Hiking Old Rag

Because sometimes, you have to skip work on a Tuesday so you can tackle one of Virginia's most challenging hikes

My friend, Michael, is a prolific hiker, climber, camper, biker, and general nature wanderer. I would be utterly unsurprised to learn that some Yellowstone visitors managed to catch a glimpse of him scaling a rock face in the background of their family photo and currently have it displayed as evidence of Bigfoot's existence in their living room. 

All to say, it's utterly unsurprising that he would be hiking Old Rag on a Tuesday. 

 

My participation was a bit more of a production. Namely the fact that I've never hiked Old Rag before and every YouTube video, Reddit thread, and blog post I frantically googled about it proclaimed Old Rag to be the hardest hike I'd ever do in my whole life that I probably shouldn't even attempt because I'd inevitably squish myself between rocks or, alternatively, find myself utterly incapable of pitching myself over a boulder. 

(I did find two videos particularly encouraging, I'll say! This one from @emilygoesplaces and this one from @mirandagoesoutside—love ya, Emily and Miranda. Tacos on me next time.) 

I digress. Around the turn of the year, my beloved friend, Tessa, proclaimed this year: "2026—f*ck it." Thus, I decided to do the hike and ignore the heaps of fear mongering I'd waged on myself. Old Rag—f*ck it! 

I snapped this gorgeous sunrise photo of the mountain on my drive to the trailhead 

I woke up at four (!) a.m. so I could get on the road by 4:45. Old Rag is about 2 hours away from Richmond and we wanted to hit the trail early. The full loop is 10 miles. The first half is one long, steady climb and then, of course, the famous rock scramble along the ridge line. The second half, I could barely find any footage of because it's apparently "so boring." (Let me tell you, around 1.7 miles up, when you've already shed two layers, gnawed through at least four of your pocket Twizzlers, and have energetic eight year olds flying past you—"so boring" sounds like heaven.)

It was around 40 degrees when we set out, quite a refreshing feeling to experience cool air on my cheek after several 80+ days. Was the ascent steep as hell? Yes. Did it go a lot quicker than expected? Also yes! Despite the aforementioned kids (and their parents) zooming past, we made it to the scramble relatively early. 

(I was very impressed by the speed of those parents, TBH, though it's probably yet another drop in the bucket of evidence that I am a slow walker—allegations I've been fighting for years.)

The first of many (many) false summits. Oh how optimistic we look!

Michael says, "Not bad for like the sixth picture we’ve ever taken together."

Turns out, the scramble IS hard as hell. It's also the most FUN part of the hike. Like...by far! It's bizarre to even try to describe...I have no idea how the first people to traverse this path managed to make it through without serious bodily injury. 

I was supremely grateful to be tackling it with Michael, somewhat of an Old Rag regular. (And at the very least, I figured, he's like 6'4" or some such ridiculous height and I could use that to my rescue when needed.)

(I'm extremely proud to report that I never needed it!)

There are places in the scramble where you legitimately belly-flop and shimmy through an impossibly tight squeeze. Others where you have to lower yourself down ~7 feet in a deceptively narrow ravine-looking space where the risk of being over-zealous or careless is smacking your face into a rock that's older than Pangea. (Literally....the Appalachian Mountains are kind of the spinal column of terra firma. They're older than trees. For real!) 

At one point, I found myself suspended in a full skandasana between two boulders. It was very Spiderman, if I do say so myself. There were several places where I had absolutely zero clue how to maneuver myself up and over—the rock either seemed too smooth or too steep. But at every challenge, there are well-worn hand and toeholds hidden in the rock that can offer much more support than at first glance. 

I am certainly in no position to offer climbing or Old Rag advice—being an ardent abstainer and absolute beginner, respectively—but I found two central truths helped me navigate successfully. One, a climber's motto, became my mantra: 3 points of contact. You always want three separate parts of your body to connect with the rocks. That could be hand, hand, foot or foot, foot, hand, or hand, hip, foot, or foot, ass, shoulder...you get the idea. 

The second was a particular piece of advice I received from a fellow yoga instructor, also a woman, when I was training to become a teacher: lead with your center of gravity. Women tend to have a lower center of gravity than men. It's why you see more guys that are able to ride a bicycle with no hands while women tend to have better standing balance. My ability to successfully maneuver through the rock scramble is, I believe, directly linked to me directing my body over and over to follow my center of gravity because that's where I experience the most stability. If I'd bailed on a decision mid-air or grip and threw more of my weight and energy towards my shoulders, for instance, I could've really injured myself.

(One third piece of advice, if I might be so bold? Bring gloves.) 

Hauling yourself up, over, underneath, and around rocks does, in fact, get old. Around the fifth or sixth false summit, I was super over it, TBH. But the only thing more impossible than going on is going back, so....thank god for pocket Twizzlers. (Seriously, best hiking snack ever!) 

Finally, finally!, we reached the true summit. And...wow. It really is breathtaking. Like...Maria and the Von Trapp children wearing her curtains in the mountains and learning to sing breathtaking. We took a nice, lengthy rest here—tucking into our pack snacks, snapping pictures, eavesdropping on other hikers' conversations, and—if you're me, anyway—changing socks. (Extremely grateful I did, BTW. No spoilers, but that definitely saved my feet a lot of unearned grief on the descent.) 

Camping isn't allowed at the top of Old Rag, for several good reasons, but I understand the impulse that might've encouraged some thrill seekers to try it. Every worldly problem, annoyance, and sensory overload seems SO small and far away from the top of any mountain. (See: my voyage to the top of Wapuwoc in Maine.)

All the vloggers and reddit shitposters were right about the descent from Old Rag, though: it sucks. Not only is the fire road that you eventually reach rather interminably long, the descent is rocky and HARD on the knees. Once, a tattoo artist named Brian, who has an ineffable way with words—which came in handy when he was an hour-deep into tattooing New Person's jutty shinbone— described his knee as nothing but "a bag of rocks." Michael has at least one of those and, after that descent, I fear I'm well on my way to joining them.

I cracked my ankle a few good times on the way down, which at least starts off just as scenic as the ascend. It quickly tapers off into a dusty, rocky, deserted road full of nothing, though.

(Another tip for you because I simply can't stop myself: when you get to the final fork in the path, when the ancient trail marker says you have 1.2 miles left to the parking lot and points you back towards the thicket of jungle onto a path that will have you scaling back UP to rejoin the path you traversed several hours ago on your initial climb, only this time in sweaty, cramping reverse....ignore that sh*t. Stay on the paved, FLAT road and you'll get back to your car a hell of a lot faster. Trust me, you're not missing anything but one more chance to swipe up against some poison ivy and for the skeeters to nibble.)

A snap I took on my way out of the park (and immediately towards the nearest McDonald's with a working ice cream machine)

We began our hike just after 7 a.m. and finished around 1:30. Honestly, not a bad split for a first-timer, in my humble opinion anyway! God, this hike was hard. But it was SO worth it. I am so proud of my body?! It's so capable and strong and resilient in ways for which I hardly give it adequate credit or gratitude. Yeah, this rocked (no pun intended). I certainly feel no urge to do it again anytime soon, but I doubt that's my last journey up Old Rag.

Top photo credit @SpencerWirkkala