Old Rag

On August 16, 2009, Pete and Dad celebrated Pete's 9th birthday by hiking Old Rag Mountain in Shenandoah National Park with a group of Dad's friends. It was one of the best days ever.

Pete and Dad drove to the lower parking lot in a caravan with Dad's friends Brian and Eric. As they turned the final corner toward the West, and the mountain first came into view, Pete realized that this was not going to be an ordinary hike. The warnings that Dad had given him each day for the previous 2 weeks were now beginning to make sense.

Dad dropped Brian, Eric, and Pete at the upper lot and then drove down to meet Jonathan, Nick, and about 8 others. Dad hiked about .8 miles to the upper lot and then Pete joined for the hike up the mountain.

Pete and Dad hiked with Brian and Eric for the first 2 miles, up to the first vista and the start of the rock scramble. Pete and Brian played some games during this stretch of the hike to help keep their mind off of the grueling steep climb up the mountain. Pete wanted to climb some of the rocks along the trail, but Dad tried to convince him to save his energy for later in the day. Finally, they reached the first scenic overlook.

The rock scramble is the most challenging part of the hike, but was also Pete's favorite. It was about 1 mile of tight passages, hand-over-hand climbing, and rock hopping.

Finally, they had reached the summit and it was time for lunch.

Pete did a little more free-climbing at the summit before they began the long hike down.

On the hike down, Dad had a hard time keeping up with Pete and Jonathan, especially if he stopped to take a picture. Can you see Pete's orange shirt in this picture?

After 2 miles of hiking down the rocky path, when they made it to the bottom of the mountain, they were greeted by a sign that said "Old Rag parking lot: 2.5 miles --->". The last 2.5 miles were mostly flat, but very long, so Dad and Pete tried to find some interesting distractions.

Pete made it all the way to the parking lot, about 15 minutes ahead of Brian and Eric. Brian's GPS showed a total hike distance of a little over 10 miles, with about 2,500 feet of elevation change (not counting the extra free-climbs).

Pete and Dad stopped in Warrenton on the way home to play a little tennis with Dad's friend Tom.

Then it was off to Friendly's to meet Mom and Sam for Pete's birthday dinner.