Zip into fall on a Virginia Canopy Tours line in the sky

Virginia Canopy Tours managers En Kite (L) and Amanda Fowler (R) say their zip lines in the Shenandoah River State Park are open until Dec. 1. Photo by Kim Riley.

Why just look at the changing fall colors from a distance when you can be part of the seasonal tree transformations while attached securely to a steel cable zip line that swiftly moves you through the canopy at Andy Guest Shenandoah River State Park.

Virginia Canopy Tours, located inside the state park off US-340 in Bentonville, roughly nine miles south of Front Royal, Va., offers eight zip lines on its canopy tour, where participants fly through the forest at heights of 15 feet to 90 feet, traveling at speeds up to 40 mph.

“At the highest point, you’ll be right at the treetops, so the trees on the ground look like little bushes,” joked Amanda Fowler, one of the three managers at Virginia Canopy Tours along with En Kite and James ‘Jay’ Herringdine.

The $89-per-person zip line excursion includes ground school, a UTV trail ride, a sky bridge crossing, one air stair bridge climb, two nature walks, and a rappel at the end of the course. Certain folks and groups get discounts on that price.

All participants receive individual safety and braking training, get a helmet to wear, and are accompanied by two certified eco-trained guides, who will point out panoramic views of the Massanutten Mountains, as well as the hardwood forest and native plant species of the Shenandoah Valley. Guests also may hear folk tales and stories about the region’s history during their nature hikes with the guides.

“Your job as a guide is to not make it boring,” said manager En Kite, a native of Strasburg, Va., who’s been with Virginia Canopy Tours since it began almost five years ago.

Zip liners are securely attached to cables by lanyards and all the safety equipment is handled by the guides working for Virginia Canopy Tours, according to Kite.

Merchandise, snacks & drinks are sold by Virginia Canopy Tours at its headquarters building, which also includes restrooms, tour and tubing gear, and a computer station for photo options. Photo by Kim Riley.

And when you’re out there, high atop the trees, it’s almost mechanical in a way, Kite said. “It’s more like an amusement park ride in the sense that you feel really secure about what’s happening.”

Kite explained that there’s a lot of redundancy. “You’ve got the chest harness, the waist harness, you’ve got two wires with two trollies, you’ve got two clips and you’re never fully unclipped,” Kite said.

Because the guides handle everything, participants don’t even bother with any of it, said Kite, who added that the mechanical redundancy usually helps calm people before they zip.

“Most people’s fear is falling — it’s not a fear of heights,” Kite noted. “I always tell them you’d have to be having a really bad day out here because even all the trees are also clipped up to other trees more than one time so that if they had some kind of trouble there are several other trees to keep the cables in place.”

A Virginia Canopy Tours guide comes in ahead of the pack for a landing. Photo by Kim Riley.

Zip liners hold on to handle bars for stability as they zip.

“You’re not holding yourself up,” Kite pointed out. “People think the zip line is like a cannon and they’ve got to hold on really tight. But if you let one hand off, you’ll turn because your stability is reduced. It’s like riding a bike almost — except you can’t go in any direction but one.”

Kite said the tour goes through several points where a zip liner may sail in the canopy or above the canopy, and there are even times when guests are zipping through the canopy.

“One of my favorite zips goes from the high zip down to where you’re kinda in the canopy and you go down into this cave, which is the canopy that’s been trimmed,” explained Kite.

A zip liner flies toward the platform with one hand on the cable and the other on the handlebars for stability. The Virginia Canopy Tours guide handles the mechanics. Photo by Kim Riley.

Unlike practices at other companies, which might require zip liners to repeatedly climb up and down to move between platforms, Kite said that zip liners with Virginia Canopy Tours continuously stay in the air until the midway point, where they are released for a water break and then walk to another platform where they’re reengaged with their zip line to continue the canopy tour in the air.

That walk also requires zip liners to travel across a suspended wooden bridge to get to the next phase of the tour, regardless of whether they want to, said Kite, referring to the apprehension some participants express prior to walking it.

