Last week on Thursday, Jodi called and asked if we wanted to meet her half-way off I-81 in the mountains. Well, we looked into some options, and found that many places required a 2-night minimum, so we looked at options throughout the day on Friday, and then decided to stay at the General Lee cabin and left Friday night around 6pm to head to Lexington, VA.
Beautiful mountain views. The air was such a welcome relief from the humidity in the Piedmont.
Virginia Military Institute. Very pretty campus. Stonewall Jackson was once a member of the faculty.
The city of Lexington is very hilly. In fact, once the town was beginning to see more trade, they were having trouble getting the horses and carts up and down the steep terrain, and so they began the process of digging out the hills to make them less steep. Since there is also a lot of limestone in the area, they would often run into rocks too large to move, and so they just built around them. On many of the buildings you can see where the original street level was - much higher than today.
We had just been reading a book about climbing trees. I told Elise that when I was little, I would climb in the apple trees in our backyard. She wanted desperately to try her hand at climbing as well, and while waiting for our carriage ride in Lexington, we found the perfect tree for her to try. After she straddled this branch, she was done. Maybe that's good for me - no more climbing in her future?
We took a scenic drive around the country side and followed a creek. The water was so clear. It was just beautiful to be outside in nature.
"Who is your favorite aunt?" said Jodi as she took off her shoes and waded in the creek with Elise.
We had a huge jacuzzi in our bathroom, and warm, fuzzy robes. Elise tried out the much-too-large robe after her bath.
We also took a short hike to explore the natural bridge. It's just a beautiful area, and was surveyed by George Washington when he was a surveyor in his 20's.
Perhaps it was the vivid color setting on my camera...but isn't the green grass in this picture just stunning?
Near the Natural Bridge is another not so natural landscape. This is Foam Henge. It is an exact replica of Stone Henge in the English countryside. Pretty funny - so we stopped to take a look.
I'm probably incriminating my daughter by posting this picture - but here she is with Bailey & a chuck of styrofoam. Hmm, where did she get that?
What a fun, last minute weekend get-away. We enjoyed it so much that we're planning to meet Paul and Jodi again in 2 weeks (probably at another location along I-81). See you soon!
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