Family Photography at Natural Chimneys Park

I tend to have this habit where I romanticize a trip or boondoggle in my mind. There was once a time when I thought it would be fun to spend the night on a deserted island. In all fairness, it was a beautiful island. But I didn’t look at the weather, so our group ended up huddled together with my frightened dog as a thunderstorm pounded down on our tent all night long. The wind was so strong, it flattened our tent multiple times. The dog, my spouse, our friend and I awoke with the tent sprung back to normal position and horse flies waiting to eat us alive outside. I prefer mosquitos and I hate mosquitos. Even after we returned to civilization that day, my dog kept snapping at ghost horse flies because his bites would sporadically throb. My bites did the same. Horse flies are no joke. 

You can see where I’m going with this. Thankfully there were no hurricane-force winds this round. However, I was very much looking forward to this trip for the last 1.5 years. I used my handy dandy internet skills 1.5 years ago to research when the next new moon would be over a long holiday weekend and during the warmer months of the year. All so we could go stargazing without freezing - inspired by us doing quite the opposite 1.5 years prior. The pendulum swung too far and we instead experienced terrible heat. 

Backtracking, I’d like to flashback to a couple months before the camping trip when I looked at my calendar and realized the 4th of July weekend stargazing trip was coming up. I scoured the internet to look for stargazing locations and found Natural Chimneys Park and Campground in Mt. Solon, VA. Wow! What awesome astrophotography. We still had our trusty tent that had survived hurricane force winds, so I booked a campsite and waited. And waited. And as the days drew closer, someone warned me about the weather. Much to my dismay, the weather forecasted rain and clouds. But Virginia weather is fickle and can change even the day prior. So, I decided to keep my campsite reservation.

It was a long drive, but my daughter held strong and dutifully used toilets along the way - a miracle on our potty training journey. While we stayed for 2 nights, I didn’t get many photos because the heat and humidity was just too much. We spent our 1 full day at the town 30 minutes away and walked around the mall appreciating whoever invented modern A/C. The first night, though, predicted rain so we quickly pitched our tent after arriving. 

When the skies darkened, we hid in the tent. I thought it would be fun for my daughter to see the rain from the safety of the tent, so I had the tent flap and door open. The skies got very dark and I started to hear some rumbling. I thought it was some truck driving by (my city experience). I realized a moment later that the rumbling was the sound of a wave of rain making its way over the tree canopy behind our tent. The wave of rain hit our tent next and we saw buckets of rain fall down. My daughter stumbled around our tent in excitement. The rain hit so hard and fast, it quickly created a puddle around our tent. The fat raindrops hitting the puddle then splashed water into our tent. Our tent wasn’t leaking, the water was just splashing high enough to hit the porous part of it. 

The tent held up well and the rain let up after some time. We were left maneuvering the maze of puddles to get to the toilets. It did continue to rain to a lesser degree throughout the night. No star photos but amazing morning pictures! The rain had resulted in a light fog that broke up the morning sunshine, creating soft rays like something from Photoshop. The 2nd morning had less fog but still nice golden light.

The 2nd night also had rain that apparently cleared while we were passed out. My spouse and I woke up early in the morning but the sun was already starting to bleed into the night sky. So, we got to experiment with some night photography without the stars. 

I do love how we visited the Natural Chimneys Park and Campground and it looks like my daughter is searching for Santa Claus who comes down the chimney bearing presents. Sorry, no Santa but really cool rock formations and peak summer heat. Much to my surprise, my daughter thought it would be fun to go camping again a week later - we didn’t go that weekend but I did book more camping trips. She also gets giddy whenever it rains now. Small victories.