Turks Gap Road

We don't own it. At least--not that chimney. Way WAY back, 1930's or so--the city bought the land under what is now the Sugar Hollow reservoir. The city also bought all the south fork of the Moorman's river (where Blue Hole is) and most but not all of the north fork. But they bought just the stream beds--not the land on either side. The land on either side is mostly Shenandoah National Park. If you look at the tax maps, the plat of the city property looks like a little string wiggling up the mountainside. Also, though technically owned by the city, the reservoir and its sources have been conveyed to the Rivanah River & Sewer Authority, a multi-jurisdiction entity. Why does all this matter?

Because no matter what jurisdiction the cop is from, if he arrests you for skinny-dipping at Blue Hole, arguably he's in the wrong jurisdiction. A county cop should have brought the case in the city courthouse. Or the federal courthouse. A city cop should be in the county courthouse. Etc.

Skinny dipping doesn't happen so much since the road out there was paved, and families with small children started showing after it got popular from being in the newspaper (gosh darn it). But in the early mornings, or late moonlit evenings, sometimes a tired Appalachian trail hiker does take a diversion downhill for a quick dip, as nature intended.

Without wishing to debate GPS coordinates,the metes and bounds in 90 year old deeds are the only accurate land boundaries as tax maps are very inexact approximations. But-- look at Sugar Hollow farm. The back entrance to the farm which is the flat spot with a stream coming down it, is just behind Blue Hole. That's private property. But the hill to its immediate east, overlooking Blue Hole and the road up to Blue Hole which further downhill has those magnificent soaring cliffs--that entire hillside up to the top is a kind of "island" of Shenandoah National Park. The opposite end of the island is (presumably) where the Charlottesville/RWSA property begins. The chimneys are I think in that Shenandoah National Park island, though I would insist on a surveyor doing metes and bounds if you wanted to put any money on it.

Cops? Sorry to hear of it. Next it'll be teenage lifeguards smelling of suntan lotion tweeting at swimmers out of boredom.

Strangely enough, Google maps accurately shows the island as a sea of green parkland isolated from the rest of Shenandoah National Park by the white squiggle which is the Charlottesville owned streambed of the south fork of the Moorman's River. But Google maps does NOT show the secret of the north fork, which is that the upper part is not parkland but privately owned. I guess the idea was that once the park severed road access, no need to spend scarce money buy it up.

For a really interesting former thoroughfare: go further up to Brown's Gap Turnpike. It s very old road that nobody knows crosses the mountain. Past a certain point the rocks and ruts force you to leave your car and walk. Stonewall Jackson used that old road for one of his lightning dash surprise marches into our valley. He would recognize it today--it hasn't changed--you can almost hear the wagons lurching, and the clatter of horses hoofs on rocks, and you can drink from the bright stream that must have stalled the march as hundreds and thousands of dusty hot tired troops could not be prevented from stoping to drink and refill their canteens.

Correction to myself: that USGS website offers for download newer satellite-photo based maps but has not yet posted all the older maps, better maps, hand-drawn maps that show details of park boundaries, together with springs, old mines, abandoned railroad trestles, lost graveyards, the collected wisdom of previous generations of map makers who walked or rode horseback to survey the area and knew every rock outcropping, every trickling freshet. We've lost that human-scale information with machine renderings of what a satelite can see. I have old-style paper 1977 USGS topographic maps updated in 1987 pieced together to show the Sugar Hollow area and will take a digital photo or provide the original for Mr. Spencer's inspection if he likes, to settle the question of who owns those chimneys. We all do: they are in the park "island."