It has been a long time since we have been on the road with our Winnebago Minnie.  Today finds us at this West Virginia State Park within the strange Canaan Valley, a three thousand foot high bowl along the Allegheny Mountains.  Its isolation within a rim of mountains and the altitude make it a “four-season playground.”  The damming of its drainage crates a maize of open bogs and rocky meadows between spruce and fir woodlands and small forests of northern red oak, beech, and red maple.  Deer are too abundant and the boreal parkland provides habitat to various species that are unusual this far south.

We are enjoying the place for its scenery and isolation.  We find birds too, of course, but August is a tough month to find land birds in the mountains.  But if there are few birds there are plenty of wildflowers and mushrooms.  This morning we made a couple of hikes between the showers and plan more tomorrow.  On Friday we will likely return to the Dolly Sods, another high elevation valley famed for its open vistas and harsh weather.  Yesterday the harsh weather drove us out.

We’re enjoying time to ourselves at last this year.  Remember we spent most of our winter in Florida and California and most of spring and early summer in Brooklyn.  So far this year we have scarcely lived a month in our little house.  Now we are in our even smaller home on the road going mostly to places we have never been before.  We will also stop at Sylva near Cherokee to visit our friends there and enjoy that lovely area.

So family and friends, wish us well in our travels.