HIKING VIRGINIA

Old Rag is one of the park’s most popular hikes, and also the most dangerous. What’s the attraction? Old Rag is a quick drive from northern Virginia and offers day-trippers a craggy knob with eyepopping views. Beating the crowds on Old Rag means hiking in the off-season. Mountain laurel decorates the Saddle Trail with white and pink blossoms during spring. In fall, views from Old Rag across Weakley Hollow are filled with autumn colors. Whatever the season, carry a warm overshirt or jacket; wind and no tree cover can make Old Rag’s summit feel positively alpine.

THE RUNDOWN

Start: National Park parking lot on VA 600, 0.6 mile west of Nethers, VA

Distance: 9.0-mile loop

Hiking time: 7-8 hours

Difficulty: Difficult due to the route’s length and strenuous climbs

Trail surface: Dirt roads and dirt trails meander through mixed hardwood forest on lower slopes and along the trout stream at the foot of the mountain; the path is mostly exposed rock face along the cliffs and through the narrow passages between house-size boulders around the peak.

Land status: National park

Nearest town: Syria, VA

Other trail users: Hikers only

Accessibility: None

Canine compatibility: Dogs not permitted on the Ridge and Saddle Trails for their own safety. On other trails they are permitted on a leash no longer than 6 feet.

Trail contact: Shenandoah National Park, 3655 US 211 East, Luray; (540) 999-3500; www.nps.gov/shen

Schedule: Open year-round. The Old Rag trailhead is outside the park boundary, so you do not have to use Skyline Drive, which may be closed during inclement weather.

Fees/permits: Parking is free, but there is an entrance fee. Overnight camping is limited and prohibited above 2,800 feet. You must obtain a backcountry permit from a ranger station. Campfires prohibited except in established fireplaces. Call (540) 999-3500 for regulations.

Facilities/features: Chemical toilets at the registration station, and 2 shelters on the trail for day use only

NatGeo TOPO! map: Old Rag

NatGeo Trails Illustrated map: Shenandoah National Park; Appalachian Trail, Calf Mountain to Raven Rock; Massanutten and Great North Mountains

Other maps: PATC #10: Shenandoah National Park Central District

From Sperryville, drive south on US 522 and in 0.8 mile, turn right onto VA 231. In 8 miles, turn right onto VA 601 and follow signs to the parking area, about 3 miles; the road number changes from VA 601 to VA 707 and finally VA 600. It is a 0.8-mile walk to the trailhead. Parking at the trailhead and along the roadside is prohibited. GPS: N38 34.243′ / W78 17.196′. DeLorme: Virginia Atlas & Gazetteer: Page 74, B3.

The climb up Old Rag leads from mountain slopes thick with oak and tulip poplar to a rugged, exposed landscape of rock and straggly table-mountain pine. The forest floor, littered with dead leaves along Hughes Run near the trailhead, sports a thick mat of pine needles at higher elevations. Where you had once seen witch hazel growing in the forest subcanopy, now mountain laurel sinks its tenacious roots into thin, rocky soil. For the hiker, this is a noticeable change with a subtle, less noticeable effect on the mountain. Near the summit, those pine needles collect in puddles of water on open rock. Nitrates released from the needles mix with billion-year-old granite rock, and the erosion process begins. Bowl-shaped depressions form in rock boulders. And just like that, another piece of Old Rag wears away.

As sturdy a mountain as the Blue Ridge ever produced, Old Rag is nonetheless a still-evolving mountain. Still evolving is a curious description for a peak of such stature that, by park estimates, 100,0 people climb it annually. But it explains both how Old Rag’s signature summit came to exist and how it continues to change. Millions of years of weathering led to the exposure of granite boulders at the summit. More recently, rain-triggered rock slides reshaped the mountain’s east slope (which is well known to only the most experienced bushwhackers and rock climbers). The exposed rock in the recent slides has triggered new interest in Old Rag among geologists. Carbon dating of rocks in the last few years debunked a long-held belief that Old Rag granite is the oldest rock in America’s oldest mountain range. Samples of rock taken near Mary’s Rock on Skyline Drive date a few hundred million years earlier. This new information doesn’t diminish or change Old Rag; it merely adds to a story that is being written in small ways every day.

