I just returned from my second vacation of June as well as my second wedding of June. My friends Andy and Mary were married on Saturday and my sister and I very much enjoyed the reception on Saturday evening. I am convinced the band is unemployed masters students from Shenandoah – they were awesome. But I digress – or actually I jump ahead. We arrived Thursday evening. Driving under the bossy influence of the GPS we arrived in Dulles around 7:00, checked into the hotel, put on clean shirts, and immediately went to Sweetwater Tavern for dinner and drinks (first visit of 3). We got our growler filled (sad story to come later) with one of their specialty brews called Wits End. Friday started off well. I got up early, no idea how, and went for a run in the hotel workout room. I got to watch Wimbledon while running so that made it a bit less horrible than usual. It was a bit overcast so we went shopping at Leesburg Outlets and drove around the old neighborhood. We had dinner in Clarendon (found courtesy of the bossy GPS) with Suzanne’s former work mate Kro and her boyfriend Felix. Clarendon is one of the many small towns now part of the DC commuter area. There is lots of good shopping and good eating in Clarendon if you should be in the area but are nervous about driving into the city. We managed to get back to the hotel and hit the sack after a long first day.
The weather turned beautiful on Saturday so we headed to Harpers Ferry to do a bit of hiking and sightseeing.
You can pick up the AT in Harpers Ferry and follow it into the historic town. It is a nice old civil war town. There is an active railroad station there and many interesting historical treasures. We hiked the mile or so to town, shopped around and then found a balcony on which to have lunch and watch the tourists walk the streets. After lunch we retraced out steps on the AT and drove back to Sterling to get ready for the evening wedding festivities. The reception was held at Clyde’s at Willow Creek in Ashburn Virginia. The have a covered patio and a nice bar. It was a lovely reception, great food, an open bar, and one of the best wedding bands I have ever heard. Also the tables were labeled with characters from Monty Pythons Holy Grail. This would have been funny by itself but it got better when the cake arrived and it was a replica of the castle in the Holy Grail complete with cow catapult and the Trojan rabbit….very funny. We ate, drank and danced the night away before heading back to the hotel to rest for another fun filled day.
Sunday was intended for another hike, but it was slightly rainy so we headed into Tyson’s Corner for more shopping. We hit the Trader Joes and got non-perishables then made our way to Tyson’s Mall – this is a big mall, but still just a mall really. We hit up the H&M (one of our favs), the L.L. Bean and Teavanna (a great tea store) before heading to Coastal Flats for lunch. Coastal Flats is one of the chain restaurants in the Great American chain. It is good, but we agree that Sweetwater is the best of the chain. We shopped as long as we could stand and then headed back to the hotel. We made plans to meet Linn at the Sweetwater in Centerville. We arrived a few minutes late and Linn was waiting at the bar. We didn’t have to wait very long for a table so we were happy about that. Our waitress had a funny voice – it was just under the pitch of a dog whistle, barely audible to human ears. I am sure this would have been a muppet character voice had she not been merely 12 years old. We enjoyed a great dinner – as usual, and good conversation. Linn gave me a bottle of Dennis’ last batch of wine which I am looking very forward to drinking and we headed back to the hotel. By this point in the trip we are pretty weary, but undaunted. We pre-pack since we have breakfast plans in the morning and hit the sack.
Monday morning came early! We rushed around getting ready to drive to Winchester to meet friends for breakfast. In our haste to pack and get out the door we left in the refrigerator a half full growler of Sweetwater beer. So not only did we leave beer behind, we left the growler – very sad indeed. I hope whoever cleaned the room makes good use of it! We made our way to Winchester to meet Janette (my former voice teacher from Shenandoah) and Grace (former classmate at Shenandoah for breakfast. We visited with them until almost lunchtime and then we had to get going. Before getting on the road we hit up the new bookstore on campus so I could replace my broken Shenandoah Conservatory mug. On the way out I ran into one of my theory teachers and had brief reunion. About 1:30 we got on I81 south and made our way to the Luray exit so we could enter the Shenandoah National Park at about the mid point. We found our trail at 3:20 and got in another beautiful hike. It was about 74 degrees in the park with very low humidity. Early on the hike we heard noises in the woods and managed to catch a couple of deer hiding in the brush – pretty cool – and oh, so glad it wasn’t a bear! We continued along the Rose River Trail as it descended over tree roots and rocks to a 67 foot cascade of waterfalls. Not ready to quit the hike we continued along to Doyle River Falls, but the lateness of the afternoon made us think better and we began to retrace our steps. This trail is deeply wooded so I didn’t want to get stuck trying to hike out in darkness or at feeding time for the animals since we were so close to the stream and had already seen deer and raccoons – I mean, how far behind could the bears really be? We pushed through and got back to the car a little after 6:00. We drove the 15 miles out of the park and then hooked back up with I81 South and turned toward Staunton to find a hotel and have dinner. We checked into the Days Inn and immediately headed to Baja Bean for margaritas and food. Much satisfied we headed back to the hotel to rest for the evening and prepare for the long drive home.
Tuesday morning we drove through Staunton to get some pics for Sandra before heading toward home. It was sad to leave the beauty of the mountains, but more sad to be driving in increasing heat. We got up to 96 degrees on the drive home and boy was it hot driving. Pulled into the driveway about 6:00 unpacked, greeted my sister’s cats and then I headed to the store to supplement dinner since the fridge was pretty barren. We tiredly watched the Braves pull out an extra inning win over the Phillies and then crawled to our own beds for a nice long rest. It was a good vacation, but I am happy to have some time at home since I only had one day between this trip and the previous one in Colorado. This is a small sampling of pics - if you want more, go here. There are lots more, but I am feeling lazy after these two fun trips.
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