Miss Travelpants Has Returned!

Iwanski and I are back from a road trip through Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia, Virginia, and Pennsylvania…and oh, what a trip it was! We had so much fun, and took so many pictures, that it was hard for me to decide what pictures to share with y’all. (I love the word “y’all”—definitely my favorite word in the Southern dialect. At least I like it as long as the person saying it has more than two teeth—but more about that later.)

Anyway, without further adieu, I hope y’all enjoy the following road trip pictures.

As we approached our first hotel room in Kentucky, we saw this scene.



Hot air balloons! There was a race going on in the town where we were staying. I never thought I’d be into hot air balloons at all, but it was quite an awesome sight!

The next day, it was my first time in West Virginia!



Here's the New River Gorge in West Virginia—one of the most beautiful sights I’ve ever seen.



This was also my first time in rural Virginia! (I was in urban Virginia—in Arlington—during our Washington, DC trip.)



Here's a view from the George Washington National Forest in Virginia:



Finally, we made it to our main destination—the beautiful Shenandoah National Park in the Blue Ridge Mountains.



Here’s Iwanski standing on an abandoned railroad in the Blue Ridge Mountains.



We saw several deer hanging out in the forest. They seemed very unafraid of people.



Then, to our delight, we saw one of these fellas on the side of the road! The next day, we even saw a mother bear and her little cub. It was too cool!



Apparently this is how the Shenandoah residents know what time it is.



And of course, to have the whole John Denver experience (“Almost heaven, West Virginia…Blue Ridge Mountains, Shenandoah River…”), I had to see the Shenandoah River. (I just like how these chairs look next to the river.)



We had an amazing walk through the Luray Caverns in Luray, Virginia.



We also visited Harpers Ferry (the site of John Brown’s famous “attack on slavery”) and saw this very old building.



Gettysburg National Military Park and Gettysburg National Cemetery were amazing places to visit.



Here is the view from our hotel room in Virginia, overlooking the Blue Ridge Mountains and Shenandoah National Park.



We absolutely loved our Southern/Shenandoah road trip!