New Places To Explore

The Virginia Dept. of Game & Inland Fisheries just opened two new Wildlife Management areas with walking trails and guess what? They are within 20 minutes of our home!! This is so great as there are really no places to hike or take the dogs for a nice long walk anywhere near us.

Well if you know us, you know we had to check them out as soon as we heard so we headed to one of the two last weekend and it was fantastic. The Duncan Wildlife Management Area is where we went and while it only has one of its trails open currently the map showed there are several more planned. The main trail is gravel covered and very wide, perfect for puppies on a leash who like to zigzag like ours. Biking would also be easy here as you have plenty of room to pass others without interfering with their walk. It has a large pond area and a large meadow near the end and was almost completely flat so not strenuous at all. It will be a very “buggy” walk though the summer so while we will go back, probably will not until after bug and tick season. Here are a few photos from our walk.

Cast Iron Dutch Oven Cooking

Tried something new this past weekend, we took a Cast Iron Dutch Oven cooking class at the campground where we were staying. We learned so much and had a blast doing it.

The class was first a lecture on types of cast iron, how to take care of it, clean it and convert recipes for it.

From there we were broken into groups and assigned a recipe to make. Guy and I were given "Upside Down Pineapple Chocolate Cake". I had never made one of these before so was a bit worried but it came out great, slide right out of the "oven" and didn't crack. Instructor told us that rarely happens so we got a gold star LOL.

Here is a fun video I put together of the class and our results!

Zoar State Forest Hike

For our get outside adventure this past weekend we decided to keep it local and visit a state forest that is just just down the road from the bluff (about 8-10 miles), Zoar State Forest.

It was a wet, slightly humid morning for the hike but since we had so much going on that day it was early am or not at all. Arriving early we were the only ones there, which was actually very nice. The forest has two hiking trails, the Mattaponi Bluff Trail which runs along the shores of the Mattaponi River and is a 1 mile loop and the Herring Creek Trail which is a offshoot of the Mattaponi Bluff Trail and is .40 long. We decided to try and get both in if time allowed, which it did as both trails are more very easy walks than hikes, nothing strenuous at all. There is one very steep staircase you must use to continue along the trail but other than than no issues at all.

The State Forest is in desperate need of some maintenance of the man made structures, bridges and walkovers but it still has beauty within the views of the Mattaponi River and the natural growth found within the forest.

Near the end of the Mattaponi Bluff Trail we came upon this marker with Captain John Smith engraved on it and the message "To The Cross Hath Bin Discoverd A.D. 1607" on the other side. No other explanation as to what the markers indicated so as always we consulted Google who explained that this is one of 24 markers throughout the shores of Virginia which highlight the history of Captain John Smith’s explorations along the Chesapeake watershed areas. More information about these markers and where you can find them is in this article Friends of the John Smith Chesapeake Trail .

This is a nice local find that we will return to again, especially in the fall and winter as it will certainly be overgrown and very buggy in the summer.