Last Sunday, my husband and I started at The Senior Center spur (behind the post office on Route 29) and hiked towards Greenbrier Park. The warning on the trailhead said that this trail is a wilderness trail, and it was so true. We picked raspberries along the trail, we jumped on fallen trees and holes and tried to avoid the mud. I felt like I was in the Tomb Raider game when we needed to use our brain to determine where the trail goes. Near Meadow Creek the trail seemed to stop. We saw a rope, which we thought a parent put for his kids. When we read the trail guide we picked at the trailhead we discovered that we needed to cross the Meadow Creek stepping on rocks. As I have short legs, my husband picked up couple of big rocks to place on the creek as supplementary to the existing rocks. The trail contained and we saw abundant fern, and a forest of tulip poplar and oak.

After crossing the Brandywine Drive we entered the Greenbrier Park, which offered wider and easier to navigate path. Both trails were covered with forest of trees, which protected us from the scorching sun. Again we didn't know what to do when we ran into the Norfolk-Southern Railroad crossing. It seemed as if we needed to cross the creek once again, or climb on the hill where the railroad goes through to pass the creek. After careful observation we determined that the trail continues on a big pipe in the railroad underpass. I was a little bit tired so we decided to end our hike and return.

I cannot wait to hike on different parts of the Rivanna Trail system and hope that they are all as fun as the one we took.

The map of the Trail System is available at http://monticello.avenue.org/rivanna/Map%20of%20Rivanna%20Trail.doc