Late last night, Caroline arrived in Baltimore, Maryland, where we picked her up and took a short 54-mile (87km) drive to Frederick, Maryland, for the night. We intentionally overshot Washington D.C., not only to skip the traffic, but as this adventure progresses we have big plans in the nation’s capital city.
Today, we drove southwest to Front Royal, Virginia, to join the Skyline Drive National Scenic Byway in the Shenandoah National Park – romantic stories say that Shenandoah is Native American for Daughter of the Stars.
The curving, winding road over the mountain ridge took us up above the clouds and back down below.
Speaking of being above the clouds.
The Skyline Drive at the northern end of the Blue Ridge Parkway and paralleling the Appalachian trail did not disappoint; it surely stands out as one of the dozen most scenic roads in America.
With 75 overlooks and a 35 mph speed limit, the guidebooks that suggest allocating a mere 3 hours for this route do not allow an adequate amount of time to truly appreciate the drive, in my opinion. Maybe someday, this will be a bike-only tour in the warmer months.
Along the way, we spied a fawn lying in the grass, gazed over beautiful vistas, and enjoyed the wildflowers.
To the people who’ve already been down this road, things will only look familiar, but to those of us fortunate enough to wander far from home and, to a degree, off the beaten path, this feels like a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for finding enchantment.
Sometimes, that enchantment is found in little things…
…and should be obvious to anyone not jaded enough to have stopped looking.
As we arrived in Charlottesville, we signed up for a tour that would take us by bus to the grounds of President Jefferson’s home later in the afternoon. Tip: sign up for tours before you ever leave home. To pass the time until then, we took the advice of the ticket agent to visit President James Monroe’s home, referred to as Highland.
Sadly for us, there was a band playing a mix of jazz and contemporary music for a wine tasting on the grounds that day. Tip: check the events calendar on the Highland website before committing to a visit.
The loud music, along with a tour guide who spoke far too fast and tried to include too much information for a tour that was trying to push us through the house in 15 or 20 minutes, made for a frustrating experience. We left before the tour was over and were kindly given refunds by the gift shop staff – a big thanks to those ladies for their understanding.
We’ve arrived at Monticello – the home of our third President and principal author of the Declaration of Independence, Mr. Thomas Jefferson.
Monticello was perfect, and as with other locations we find so enchanting, it turned out we had not allocated enough time to adequately visit this mountain-top home. We make note that this is one of those places we must plan on returning to someday.
How this man just happened to die on the 50th-anniversary celebration of the day he helped usher in beggars’ belief. Yep, he passed away on July 4th, 1826.
With Caroline now along for the journey, it’s as though we’ve begun vacation number two. Our first day into American history has been perfect with a lot more yet ahead of us.