Climbing the last mile on the Ridge Trail demands strength and balance. At one point, a narrow rock ledge is all that separates you from a long fall onto a pile of loose rocks. At another point, you may need a boost from behind to climb over a boulder. The trail negotiates steps made of Catoctin greenstone, rock pillars and boulders as large as a house, and short tunnels between the first false summit (where the trail emerges from the forest) and the true summit at 3,268 feet. The difficulty of the last mile, coupled with the crowds that flock here from June to October, will cause climbing delays.

Approaching Old Rag on the Saddle Trail is less popular, but it recommends itself for exactly that reason: Few people hike it. Hiking on Weakley Hollow Road, views open in the forest canopy and stretch all the way to the mountain. If you bushwhack off Weakley Hollow Road, it’s possible to find relics of Old Rag village. In the 1780s there was a post office, school, church, and homes. (The post office stood at the junction of the Saddle Trail with Old Rag Road.) Local mountain men were employed by Skyland Resort to carry packs for the visitors climbing and camping out on Old Rag. Byrds Nest Shelter No. 1, a mountaintop picnic spot just shy of the peak, was donated by another well-heeled Old Rag climber: Virginia governor and senator Henry Flood Byrd Sr. climbed the mountain every year on his birthday.

Land at the foot of Old Rag was once one of the most populated and developed areas of Shenandoah National Park. Archaeologists estimate 460 people lived in a network of hollows and coves, including Weakley Hollow. Recent surveys have identified nearly ninety sites that were once homes, gristmills, churches, or schools. It is from Weakley Hollow—and the communities in neighboring Nicholson and Corbin Hollows—that the image of Appalachian mountain folk as barefooted, moonshine-swilling hillbillies emerged. A 1933 sociological study called “Hollow Folk” described residents of the Blue Ridge as “unlettered folk, sheltered in tiny mud-plastered log cabins and supported by a primitive agriculture.” That description went a long way in swaying public and political opinion to evict residents in favor of building Shenandoah National Park.

Seventy years later, archaeologists with the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation began revisiting these hollows and rewriting the history. Material collected, from calendars and watches to medicine bottles and music, paints a picture of inhabitants not as primitive people who lived hand to mouth. Rather, they were rural people who faced and overcame weather, soil, and social conditions that might have humbled people of lesser character—and probably did. Testament to the power of catalog marketing, the Sears Roebuck Company probably did more to bring the outside world to hollow folk as any technological advancement.

The 2004 book In the Shadow of Ragged Mountain, by archeologist Dr. Audry Horning, systematically disputes “Hollow Folk.”

Climbing away from the remains of Old Rag village, the Saddle Trail passes by thick patches of blackberries. A shredded log shows where a bear ripped away soft, rotted wood hunting for grubs. Unlike deer, which were reintroduced to the park in 1935, bears returned to the park on their own. They now number between 250 and 300 (deer number in the thousands).

On a quiet day, the staccato of a woodpecker echoes through the woods. In winter, the source of sound may well be a yellow-bellied sapsucker, a bird species that extracts sap from tulip poplars. Nestled below a rock outcrop at lower elevations along Saddle Trail, dusk wraps around the mountain. Wind buffets the peak and drifts downslope. It whistles outside the tent. One gets the sense that the mountain is alive.

MILES AND DIRECTIONS

0.0Start from the park’s official parking lot/entrance station on VA 600 (Weakley Hollow Road). Walk west to the park boundary.

0.8A chain blocks vehicle traffic from passing. Follow the road as it drops to Hughes Run, crosses on a bridge, and begins a long, steady climb.

