And this vacation will henceforth be known as “That fall camping trip when it rained so much”.

The trip ended as it began: camping in the rain. 

We left Fancy Gap, VA on Saturday morning, heading north on the Blue Ridge Parkway (MP199).  The day started with bright sunshine, but clouds moved in as we went around Roanoke, threatening rain.  We continued on the parkway to the south shore of the James River (MP64), exiting toward Lynchburg on route 501.  From Lynchburg, we traveled on to Appomattox, then to Holliday Lake State Park. 

The park is small, only 37 campsites, and it was full on a Saturday in October.  On our arrival, the clouds had disappeared, and in mid-afternoon as we set up, I switched to shorts and t-shirt in the upper-70 degree sunshine.  We took Ranger out for a walk to the lake and took a short hike along the Lakeshore Trail (0.8 miles).  The evening was pleasant enough to grill dinner and have a campfire.  The campers in the next site came over to share our fire; they were from Hawaii and spend several months each fall and spring traveling in their Class B motor home around various regions of the US.  The night sky was full of stars, and it was hard to believe the weather forecast called for high of 50 and rain on Sunday.

And at 1:30 am, the rain arrived.  It continued most of the day Sunday, with falling temperatures.  We talked about heading home early, but decided to just relax and hope to pack up in drier conditions on Monday morning.  So another day was spent reading in the RV.  The rain let up enough to get Ranger out for a number of short walks.  (I was cautious about getting too far from the RV after a disastrous early morning walk when we both were soaked to the skin by a downpour.)  By evening, it was heavy overcast, but the rain had stopped, and we had a quiet evening of TV and indoor dining.

The trip home from Appomattox should be easy one, perhaps two hours of driving.