Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Veerheenyah
Posts: 3285

I went up to the Shenandoah Valley this weekend to visit with some family and friends. I hit the mountains right at sunset on the way up friday and got some awesome pictures.

As I started the trip, I noticed my odometer and snapped a pic:


I took these next couple pictures while going 70 miles an hour and was amazed that they didn't come out blurry (and that I didn;t kill everyone in the car either)






As the sun started to set and I neared the top of the mountain, I stoped at Rockfish Gap, near Waynesboro and one of the entrances to Skyline Drive, to take some pics and climb around on the rocks.

The sky was still pretty bright at this point, but the moon was big and bright and full, so you could see it rising really well

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Veerheenyah
Posts: 3285

Some shots looking down into the valley









I love watching the sunset in the mountains. I swear I'm gonna move somewhere that's not flat one of these days


Some more shots of the moon:





The next two are the same shot, just with and without flash:

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Veerheenyah
Posts: 3285

Here's Madison climbing around on some rocks:








More pretty sunset pictures:







A little ways down the road near a cute little town called Crozet:



Some historic markers at Rockfish Gap:

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Veerheenyah
Posts: 3285

Lastly, some pics I took around The Quad at JMU. This is a beautiful campus with awesome bluestone buildings (this is the stone that the Blue Ridge Mountains are made of)

Mr. Madison himself


Madison & Madison


Looking down the quad from the statue. The big tree on the right is a Silver Maple. They are gorgeous trees. My Uncle has one in his back yard that is almost 14 feet around (I'll post a pic of it later)


Bluestone buildings (Melesse would be the one to ask what the names of the buildings are and what they are used for)

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Veerheenyah
Posts: 3285

This is a really old and pretty (but crooked) Cedar tree that I saw and had to have a picture of:


And I loved the way the shadow from this Maple tee fell on the grass. It was right at noon, so the length of the shadow should be about the same as the height of the tree if I remember correctly from Science classes.


Yup, right about noontime. This is an interesting sundial. I hadn't seen one like it before. There's a bar on the ground, and where you stand along that bar depends on the date.

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Veerheenyah
Posts: 3285

This is a pic of the Silver Maple in my Uncle's back yard. As much as I could get of it anyways. I have shots of the whole tree in sections if anyone is any good at putting them together and wants to have a go at it.

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Registered: Jan 2001
Location: library
Posts: 19581

Very nice vyper, but my mountains are better.

-m

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Registered: Oct 2001
Location:
Posts: 17905

yer mountains are different. free to be you'n me, puddin. mmmkay?

yer pics are cool, vyper

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Registered: Jan 2003
Location: mediocre apartment
Posts: 2615

Prettiest part of the country. Thanks for the pics, they're great.

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Registered: Sep 2000
Location: MadCo
Posts: 1801

Interesting Fact about that Sundial....it was added just this last year, and they asked a Grad student to compute where the elements should be, and he got it wrong. The Geophysics professor in the Geology department fixed it, and he died last night at 2:15 AM after battling cancer for a few months.

And I hate to correct you, Vyper, but the buildings are made out of Limestone, the Edinburg formation if I remember correctly, and the top of the Blue Ridge is Catoctin Greenstone. The Edinburg is found in the valley :-X.

The building to the left of Mad and Mad is Roop hall, which is of a completely different architecture then the rest of the Bluestone buildings is rumoured to be a Virginia Tech building. The rumour goes that the architect was designing a building for each, and when he sent them to the builders to make, he accidentally switched the designs so we have a VATech building, and they have a JMU building.

I would be in some of those pictures no doubt if not for my dastardly inlaws and their insistance on my attending their Thanksgiving feast.

The rest of the buildings aren't that interesting, with the exception of Wilson, the one with bell tower, and that's interesting cause the auditorium inside is where concerts are held, and it is a quite popular place for public sex. I myself have had sex on the porch there, and the balcony inside overlooking the stage.

Melesse

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: b0ulder
Posts: 5126

Smoovie

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Veerheenyah
Posts: 3285

quote:

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Originally posted by Melesse
And I hate to correct you, Vyper, but the buildings are made out of Limestone, the Edinburg formation if I remember correctly, and the top of the Blue Ridge is Catoctin Greenstone. The Edinburg is found in the valley :-X.


Melesse

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No problem... I was just going by what my uncle told me. He used to be a Political Science Prof. there, and he thinks he knows everything. He was wrong several times this weekend, but I don't even bother pointing those times out anymore.

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Veerheenyah
Posts: 3285

I would also like to point out that if you ever decide to go walking and taking pictures around the JMU campus with a 3 year old, noon on Sunday during a holiday weekend is not a good time. None of the buildings were open, and when Madison started doing the pee-pee dance, we had to walk over to Rockingham County Hospital to find a bathroom.

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Veerheenyah
Posts: 3285

On the way back, we stopped at a little ghetto grocery mart in Richmond, near where my friend that went with me lives to buy her some cheap cigarettes. On the door, I saw this sign, and have not been able to figure it out.

Apparently they sell 8 inch tall humans that are wet and "wevy"(?) for $8.99

Attachment: sign.jpg
This has been downloaded 180 time(s).

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Registered: Dec 2000
Location: Smith County
Posts: 1366

quote:

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Originally posted by Vyper

It was right at noon, so the length of the shadow should be about the same as the height of the tree if I remember correctly from Science classes.

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Veerheenyah
Posts: 3285

well, it was definitely right at noon when I took that picture (the bells in the clock tower went off as we were walking back up the quad), and that was a really big shadow that looked as long as the tree was tall.

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: b0ulder
Posts: 5126

I think the sign is for hair weave.

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Registered: Sep 2000
Location: MadCo
Posts: 1801

quote:

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Originally posted by Vyper
I would also like to point out that if you ever decide to go walking and taking pictures around the JMU campus with a 3 year old, noon on Sunday during a holiday weekend is not a good time. None of the buildings were open, and when Madison started doing the pee-pee dance, we had to walk over to Rockingham County Hospital to find a bathroom.

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Registered: Jul 2000
Location: zanzibar
Posts: 10428

Someone has been stealing the historical markers in Michigan. It seems they contain about $40 worth of aluminum when sold for scrap. It made the news recently because the marker for the 1936-37 sitdowners strike was stolen and the UAW was up in arms. Now people are calling for them to make the signs out of a less valuable metal.

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