10:45 4/26/2003

Friday we said our goodbyes and hit the road. We had a fairly easy day - only 170 miles under tow. Stopped at aa mall in Glen Allen, VA for lunch at Chili's. Expensive but nice hamburgers and it made a change from the small town America we've been seeing. We spotted a Circuit City and went over to 'check out' the cameras. Ended up buying a Sony Cybershot DSC-P72 camera. It was $340; takes pictures, will make GIFs, will even take short MPEGs! Looks like it will be fun but the learning curve might be something. I was kind of hoping for a remote to take self-portraits but none of them have one. Oh well! It has rechargable batteries & needs more!

What with all that shopping and terrible traffic (and it started raining) it was about 16:00 when we pulled into the Prince William Travel Trailer Village in Dumfries, VA. I think it is part of the Prince William County Park System. Nice little place; not much space between rigs but the spots are slanted so you do see trees out the window. It is $22 a night with no sewer. We'll have to try and be good or I'll be using the blue meanie! Signed up for 4 nights (leaving Tuesday) but may stay for more. When I opened the fridge I found it not working. We'd run out of propane completely. Bah! Went and got propane, then got batteries for the camera (just in case) and some wine to take to dinner. We were off to dinner with Connie and Steve at Steve's place in DC. We left the trailer about 18:40; got on the Metro about 19:30 & got to his place about 20:30! What a trip! First of all, we couldn't work the ticket machines. Fortunately it wasn't busy and the guys had lots of time to help us out. We had to go into the city and change trains; then Steve got us confused telling us to go out the way marked 'Shuttles'. Anyway, we did find him - good thing too because he wants to leave on vacation and was waiting to see us before he leaves.

Connie has a PT Cruiser. Cute and we all four fit in it very well. Steve lives in a little house he bought in 1982; I thought it small but very nice. Hardwood floors, fireplace, dining room and a nice little back yard are all I remember of it. He served quite a dinner starting with champagne, appetizer, lasagna, salad and dessert of pie & ice cream. Neither Judie nor I could manage the dessert, we aren't used to eating so much. He served some kind of very nice Chianti with the lasagna. The stuff we brought him may end up as cooking wine if those are his tastes! The three of them talked about people they had known for the whole evening. About 23:00 I started giving Judie the 'we gotta go' sign but it was more like 23:30 before we got out. We all had to go again because Connie can't find her way around Steve's neighborhood. I don't blame her either because the first direction Steve gave her was to go down an alley for about 4 blocks! Life is tough enough without driving down alleys at midnight in the rain. Then we had the hour on the train to finally get back to the truck; then half an hour's drive getting home about 01:30. Was Sammie ever glad to see us!

This morning there are still lots of showers around. Took Sammie out & it started to piddle, then rain. We may spend much of the day inside recuperating and learning more about the new camera. Took a couple of shots of each other on the train last night but none of either Steve or Connie. Duh! Haven't even uploaded them yet.

12:45 4/26/2003

We did upload the pictures just for the heck of it including an mpeg of Sammie. You connect the camera to the computer, the computer sees it as a removable disk drive and there you are. You can view things from the camera or move them to a real disk drive almost that fast. The only hassle is that you have to remove the camera from the system carefully. It will be a long time before we can lose that instruction booklet!

Decided to take the truck (and Sammie) into DC just to check it out. I've gotta admit that it was impressive just to be driving past all these famous buildings and monuments. You can't get anywhere near the Capital or the White House - surprise, surprise. Of course, we weren't really expecting to either. The lady at the campground office said the Capital has been reopened; we don't know if she was confused or not. We are mainly here for the Smithsonian and the memorials as far as I'm concerned.

Driving in DC was a pain even though it's exciting. I love seeing the Washington Monument in the distance; it's like seeing the Space Needle or the Eiffel Tower. You get that instant place recognition from seeing it across the tops of the trees. There were lots of people driving though who didn't have a clue about where they wanted to go and a reasonable number of cabbies with death wishes. More than one pulled out in front of us and at least one made a right turn from the center lane without signaling. That shit is ok in Manhattan where everyone knows what they are doing but to do it in a city full of tourists is just stupid. Plus, of course, parking is really tight so you have people double parked and/or waiting for spaces all over the place. Not a good place for the truck; a Mini would be lots more fun but even then! (The next day we heard on the news that a tourist kid was killed and his mother injured by an out-of-town tour bus while crossing a street in a crosswalk. The combination of tourists, drivers unused to the city and tight spaces was deadly.)

