The Valley
I’ve been to a lot of places in my life, 13 different countries and 35 of these great United States to be exact. I’ve seen a lot of mother nature’s creations all throughout earth and not one of them have ever been as welcoming and beautiful as Sinking Creek Valley. It runs along with route 42 that stretches from Newport to New Castle, Virginia. It has the most intricate colors of green you’ll ever lay your eyes on. When spring hits I swear there’s just as many colors in the trees as fall. My favorite is the brightest green trees, they can be overwhelming in their random patterns.
If you think the colors and trees are beautiful take a step inside and take a look. You’ll find the deer grazing hard and trying to find that spot where they want to drop their fawn. You’ll hear the echoes of the Toms’ gobblings bouncing off the trees.
One morning I was sitting at the base of a tree working on my turkey call. It was a beautiful morning-the fog was still settled on the ground when I got out there, and as the sun slowly rose the fog went with it while the rays shinned through and lit up the forest. I was sitting on the back side of the national forest on a part of our farm that we call the “Moses” property. I had already heard one Tom but he was far off, I believe he was across the road from me on another stretch of woods. It got to be about 7 am so I thought I had better load up my stuff and go check the farm and do my daily chores. As I stood up I looked over and saw a bobcat walking down the trail kind of parallel to me. Usually I’d be in a complete hurry to pull the gun up and stretch him out but that day was different. With the sun coming through the fresh spring leaves and the moss shining bright, that bobcat just stopped and sat down and looked out over the mountain as if he could see every bit of beauty I saw in that moment.
I just slowly sat back down and let him enjoy his moment. He just sat there, he didn’t have his nose turned up so he wasn’t hunting anything, he was just sitting there soaking it all in (and so did I) until he walked off. Then I stood up and walked back to the my parked farm Gator.
That’s just what this valley will do to you, it will stun you and bring some peace to your life. The sunsets are priceless. I sat on a ship for a few months while I was in the Marine Corps and watched a lot of beautiful sunsets but none like these. You want to talk about a lot of colors? Ive seen red, purple, orange, yellow, blue – you name it. There’s many different stages to one sunset out here. It’ll start out gold with the rays breaking out of the trees pointing upward in the sky like spot lights. Then as the sun slowly sets down it’ll turn red, then purple and finally a dark relaxing blue that’ll make you want to start up a camp fire and listen to the frogs all night. It truly is a stunning place, the valley is. I sure look forward to the many more years that I have to come in this valley. I want to learn every inch of what it has to offer.
