The weather had improved somewhat while we were at the park. It only rained a couple times but wasn’t nearly as bad as what we had been getting. It did get down to 38 degrees the first night we were there and improved to 40 the next night! It was great hiking weather though in the daytime. The photo here at the left is very near the highest point in the park. 
As always click on the photos to enlarge.
When we first entered the park a large black bear ran across the road in front of us but I didn’t have the camera handy and couldn’t get a picture. We didn’t see anymore the rest of the time we were there and I had the camera handy then! Every time we were in the car while Mike was driving I had the camera on my lap and turned on – of course when you are prepared you don’t see them!
We were surprised at how far behind in spring the park was – it is much higher 
in elevation than the valley – the highest peak is close to 4,000 ft. elevation. In some places the trees had barely started to get leaves. Another thing we noticed was how few evergreen trees there are. In Arkansas we have so many pine it was something that we noticed so Mike got a photo of this pine tree to the right. The mountain behind the tree looks brown and that is because of how little leaves are the trees.
Of course we took a trail that led to a waterfall – it was pretty. As trails go it was short about 2 miles round trip – but always remember most mountain trails are not flat, I think this one took us about 1 1/2 hours to do. It was steep in places but what a reward when you see the falls. One of the days we took the hike to the tallest peak in the park (photo on the 
top) – this trail was only 1 mile up — straight up!! It took us over an hour to get to the top just to go one mile. At the top there was a rock shelter built where you could take protection from storms. The Appalachian Trail runs right next to this trail in places and throughout the whole park, we actually got off one trail we were on for a little bit and walked part of the Appalachian 
just to say we had as the trails intermingled for awhile.
Here on the right is a look at some of the vegetation on the trail. A tree that is alive had a hollowed out point in the trunk and a fern of some type was growing inside it. The tree was quite large and this just looked so unique had to get a photo.
Our motorhome has a large picture window at the back where the bed is. Wake up in the morning – open the blind and here are deer eating breakfast – what a view. The last day we didn’t see any in the campground. We had people on both sides of us with rather loud dogs. One family didn’t follow the rules and did not have their dog on a leash – there are rules for that – for the safety of campers and the pets – we did not see any but this is a park with bears – keep your pets on a leash please!! Do not throw balls for them to run into the woods and catch – they might get attacked or cause an attack!!
On the last day at the Shenandoah’s it was a rainy cool day and I mentioned in the previous post 
that we found a quilt museum. This is the outside of the museum – an old house that is in great shape inside and out. The photo to the left is the sign outside of the building. A great place if you are ever in that area to visit.
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