While vacationing in Pembroke, VA we discovered an unusual creek that I simply had to yelp about. What makes a simple ordinary creek yelp worthy you ask? Well, it disappears!
At the time of our visit, we had no idea of this phenomenon. As we drove to our Air B&B location, we simply thought the creek along the way had dried up from lack of rainfall and didn't give it another thought. Later, after exploring the area we learned that the two covered bridges we visited were actually on the SAME RIVER as the dried up one near our accommodations. How could that be?
The dried creek bed is located approx. 5 miles downstream from the covered bridges, and less than a mile from where it reappears and actually flows into the larger New River.
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CONFUSED? We were too until we discovered this area of Virginia is rich in what is called KARST TOPOGRAPHY. To avoid complicated scientific terms, just simply picture one of those multi-level bridges you see in cities like New York, San Francisco, Philadelphia and even Portland. Imagine an opening in the top layer causing all the traffic to flow to the lower level. However, when the bottom layer is full, the excess traffic is forced back up to the upper layer (hypothetically speaking).
When there is sufficient water flow, you would never know the water is actually leeching underground to a cave-like drainage system. The water would fill the underground system to the point where all of the excess water stays above ground in the rivers basin. But when the water flow is lower and there is not enough water to fill the cavity, the water disappears underground (not visible on the surface) only to reappear as if from a spring near New River into which it flows.
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Most people would probably find this sort of information nerdy and underwhelming, but I found it to be absolutely fascinating. I only wish I had taken pictures of the dried creek bed, but at the time of our visit, I had no idea of what was actually occurring. Our host home told us the creek was full just two weeks prior from heavy rainfall. Not to mention we saw with our own eyes a significant amount of water in the creek below the bridges just a few miles away.
I swear, you are never too old to learn something new.
2020 / 32 read more