Fairy Stone - Virginia

Fairy Stone State Park, Virginia
July 2 – July 5, 2010

To throw a little twist into our venture, Scott and I went to Fairy Stone State Park in Virginia with my parents and to meet up with some relatives for a mini first annual family reunion. I felt appropriate to add this park from Virginia for various reasons you will see as you continue reading.

Scott and I left Kennesaw Thursday night and met my parents at a KAO in Statesville, NC (roughly 6 hrs away). The KAO itself I can safely say was better suited for RV’s, perhaps those that were cross country traveling and needed a place to park. The KOA was kept clean and even had a pool and a playground, the downside was they had one bathroom at the front of the campgrounds (which is not cool when you have a pop up and no bathroom) and the sites themselves are literally running over each other. Why I say its better suited for an RV… well think about it... all they do is pull in and they never have to leave since there is a bathroom, kitchen, and bed inside!

Regardless, we all woke at 6am and were packed and headed out by 7! I don’t think we’ve stayed at a place any shorter amount of time! Dad stopped in a small town in NC, Mt. Airy. We went in the Walmart for some last minute groceries and left (not knowing this would be the last location for cell service!)

We drove another hour, thru the small town of Stuart and finally made it to Fairy Stone State Park just after noon. Dad got us checked into sites 50 for us and 51 for the Feb’s. We made it to camp and after unpacking in record breaking time all crashed in the hammocks and chairs outside :)
The Feb’s arrived around 4pm and we sat around a fire catching up on what life has brought. Dad grilled some chicken and Scott finished it off with an amazing dessert! We tried something new by placing a piece of aluminum foil splitting the inside of the Dutch oven in two and creating two cobblers at once, apple and strawberry. Both were to die for! Who knew strawberry cobbler could taste so amazing. Turns out that Uncle Earl had purchased a Dutch oven from Walmart (which Scott will invest in shortly!!) that he had just seasoned in order to try out some recipes. Brandon just became a Webelo Scout in BSA and uncle is a leader. Scott and Uncle had a lot of fun talking about scouting.

Uncle also showed me a journal he had started before Kendall was born of various parks and places he has hiked or camped. I was flipping through looking at all the pictures he drew in, pasted in, and maps of stuff in there. He is very talented! There were some great stories too… like the one about the mouse in the cabin… let’s just say it ended up being the shortest camping trip ever! Also Scott and I decided to start a tradition (taken from a friend). We have created a flag that we made on a thick piece of canvas fabric that has an outline of GA. Yet to be named, it has glued on all the state parks to date we have been to. On the pack will be places elsewhere we have been (but still relating to parks etc). This is cool as it serves as motivation for us to continue, not that we need it, and as something we can display when we go camping to well show off!

Saturday was spent relaxing as well. Kevin woke up almost at 12:30pm as usual. At 1pm we went to the Visitor’s Center for a park activity: Hunt for Fairy Stones. The park had a location at the foot of two mountains were all the eroded rocks settle. This settling ground was the site of the fairy stones. Legend says that when the fairies and elves heard Jesus had died, they cried; their tears became mini crosses made of rock. In actuality, these stones are naturally forming and erode from mica schist (which is also used to create make up by grounding it into fine powder!) We found several cool single column stones and St.Andrew’s style stones. A lot of stuff was really eroded to where you couldn’t distinguish a shape or they had not separated from the original rock yet. I still think the park rangers go every night and place those stones everywhere…..

We, as in our family, went to Walmart yet again for another trip. Mom was definitely going crazy at this point for not having any service. I think it was nice not to have to think about phone calls or emails. I mean yeah it is a worry, what if something was wrong with Hunter (we boarded him) or what if the world was coming to an end.. but as they say, ignorance is bliss :)

The end of Saturday day was more chill time talking around the fire pit. Saturday night was our assigned day to cook dinner. We decided on the spot to create our own recipe of beef stew for the Dutch oven. With ingredients that shall not be mentioned, it turned out to be delicious! AND we had enough for leftovers! It will definitely be something we make again. Scott then used Uncle’s Dutch oven to create a second dessert, pineapple upside down cake. MMMMM, it was so mouth-watering. It was a surprise for Titi Arlene’s birthday. The best part was when we flipped the cake, just after finishing, we put the candles on it and began to sing happy birthday. The problem was that we didn’t give it a chance to cool and as we sang the candles were melting! All of us were starring at the cake singing faster! It was sooo funny. The cake turned out to be amazing!

Sunday, July 4th, we found out that we had missed the fireworks from Stuart. They had celebrated on July 3rd… go figure they couldn’t even celebrate on the right day…
It turned out to be a day for adventures though! Kevin went with the Feb’s and went canoeing. They ended up canoeing for about an hour going down the lake to the Philpot Dam. Mom and Dad stayed back to relax and spend time together. Brandon and my aunt went to the beach to get some rays and play. Scott and I decided to go for a hike :)

I told Scott I wanted to do the Little Mountain Falls Trail, 2.3 mile moderate trail. Funny thing… somehow we ended up doing over 5 miles! Even though the trails don’t cross on the map, we ended up getting on the Mountain View Trail then back onto the Little Mountain Falls Trail. AND to make things crazier it was much more than moderate.. there were parts where we felt like we were rock climbing! As for the falls… Scott and I joke about it being a trickle-fall rather than waterfall. It would have been much prettier if it had just rained. It was definitely strenuous but I did enjoy the hike. The view from the top gave us a glimpse of the Blue Ridge Mtns (where we were), the Appalachian Valley in the middle, and the Appalachian Mountains on the other side. It was definitely worth seeing! I also probably drove Scott crazy with some of the plant stuff. I loved being able to see plenty of Chestnut Oak trees and seeing such a rich soil ecosystem (noted by the ferns and other plants). Not much was in blume but I showed Scott pipsessiwa and some Galax. I think he secretly enjoyed it, especially because it made me happy.

We ended Sunday night with my uncle making a fantastic Chuck wagon Casserole, think of chili with a layer of corn bread on top. MMMMM Fantastic!

The trip overall was amazing. I loved being able to be away from civilization even communication and escape from everything. Scott had 1 bar of signal but he even kept his phone off so that was even better.
Fairy Stone is definitely a park I would go to again, especially with children, and I would definitely recommend it to anyone looking for a park to try out.

What I liked about Virginia State Parks… They have a hiker program. You register and you get a pin. You also get a pin after 5, 10, and 20 hikes you complete. If you complete a certain amount of hikes you also get a master hiker pin. I thought that was pretty neat! Wish GA had something similar with parks/hikes. They also provided patches but I think it was like the individual park not necessarily something each park would have. One thing though… they don’t have decent park maps. The map they provided did not have campground sites labeled or the trail maps. That’s one thing GA does right :)