“If you didn’t want to do the bridge, then we’d have to rescue you from the platform,” Kite mused, because there’s no other way to continue the roughly 2.5-hour course.

Gotten stuck? Don’t worry. Fowler and Kite explained that the guides have been trained to help in such sticky situations.

Virginia Canopy Tours Manager En Kite details the natural surroundings on a hike. Photo by Kim Riley.

For instance, all the zip lines have enough downhill momentum to get people up the uphill portion. The more a person weighs, the faster he or she will zip.

“Normally, the heavier you are you won’t have a problem getting to the end [of the zip line],” said Kite. “It’s the younger kids that might have more trouble, but even then, it’s designed so that they can get to the end.”

However, if someone does get stuck in the middle of the line, guests have been trained at ground school to do what’s called a self-arrest, which is to stop themselves in the middle of the line — usually called a park and brake, Kite said — so that a person is able to grab the line on either side of the trolley to stop forward motion.

“If you make it toward the uphill portion but you don’t make it all the way in, you stop yourself so you don’t go all the way back out and then you just turn your back toward the platform and pull yourself in, hand over hand,” Kite explained. “All your weight is held in the harness so it’s not like you’re pulling your entire body weight up the line.”

Guides also are trained to conduct an assisted self-rescue, which entails zipping out on the line to the stuck guest, clipping themselves together, and then pulling them both in, Kite said.

“Staff are trained in several different rescues, just in case,” Kite said. “All of it is very precautionary.”

Virginia Canopy Tours Manager En Kite (L) provides Royal Examiner Account Executive Bruce Beavers (R) with information about the changing natural habitat in the state park. Photo by Kim Riley.

Fowler added that people tend to get stuck for random reasons, like inappropriate braking or a bit too much wind, not because they’re afraid.

But if someone did get scared and stopped mid-line, Fowler said the guides also are trained to help people move along in the process.

“It may seem a little dramatic while it’s happening,” said Kite, “but it always works out fine.”

Nature abounds

Motoring UTV-style out to the course’s midway point and exiting near the company water cooler, Kite pointed out white oaks, edible huckleberries, reindeer moss, witch hazel, and other varieties of plants along the trail, some poisonous and others safe.

Guides will note such items during the two nature hikes guests are provided as part of the canopy tour. Different seasons, weather and guides make each nature walk a unique experience for participants, Kite added, “so you’ll never hear about the same things over and over again” when returning for another zip line outing.

Kite suggested that participants wear closed-toed shoes as most of the injuries they’ve seen are derived from simply walking on the ground and not noticing tree roots or rocks, for instance. The guides do point them out so pay attention to what they tell you as you’re hiking on the nature walks.

Also on the nature walks, Fowler said guests are guided over two streams, which this season looked more like raging rivers due to all the rain.

“Some days we had to cancel the tours because the streams were just impassable,” Fowler said.

The weather also impacted the number of visitors to Shenandoah River State Park, which she said seemed less crowded this summer.

“Normally, every weekend last year they were closing a lot because they would run out of parking spots,” Fowler said about the state park. “And we noticed that this year they weren’t really closing at all.”

Beavers (L) and Kite (R) in a Virginia Canopy Tours UTV head out to the zip midway. Photo by Kim Riley.

Virginia Canopy Tours relies on data posted online by the Bentonville-based Down River Canoe Company, which daily gauges the river’s level, speed and temperature, among other conditions, to inform its daily tube trips, she added recently.

Separately priced from the zip line expedition, the Tube Trip offered by Virginia Canopy Tours includes a life jacket and tube, requires each person to view a safety video before beginning a trip, and provides transportation to the river put-in location, all for less than $20 per person. The river take-out spot is within walking distance of the company’s parking lot, Fowler said.

Weather permitting, Virginia Canopy Tours’ last scheduled day open is Saturday, Dec. 1. Call ahead to (540) 622-2000 or go online at www.zipthepark.com to make reservations or learn about rates and participation requirements. On Mondays, Warren County residents save $10 on each ticket.