Birthday hike

Sunday, July 3rd, was my birthday. My 64th birthday. I slept in a bit because Della slept in bed last night and she's not in such a hurry to get up in the morning if she's in bed. But after we all got up, I fed the dogs, ate breakfast myself, and then loaded up Della for an adventure hike. 

I've been wanting to do the Blue Ridge Tunnel Trail since it opened, over a year ago now probably. Today was the day and Della was the dog. We headed out to Afton Mountain, to the east trailhead because it has more parking and less of an incline on the trail. I put the Gentle Leader on Della, along with a short slip lead just for good measure. I wasn't really sure what to expect or how either of us would react. I'm a bit claustrophobic but it wasn't a small, enclosed space sort of a situation. Everyone is told to bring a flashlight and I did and it really is necessary. I was somewhat surprised that you can always see the light at the end of the tunnel because it's a perfectly straight line. That created a misapprehension of the distance, however. Although you can see the end of the tunnel, it's still a pretty good distance. and it's dark the entire way. There's no cell service inside either.

Della walked right by my side the whole way and didn't give me any trouble at all, even when we passed other dogs. We passed one woman with a dog who was pulling her a bit and she commented "nice heel" as Della and I walked calmly past her as if we were a well-trained doggy duo. She got lots of looks and comments of course, as she always does. 

There's not much in the way of photo ops inside the tunnel, so I took lots of wildflower pictures on the short walk from the parking lot to the entrance. 

Back home I puttered around with my new pond plants, did some mowing, and then joined some friends at Patch Brewing Co., for some day drinking. Not a bad way to spend the day.

This is the eastern entrance. Notice the rough hewn rock.

Just inside. Very nice crushed stone walking surface.

This is the western entrance, which has a much more "finished" look to it.

Nice stone work on the outside and brickwork inside for the first 100 feet or so.

It's close to a mile long and was once the longest railroad tunnel in the country (world?).

I'm not sure why the didn't build a nice looking entrance on the eastern end.

I have just a small pond so I really had to restrain myself when buying plants yesterday.

The water lily is pretty though and I'm already thinking of turning one of the

stock tanks from Daneland into another pond.

Maze (Mazikeen) joined us at Patch this afternoon.

Maze is very social and made the rounds letting people love on her.