Now, I’m not a destination-driven leaf-change color lover. This weekend just happened to be Chesterfield County Parks & Recreation’s Mommy & Me backpacking trip, an introductory wilderness experience for moms and future backpackers between the ages of 5 and 8. I’ve been leading this overnight trip twice a year now for more than 12 years, and this past weekend’s excursion reinforced why I keep doing this … even though sometimes my old body asks, why?

Friday, two families canceled due to flu, but late that afternoon, we rounded up a raring-to-go mom and 6-year-old, and Saturday morning off we sloshed—three families and me—up the Old Hotel trail in a Noah’s Ark rain. It’s a three-hour drive from Chesterfield to the trailhead at Hog Camp Gap off Route 60 between Amherst and Buena Vista. We had known it would be wet, but the continuous deluge seemed a bit heavy-handed, hiking with full packs through clouds so thick we could see only a couple of feet into a silvery mist wall. Kids and moms were prepared, though, but even so, we were all drenched. Luckily Saturday was warm, shorts-hiking, puddle-splashing weather.

Along the way we saw stone walls—so-called hog walls—part of a network of 12 miles of stone fence more than 200 years old, partitioning more than 1,000 acres for livestock grazing. The name of the trail, Old Hotel, is a misnomer. The only structure known to have been along this trail was possibly a 19th-century frame house, a summer retreat that became a shepherd’s refuge, then perhaps a hunting cabin. Nothing there now but a campsite under a huge oak in a big, grassy meadow. I’ve read that a Union soldier is buried near this site, perhaps cared for by the family that lived in the house.

Our destination was the Cow Camp Gap shelter, a much-frequented stop for Appalachian Trail thru-hikers. We got there around 3, only to find a substantial troop of Boy Scouts (from Powhatan) at the tent site. They had been headed for the meadow but got cut short by the downpour. We put up our tents near the shelter. I fixed Moroccan chicken with apricots and veggies over couscous for supper while one intrepid mom built a fire. She’d hauled a garbage bag of dry lightwood from home, assuring her son that despite the rain, we would have a marshmallow roasting fire. It was tough. She got a small blaze going, then dried larger wet logs, creating a spectacular, roaring campfire, perfect for stories, marshmallows and s’mores.