Rocky Ridge Rock Scrambling
Emilie Phillips
We are down visiting my parents in the mountains of West Virginia. It’s nice being home, even if it rained most of the week. But I suppose that’s how you get vibrant green but treacherous sphagnum bogs, carnivorous sundews, and meadows full of lavish ferns, laurel, and azaleas. We picked a loop to the northern end of the Dolly Sods Wilderness where there are rocks for Isaac to play on and lots of open views. My parents showed us some rock formations that I wasn’t familiar with. Isaac explored and found even more tunnels than they knew. I fit through every tunnel he found. He surprised me by doing every climb I did. The trees have grown up some since I was a kid, but the soil is still thin and brittle from logging and fires over a hundred years ago. We rarely see the azaleas in bloom. They seem to only bloom for a few days. This time we found both pink early azaleas and orange flame azaleas. It has been rather cold, so the plants are late. The laurel are still tight pink and red buds.
All Photos
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- Nifty Moth -- Comments (0)
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- Looking towards Cabin Mountain -- Comments (0)
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- Breezy on the ridge -- Comments (0)
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- Ferns with spores -- Comments (0)
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- Flame azalea -- Comments (0)
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- Flame azalea -- Comments (0)
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- Climbing the sandstone rocks -- Comments (0)
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- canyons in the sandstone rocks -- Comments (0)
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- Emilie assured Isaac that rock has been there her whole life -- Comments (0)
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- Tyson doing a little climbing -- Comments (0)
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- Isaac found a skinny slot -- Comments (0)
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- Isaac climbed the erroded boulder -- Comments (0)
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- View north along Rocky Ridge -- Comments (0)
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- Sandstone formations -- Comments (0)
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- Emilie helping Isaac to the top -- Comments (0)
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- Isaac on the highest rock -- Comments (0)
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- Knobbly top of the rocks -- Comments (0)
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- View southward -- Comments (0)
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- Trudy and John -- Comments (0)
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- Trudy through the crack in the rocks -- Comments (0)
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- Ornate sandstone and iron shapes -- Comments (0)
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- Trudy climbing -- Comments (0)
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- Isaac climbing -- Comments (0)
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- Isaac on top of a different set of rocks -- Comments (0)
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- Laurel in bud -- Comments (0)
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- Tyson squeezing through a small tunnel -- Comments (0)
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- Lunch time -- Comments (0)
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- Isaac checking out a puddle -- Comments (0)
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- Early Azalea (Pinkster?) -- Comments (0)
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- Raven Ridge trail -- Comments (0)
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- Bluettes -- Comments (0)
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- Left Fork of Red Creek drainage -- Comments (0)
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- Emilie and Isaac descending to Left Fork -- Comments (0)
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- John -- Comments (0)
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- Trudy and the mud -- Comments (0)
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- Sun dews -- Comments (0)
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- Ant hills are bigger in WV than in NH -- Comments (0)
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- Back on Rocky Ridge -- Comments (0)
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