Fairy Stone State Park

Virginia is beautiful this time of year. I had been looking up state parks all along our trip route and found Fairy Stone state park listed on the west side of the state. It was a little off the beaten path but....there are fairies involved and it sounded just so magical.

This place must be fabulous during the Summer months. As it was the leaves are covering the ground like a beautiful wool carpet and there is a chill in the air. We paid the small fee and brought out our picnic lunch while the kiddos went to explore the park a little.

There is a place where you can hunt for the fairy stones..so we went searching but to no avail.
Come to find out it is not even at the main park. We enjoyed our picnic then headed out to figure out where to hunt for the stones. That was the really reason we came, to find magical talismans.

To find fairy stones you actually have to leave the park and go back down the road a few miles to a gas station. The fairy stones are not anywhere near the park itself. We got there and were delighted to find a park ranger who gave us bags and explained what to look for.

"Fairy stones are staurolite, a combination of silica, iron and aluminum. Staurolite crystallizes at 60 or 90 degree angles, hence the stone's cross-like structure." The legend is that they are fairy's tears that crystalized into crosses upon hearing about Christ's death.

Hunting and gathering fairy stones took us several fun filled hours. We filled our little paper bags with a goodly amount and now have a great little collection. It was so delightful to have the peaceful forest surrounding us. It really did feel a bit magical there.