Pocahontas State Park (Chesterfield, Virginia)

Five miles down the road from where we were staying in Ashland, Virginia, is the Pocahontas State Park. Swift Creek meanders through the middle of 7,600 acres that are crisscrossed with numerous hiking and biking trails, campgrounds, and two small lakes. Although this is one of the most popular locations in the State Park system, we only saw a handful of people that day in late September, and we felt like we had the place to ourselves. Autumn colors were just beginning to tease the edges of the leaves, a hint of what lay ahead in this pretty forest. We enjoyed an 8-mile hike over mostly flat terrain, stopping for a picnic alongside one of the lakes.