The Pinnacles was our third hike of the three that Beth and I planned for our quickie day-tour of Shenandoah National Park. About an hour earlier we'd visited Hawksbill Mountain a few miles down the road, then drove back up north along Skyline Drive to dry out a bit at the Skyland resort stop. All day the weather had been foggy, cold, windy and wet, but the wetness had mostly been in the form of light sprinkles, so it wasn't too troublesome until now. In the past hour the intensity of the rain had picked up considerably. After about 20 minutes at Skyland, we drove about 4 miles further on northboud Skyline Drive and pulled into the Jewell Hollow Overlook, very near milepost 36, and sat in the car. The winds were gusting to about 40 miles per hour and the rain was quite heavy. My wonderful, loving and very patient wife Beth clearly did not think it was good hiking weather, and I had to agree with her. It was, however, good highpointing weather! Joking aside, I knew she wasn't eager to do this hike and I even offered that she could stay in the car if she so desired while I made a quick run of the peak. She did decide to go with me but only after winning a promise of a long back massage for that evening from me. So off we went into the woods.

From the parking area there is an open meadow which the Appalachian Trail crosses, about a 200-foot walk from the car. We got onto the trail and immediately into the trees, which helped mitigate the wind and sideways rain. A good trail gained generally eastward at a steady pace then swung northward up toward the top, marked by numerous rock piles and spires (hence the name). Now, exposed to the winds again, we scrambled off the trail slightly into the trees and thorny brambles and spent a very quick few minutes tagging rock tops and scrambling here and there. A spot elevation of 3,730 feet is listed on the map for this small summit. We did not visit the second area, the one without the spot elevation, a bit to the east. Instead we made a fast quick hike back to the car. The hike was short- maybe just 1.6 miles round trip. In better weather I'm sure it's very pretty. Actually, it was pretty... just wet and windy. Anyway, with daylight fading, we turned up the heater and drove a few miles north to Thurston Gap (milepost 31.5) where we exited off of Skyline Drive via US-211 and down into the town of Luray, where we caught US-340 which we followed about 50 miles back to Beth's folks' place.

The next morning the storm had passed but now the temperature had dropped into the high 20s with a very stiff breeze. We got to thinking whether it would have been more uncomfortable to do the hikes we did the previous day in the rain or the cold, stiff breeze. Despite the rains, the temps always stuck around 45... not warm, but not too cold either. I guess it's a toss-up.