{"id":842,"date":"2016-03-20T23:20:43","date_gmt":"2016-03-21T03:20:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/art-rageous.net\/artrageousblog\/?p=842"},"modified":"2016-03-21T06:02:42","modified_gmt":"2016-03-21T10:02:42","slug":"rainy-day-ramble-to-lake-anna-state-park-march-20-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/art-rageous.net\/artrageousblog\/?p=842","title":{"rendered":"Rainy Day Ramble to Lake Anna State Park – March 20, 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

With my\u00a0Spring Break coming to an end, we decided do a scenic, back roads drive to Lake Anna State Park. We were last there March 22, 2014, so it was certainly time for a return visit. We were hopeful when we saw a few peeks of sunshine through the clouds as we left the house, but ultimately we encountered chilly temperatures, rain, and some rain mixed with snow! Much driving, but not much picture-taking this time!<\/p>\n

You can view a large, \u00a0interactive map<\/a>\u00a0 of our trip, and this is\u00a0a small screenshot that shows our route. The red dots represent the drive to Lake Anna, blue stars mark places we stopped, green dots show the return route, and the yellow dots show a brief side-trip loop!<\/p>\n

\"00-Trip-Map\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I took this picture of Wayne at Colling Point on Lake Anna (point 26 on the map). \u00a0It was in the upper 30s, breezy, and especially\u00a0cool by the water, so we didn’t stay long!<\/p>\n

\"01-Wayne-LakeAnna\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Unfortunately, by the time\u00a0we got to Lake Anna State Park, the weather was even worse! \u00a0The Park was basically deserted, and there were no boats out on the water. \u00a0Even though it was too wet to get out of the car and walk around, we enjoyed driving through the campground and picnic areas.<\/p>\n

\"02-LakeAnnaStatePark-1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Pretty place, even in the rain\/snow–and the lake is HUGE. \u00a0It’s about 17 miles from one end to the other, with over 200 miles of shoreline:<\/p>\n

\"00-LakeAnna\"<\/a><\/p>\n

With so\u00a0few pictures from today, here are some pictures from March 22, 2014 when we had much better weather:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sign at the entrance:<\/p>\n

\"024-LakeAnnaStatePark-Sign\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Red-tailed Hawk:<\/p>\n

\"045-RedTailedHawk\"<\/a>\u00a0\"044-RedTailedHawk\"<\/a><\/p>\n

American Coot, seagull, and ducks. \u00a0We also saw Ospreys in 2014, but we weren’t able to photograph them.<\/p>\n

\"036-AmericanCoot-LakeAnna-HighPoint\"<\/a> \"039-Seagull-LakeAnna-HighPoint\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"028-AmericanCoot-LakeAnna\"<\/a> \"038-Ducks-LakeAnna-HighPoint\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Sun setting\u00a0over the water:<\/p>\n

\"050-Sunset-LakeAnna-Dike3\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Fishermen at sunset:<\/p>\n

\"055-Fishermen-LakeAnna-Dike3\"<\/a><\/p>\n

When we left Lake Anna\u00a0in 2014, it was almost dark–and then it was REALLY dark when we tried to find our way home on back roads. \u00a0Thinking we were lost, we stopped by the side of the road to look at a map. \u00a0Up ahead and on the right we\u00a0could see some building lit up out there in the absolute middle of nowhere. \u00a0By accident, we’d discovered Tavern on the Rail<\/a>! \u00a0It was a wonderful, unexpected surprise, and our dinner was delicious.<\/p>\n

\"061-TavernOnTheRail\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"064-LobsterShrimp\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"063-SeafoodCasserole\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The restaurant (in a restored building from 1837) is only open Thursday – Saturday, so we didn’t have the option of stopping for dinner tonight. \u00a0We also decided to take a different route home, so we wouldn’t have passed it again, anyhow.<\/p>\n

We DID drive through the town of Mineral twice today, and I just\u00a0learned that the town was named “Mineral”\u00a0because it was an early mining center in Virginia. \u00a0It\u00a0had as many as fifteen gold mines, and zinc and lead mines operated into the 1970s. \u00a0Interesting!<\/p>\n

When we drove through Mineral\u00a0on the\u00a0way home, we turned\u00a0RIGHT when we came to this intersection. \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n

\"04-Cuckoo-Sign\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Given the history behind\u00a0the name of “Mineral,” I wondered how\u00a0the town of Cuckoo got its name.\u00a0Well, supposedly one of the first cuckoo clocks in Virginia was in a tavern\u00a0in the\u00a0little community, so the name “Cuckoo” stuck.<\/p>\n

And more\u00a0trivia: the 5.8 magnitude earthquake in August 2011 was centered near the town of Cuckoo, VA. Not only did I feel it (understatement!) at my school 60 miles away, it was felt in more than a dozen states and into Canada.<\/p>\n

We also passed through the town of Bumpass today. \u00a0I’ll let you Google that one yourself! \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

We’ll certainly visit Lake Anna again–but we’ll try for a day with more warmth and less rain!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With my\u00a0Spring Break coming to an end, we decided do a scenic, back roads drive to Lake Anna State Park. We were last there March 22, 2014, so it was certainly time for a return visit. We were hopeful when … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[96,98],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-842","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adventures","category-animals-wildlife"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/art-rageous.net\/artrageousblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/842","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/art-rageous.net\/artrageousblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/art-rageous.net\/artrageousblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/art-rageous.net\/artrageousblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/art-rageous.net\/artrageousblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=842"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/art-rageous.net\/artrageousblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/842\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":870,"href":"https:\/\/art-rageous.net\/artrageousblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/842\/revisions\/870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/art-rageous.net\/artrageousblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/art-rageous.net\/artrageousblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/art-rageous.net\/artrageousblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}