1.9Continue straight on Weakley Hollow Road as Corbin Hollow Trail enters on the right. Note: Corbin Hollow Trail leads up Brokenback Creek and intersects with Old Rag Road in just more than 2 miles.

2.0Continue straight on Weakley Hollow Road as Robertson Mountain Trail enters on the right. Note: Robertson Mountain Trail leads across the top of Robertson Mountain and intersects with Old Rag Road in 2.4 miles.

2.9Turn left onto Old Rag Road. In a few feet, turn left again onto the blue-blazed Saddle Trail, an old road overgrown with grass. The signboard has information on park fees and the “leave no trace” ethic.

3.3Pass the Old Rag Shelter and a spring on the right side of the Saddle Trail. Note: The shelter is for day use only. The spring is marked by a concrete post with yellow striping. If you drink water from the spring, make sure you treat it first.

3.6Saddle Trail narrows and crosses a boulder field.

3.9Pass around a boulder the size of a small house. Steps lead uphill to a switchback in the trail.

4.3Reach Byrds Nest Shelter No. 1. Note: An unmarked and unnamed footpath leads past the day-use-only shelter to a perch overlooking Weakley Hollow. Use caution when walking on exposed rock or near cliff edges. The views are beautiful, but they’re not worth dying for. Another unmarked trail descends down the east slope of Old Rag. This trail is abandoned and ends at private property with no public access.

4.5Saddle Trail forks. Bear right and switchback to continue ascent of Old Rag.

4.8Reach the top of Old Rag. A concrete post marks the end of the Saddle Trail and beginning of the Ridge Trail. Note: For views, turn left at the concrete post and climb the rocks. To descend on the Ridge Trail, return to the concrete post and turn left.

5.3Begin rock scrambling beneath boulders wedged in crevices. The next 0.5 mile brings steep dropoffs and tricky passages around and over the rocks.

5.5Pass over the “false summit” of Old Rag. A look back up the trail nets a nice photo op of the Old Rag summit.

5.9The Ridge Trail leaves Old Rag’s exposed granite and reenters the woods under a canopy of oak and yellow poplar.

8.2Cross a small bridge and arrive back at the Weakley Hollow trailhead, marked by a chain and post.

9.0Arrive at the park’s official parking/lot entrance station on VA 600.

Rappahannock County Tourism, Visitor Center, 3 Library St., Washington; (540) 675-3153, www.visitrappahannockva.com

Just minutes from the trailhead, Old Rag Cottage can accommodate groups of up to six people. 3504 Weakley Hollow Rd., Syria; (540) 672-2421; www.oldragcottage.com

Graves Mountain Lodge is also near the base of the mountain, offering lodging and dining. (540) 923-4231; www.gravesmountain.com

Park lodges at Skyland (Mile 41.7 and 42.5), Big Meadows (Mile 51.2), and cabins at Lewis Mountain (Mile 57.5) are seasonal. Call (877) 247-9261 or go to www.goshenandoah.com for reservations.

Campgrounds are located at Matthews Arm (Mile 22.2), Big Meadows (Mile 51), Lewis Mountain (Mile 57.2), and Loft Mountain (Mile 79.5). Some are first-come, first-served. For campground reservations, call (877) 444-6777 or visit www.recreation.gov.

Six backcountry cabins are operated by the PATC. For reservations, call (703) 242-0693 or visit www.patc.net.

Full-service restaurants are located at Big Meadows Lodge (Mile 51.2) and Skyland (Mile 41.7 and 42.5), and seasonal Wayside Food Stops at Elkwallow Wayside (Mile 24.1), Big Meadows Wayside (Mile 51.2), and Loft Mountain Wayside (Mile 79.5). All restaurants are seasonal. Visit www.goshenandoah.com for information.

The town of Madison, about 14 miles away, has several good restaurants, as does Sperryville, about 19 miles.

17. OLD RAG