Adventures: Fall in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley

We've been on a fall travel binge with two mountain trips over the last two weeks and a blustery beach trip just ahead. How lucky we are to have family sprinkled across the country in so many beautiful places. Our area doesn't typically have a dramatic leaf peak, so we headed up to Virginia's Shenandoah Valley for some color and cousin time. (You can find posts on our last summer trip to Virginia here and our last winter trip here.)

I've become a serial drive-by photographer. Jeff drives (and rolls his eyes at me) while I take photos out the window with my iPhone. Here are a few shots from our late afternoon drive over the mountains and into the Shenandoah Valley.

The leaves weren't quite peaking in the valley, but as we drove up the mountain to Shenandoah National Park for a hike, we wove through bands of red, yellow and orange. By the time we reached the park's highest elevations, the leaves had mostly fallen.

No hike is complete without getting a lift from your older cousin along the way, right?

I kept walking around a bend to find my niece waiting for me, ready to pose for a photo.

On our way out of town, we stopped at Carter Mountain Orchard in Charlottesville to pick apples. Cricket was so excited she choreographed an apple dance.

We've been on the road and in the skies so much this year that I haven't gotten a chance to post about each trip, but I've been spending a lot of time on Instagram. You can find me at @jsoplop. (You don't need an Instagram account to view my photos.) 

For more Adventures posts, click here. For more Nature posts, click here.