Park Number: 18/63

First Visited: May 6, 2011

I dream of Shenandoah in the fall. Well, that is to say, I dream with a full color palette—eyes closed, brain subdued, nocturnal swirls—and this, I believe, is what the park brings to its visitors. You get to live in a Monet painting.

Shenadoah National Park also kicks off the northern section of the Blue Ridge Parkway, a route running all the way down to the Smokies. Entering this park and achieving this ridgeline gives east-coast visitors an escape from the municipality of the crowded seaboard. You forget Washington, DC is an hour and a half away. You remember what it means to be alone.

The following tribes are thought to have been active in Shenandoah: the Piedmont Siouans, Catawbas, Shawnee, Delaware, Cherokees, Susquehannocks, and the Iroquois.

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