The Vining Cabin is one of many (40 plus) cabins available for rent by either the public or members of the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club (PATC).
These cabins are made available at very low cost because of the tremendous generosity of prior owners and the on-going mostly volunteer stewardship of PATC volunteers. For more information about PATC visit their website located at:
What is now referred to as the Vining Cabin is part of what was called the Mutton Hollow Farm and it adjoins a large 600 plus acre tract of land and cabins that was generously donated by Dr. Vining and his family. For those who enjoy adventure and joy of of discovering special deeply historic connections you will be interested in knowing that there is a bath tub which was used by Winston Churchill, Bertrand Russell, W H Auden and many many other famous people which is available for the common man to take an open air bath or use to chill his beer under the canopy of the seemingly timelessness of the ancient mid-Atlantic woods the following two links provide first and insight to the aesthetic nature of staying at a primitive PATC cabin and then a view of a the bathtub once used by many famous people:
The following link is to a good video about PATC's Mutton Top Cabin which is also on the Vining Tract:
CONNECTIONS:
Dr. Vining who was a professor at UVA found out that he could obtain some recycled bathtubs from the faculty club which had hosted many many very famous people and it just so happens that a tub which was used by lots of famous people who had visited UVA was headed for the dump. Well one of those tubs which had hosted and comforted many famous peoples naked bodies is now located out in the open air of the Appalachian woods on the Vining Tract. WHO WOULD HAVE EVER GUESSED?! How many unassuming trails have hosted the intimate presence of prior dignitaries of today's or prior worlds!?
MUTTON HOLLOW FARM
As written up in the PATC newsletter, The Potomac Appalachian of January 2004
ATC has leased the 675-acre Daniel
Vining family farm located in Greene
County, Va. The farm, previously owned by
Daniel Vining’s parents, Dr. and Mrs. Rutledge
Vining, adjoins PATC’s Vining Tract, which
was obtained by purchase and grant from the
Vinings in the early 1980s. It is a classic example
of a 19th century Appalachian farm containing
a log cabin, numerous barns and other
out-buildings, and pastures surrounded by
stone and rail fences. The farm is located at the
end of Mattie’s Run Road (State Rte. 635) in a
valley at the bases of High Top and Daniels
Mountains (PATC Map 11). Known as the
Mutton Hollow Farm, it consists of extensive
pasture land bisected by Mattie’s Run and is
surrounded by rapidly rising forested hillsides
that ascend nearly 1,000 feet to where the property
adjoins PATC’s Vining Trail
Cabin Will Enter System Soon
With the lease, PATC members gain access to
the entire property for hiking and the cabin,
which will enter the rental system once minor
repairs are completed. The cabin consists of
the original chestnut log structure, estimated
to be more than 100 years old, and a stone
addition constructed by Dr. Vining. The first
floor of the cabin contains two large sitting
rooms, a kitchen, and a bathroom. A large
bedroom is above the sitting room in the log
portion of the house. Well water is pumped
into the house to a toilet, shower, and bathroom
and kitchen sinks. The cabin also has
electricity for hot water, cooking, lights, and
baseboard heat. Fireplaces in both sitting
rooms provide additional heating. The cabin
will sleep six people.
The farm contains many roads and trails that
will provide opportunities for hiking and
exploring the area. Several of the trails extend
to existing trails on PATC’s Vining Tract and
to the Goose Pond/CCC Road that bisects the
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