National Forest located in the eastern panhandle of West Virginia. We made one of these trips in October after the 911 tragedy. The Air Force was still flying sorties over these mountains because of the proximity to the Washington DC area. This was an eerie feeling. The skies were so empty of air craft and then suddenly you would hear the roar of the fighter jets flying low over the mountain tops. At times you wouldn’t hear the jets until they had passed over and then the reverberation of the engines would echo throughout the valley where we were camped. It was both sobering and awe inspiring, and brought back the horrific sights and sounds of that horrible day, but at the same time made us feel safe. In the area we were camping in, all was peaceful and serene, no sounds except the birds and the creek bubbling over the rocks near where we were camped. It brought home how wonderful our country is, in spite of its problems, that you can still find areas that are very much the same as they were when it was first explored, and can still feel safe to do some exploring of your own.
We were camping in an area that is designated for primitive camping, and that late in the season was not being utilized by a lot of campers. For this type of camping, you are pretty much self-reliant; there are no fast food restaurants, or even stores to purchase supplies for quite a few miles. We try to bring everything we feel we will need with us. We arrived at our campsite at 10:00 AM, and spent a few hours getting the camp set up. This “setup” entails getting the camper leveled, digging a fire pit, and getting organized. We then had to gather firewood, which even in the middle of the forest can present a problem. You can only use wood from downed trees, or is otherwise lying on the ground. You are not allowed to cut any standing trees; fortunately we found a tree that had fallen by the roadside, that my husband cut into firewood. I loaded the cut pieces into the truck, which we stacked and covered with a tarp, when we returned to our camp site.
By this time it is later in the afternoon, I prepared our dinner while my husband started a bon fire in the fire pit. Our Golden Retriever, King, accompanied us on this trip, as well as many others, he loved to swim and spent a lot of time in the creek chasing frogs and sticks. When he had finally exhausted himself, he stretched out by the fire and promptly went to sleep. We normally sit around the camp fire in the evening and listen to music, but on this trip, it didn’t feel appropriate, we sat and listened to the night sounds and the creek as it passed over the rocks, and spoke of how fortunate we were. The sound of this creek lulled us to sleep quickly when we climbed into our sleeping bags for the night.
The next day dawned clear and crisp, and we decided to hike some of the trails that were near the camp grounds. These trails are well marked and intersect with other trails up and down the mountains. I considered myself to be in really good shape, from exercising and walking a lot. We did the first trail that is 3 miles long and then decided to take another intersecting trail to go further up the mountain, by this time King and I are beginning to lag behind, and I’m beginning to doubt the idea of taking the second trail. When the dog and I finally catch up to my husband and pause to catch our breath, I was told this was going to be a short break, because we still had a long way to go to get back down the mountain before dark settled in. He reminded me that we had made no provisions for staying out in the open for the night and that we didn’t have a flashlight with us. Needless to say, I suddenly found strength to keep walking, the dog seemed to understand the urgency and picked up his pace also. We made it down the mountain just as the sun was beginning to set, but the place we came out was a mile from where we started, and had left the truck. My husband suggested that the dog and I wait and he would retrieve the truck, I gratefully agreed, but our old dog didn’t, he followed my husband off down the road to the truck, in spite of me. The dog and my husband made it back to where I was waiting, just as dark settled in completely and I was getting very cold. That dog was so tired that he flopped down by the fire, and didn’t move for quite awhile. We ate a cold supper and fell into bed. The next morning I had trouble getting all the parts of me to move without protesting. The dog seemed fine and was back to chasing frogs in the creek. My husband suggested teasingly, that another hike would work all the kinks in my muscles out, however I think he got the point; that was not going to happen. When we did the math on the meandering path that we had taken, we discovered that we had walked over 10 miles.
Our dog died about two years later, but I think often of his determination and loyalty and how much he enjoyed playing in that creek. Some days when I'm feeling overwhelmed by all that is going on in this great country, I think of King with his big heart and devotion to us, It gives me the strength to take a deep breath and keep going. This trip added to my cache of stories to tell my grandchildren, and they seem to particularly enjoy this one. It was a special trip.
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Posted by blog.houseboatodyssey1.com at 3/19/2009 2:36 PM 
Categories: Article, Redneck, Camping
Tags: camping travel West Virginia adventure article
Categories: Article, Redneck, Camping
Tags: camping travel West Virginia adventure article
I do not intend to copy your website, but I really like the template. Might you touch upon which theme are you using or is this custom designed?
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Our main page theme is what they called horse-farm and we changed the photo in the theme to a sandbar photo that I'd taken in our primary boating area. As far as the blog here goes it's pretty much unchanged as we got it initially free with our domain and website. Since then we have upgraded to a paid blog format with the same host minus their free advertisement that came along with it, otherwise everything's unchanged.
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