A few good books to help prepare you for visiting Shenandoah National Park/NPS

There's nothing like a good book or two to help you prepare for a national park visit, whether you're looking for some historical background, a trail or two to hike, or interested in the natural resources or local culture. With that in mind, here are a few titles you might consider in preparation of a visit to Shenandoah National Park in Virginia.

Shenandoah: A Story Of Conservation And Betrayal

Sue Eisenfeld opens a window into the lives of some of the mountain folk who called the Blue Ridge Mountains home before a large chunk was transformed into Shenandoah National Park and they had to move out. In Shenandoah: A Story of Conservation and Betrayal, Eisenfeld and her husband, Neil, seek out old homesteads and family cemeteries that have been grown over by the returning woodlands. They turned up pottery fragments, broken heirlooms, foundations, and chimneys, and rows of daffodils that outline some of these long-lost cabins. This is a wonderful book if you like to explore local cultures and find yourself wondering about those stone walls you occasionally come upon while hiking in Shenandoah.

Guide To Shenandoah National Park And Skyline Drive

This title started out as a printed edition by Henry Heatwole. It went through four editions, the last in 1988, and several reprintings, with corrections, the last in 1999. While you might be able to find a used copy somewhere, there's an online version you can turn to that has been updated. Created by the Shenandoah National Park Association with help from the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club, the park staff, and Tony Heatwole, this guide offers details on hikes through the park, information on vegetation and wildlife, seasonal conditions, lodging, campgrounds, and even geology.

The Undying Past Of Shenandoah National Park

Darwin Lambert's book, last published in 2001 and available through the Shenandoah National Park Association, is a well-researched and written history of how the park came to be. With chapters on Paleoindians, fur traders, early British settlers, miners, and more, Lambert also gives good coverage to those who lived in these mountains long before the park came about in 1935.

Becoming Odyssa, Epic Adventures On The Appalachian Trail

For anyone who has looked at the crooked path the Appalachian National Scenic Trail weaves along the spine of Shenandoah National Park and thinks they might like to hike it for more than a day or so, Jennifer Pharr Davis's first book is a great primer. Davis figured hiking the trail that runs from Maine to Georgia would be a way to both put off entering the working world and to spend more than a little time figuring out just who she was and where she wanted to go in life. Though she had grown up in western North Carolina not far from the A.T., Davis was never a serious hiker until she set out on a northward path from Springer Mountain in March 2005. In doing so, she began to fill internal voids. This book could help fill some of your own voids.