Last November, my husband and I decided to take an afternoon hike up Old Rag, which is located on Shenandoah Mountain. I went to JMU, which is in the Shenandoah Valley, but I never took advantage of Old Rag because I was too busy probably partaking in a number of less enriching activities. I digress. Here is a link for more details on Old Rag. http://www.hikingupward.com/SNP/OldRag/
If you clicked the link (hence why it was provided), you see the hike is just shy of ten miles. Also, according to the all-knowing internet, you will burn roughly 430 calories per hour. Prior to my Old Rag hike, I would have found this estimate wildly generous, but now I would say that is a fair estimate. I earned the treats (cheese - the treats are always cheese) I ate at the top.
The hike started out pretty standard (if standard hikes are a thing). There was a path and we began to follow that path up the mountain. At first, the path was largely tree lined, and then the scenery morphed into boulders as we neared the top. You can see this picture to the right of my husband hiking between boulders.
When we reached the rockier area, the spray painted lines denoting the trail began to fade. The top of a mountain is a terrible place for lines to fade. The few arrows still visible seemed to point us over rocks and questionable surface area. I am a woman with a desk job, not a mountain goat. I started to get a little nervous, which is unusual because not much makes me nervous. My dad always had this saying to think out your worries. If they don't end in death or prison, then they probably aren't worth the energy. I think this is awesome advice, but I am sure that is up for debate.
Regardless, my rare episode of nervousness escalated when a woman in front of us had a panic attack when she needed to hop into a narrow rock crevasse to get through a certain point on the trail. Her panic was infectious, and not in a delightful way. My fear apparently triggered the fear of the couple behind me. So things were going well.
About that time, a random head popped out behind the corner of a rock. A man was hanging off the mountain complaining that he could not see next step in the trail. The gentleman accompanying panicky lady one (remember, I am panicky lady two at this point), tells the head (that was literally all that we could see) that the head was not actually on the trail, but in fact was just randomly hanging off of the side of the mountain. At that point, the entire crowd was a bit uncomfortable.
Regardless, my rare episode of nervousness escalated when a woman in front of us had a panic attack when she needed to hop into a narrow rock crevasse to get through a certain point on the trail. Her panic was infectious, and not in a delightful way. My fear apparently triggered the fear of the couple behind me. So things were going well.
About that time, a random head popped out behind the corner of a rock. A man was hanging off the mountain complaining that he could not see next step in the trail. The gentleman accompanying panicky lady one (remember, I am panicky lady two at this point), tells the head (that was literally all that we could see) that the head was not actually on the trail, but in fact was just randomly hanging off of the side of the mountain. At that point, the entire crowd was a bit uncomfortable.
How did this resolve? Well, the head turned around, and I honestly couldn't tell you how that ended. Panicky one got over her panic. I got nudged into the crevasse by the building crowd.
Eventually, we got to the top, and it was absolutely beautiful. See the picture to the right. It was totally worth the fear. At least the front end fear. The backend fear did not end with a beautiful view. Now I will get to that part of the hike. What goes up must come down.
So remember how I mentioned that it was November. Well, it gets dark early in November, and we had the bright idea to start this hike around 2. I had no concept of how many hours it would take to hike ten miles. I should have reasoned that I am a painfully slow runner. It takes me roughly two hours to run ten miles, so I should have probably doubled or tripled that estimate for a hike. To this day, I could not tell you how long we hiked took, but darkness fell. And as referenced above, I do not like the outdoors after dark.
On our way down, as the sun was setting, we ran into a child who was leading his parents on the hike. The child announced that he was six, he was leading his parents, and they were lost. Indeed, this seemed accurate since night was falling and they were headed up and not down. Perhaps they were brave enough to be camping with nothing but smiles and a walking stick.
By the time we reached the last mile, it was pitch black. My husband's cell phone was dead, so we were using my cell phone flashlight to see. We were all alone. If this scenario sounds familiar it is because it is the opening scene of every horror movie. Needless to say, I was not a fan of the last mile of the hike, but I might have a higher opinion of that section if I tackle it again in the light of day.
When we reached our car, the sky was full of stars. That was the rewarding end to the hike down. I highly recommend hiking Old Rag. Just try to go during the light of day and don't follow overly confident kindergartners with walking sticks. His parents looked like they were in for a long night.