Came home & had leftovers. Only a little more curry left! (Still yummy though!) Judie watched a three hour movie Ginny had given her and I read a sailing magazine. It had a story where someone lost their boat on the rocks then rebuilt it. It wasn't an inspiring story just a story of stupidity.

08:46 4/27/2003
Got up at 07:00, Sammie was thinking more about 06:30 but I wasn't playing. We walked or rather she towed me. I let her get away with it for most of the walk then make her walk properly since I don't want her to have totally bad habits! Perhaps I should reverse the order so she sees the freedom as a reward for walking properly; I'll think on it.

We are planning to see Connie again today. We didn't really get to talk about what we are doing now or planning for the future the other night. We are to meet her at 18:00 at the Dupont Circle metro station. We are thinking we'll see a couple of monuments afterwards. We are trying to leave Sammie alone for something less than 10 hours and since there is a total of 4 hours travel back & forth; we aren't getting as much time to tour around as we would want.

I did go out & got bolts for the truck. There is a wind deflector or something that lost some bolts so I got replacements - 10mm pitch 25mm long or something like that. The guy had a really neat set of gauges to measure bolts & I wanted to buy one but he directed me to an auto parts store! Hmmmm.... Anyway, got some more cash, food, etc. while I was out.

08:24 4/28/2003

Had a good afternoon yesterday. Left about 15:00 for the city. 30 minutes driving to the Metro and another 30 or so getting to our stop. Though we'd check out the National Archives before meeting Connie. Walked almost all the way around the building & couldn't figure out how to get across all the construction that was going on! Maybe next time. Anyway we had a great time in the National Sculpture Garden. Lots of really nice things and I got some decent pictures with the new camera (stored in the National Sculpture Garden folder). The main folder for this trip is Washington DC 2003; there are sub-folders for the major portions of the trip.

Had a very nice evening with Connie. Ate at a restaurant she suggested - got a discount for being 'early' totall was $78 with 2 bottles of wine. Spent another $30 on 4 more glasses! Judie and I were just having fun. Had a quiet trip back; getting home about 11:30 if I remember correctly.

Got up this a.m. & walked Sammie. This place is pretty quiet now in the water-electric lanes. The full hookups are still fairly full. Works for us!

Connie is coming here for dinner tonight. We will go to Mount Vernon today and prepare for the visit, might even get to the library to check out email.

We got a call from Hitch King on the answering machine at home so I called Hitch King back today. Their number is 727-573-0662. They sold the old boat trailer for $225 after they put new hubs on and we get $200. Cool!

09:08 4/29/2003
Nice day yesterday. Went to Mount Vernon and had a very nice time. It is more a gentleman farmer's residence than that of an eccentric (like Jefferson). Washington was interested in having his farm be profitable and made it so. He had 8000 acres to farm and good people in charge. He was gone a lot, 8 years during the war, 8 more as president just for starters but when he was home had a few visitors: like 450 a year or so! Apparently it worked for them. The place has been restored with original colors, etc., which were quite bright. Apparently that was GW's taste. The gardens were interesting and we found a flower, a Crown Imperial that we'd never seen. Its flowers hang upside down; it is said to be hanging its head because it was the only flower that didn't welcome Jesus (or something like that). Got some nice pictures and our first real mpeg of the view of the Potomac - like Monticello you couldn't take pictures in the rooms. Hate that! Have loaded all the pictures to the trip folder under Mount Vernon.

We found the little Dumfries library and Judie did email & paid some bills while I went to the store. Got stuff for dinner: chicken, skewers, veggies, etc. Connie showed up pretty much on time though I think the traffic was awful. We sat outside and talked then came in to eat. A nice evening and Connie is a very interesting person.

Slow start to today but I do need to go pay for camping here a few more days. We still haven't seen any of the things we came to see!

19:48 4/30/2003
TWO interesting days to write about! Excellent too!
Yesterday, Tuesday, we decided to go into the city about noon and check out things until 20:00 or so. Unfortunately when we arrived at the Metro parking garage there was no room. So we decided to drive into the city. The trip wasn't so bad but then it took quite a while to find a space. We wanted to hit some museums but couldn't find a parking space. Finally we found one that was JUST big enough in front of the 2nd Division monument on the Ellipse. It required that we leave by 16:00 but we thought that it would be ok. That is way down by the monuments so we decided to make it a monument day. First we checked out the Vietnam Memorial; then Lincoln; then Korea; then WWII; then we cut up and saw the White House. Finally we returned to the truck. We must have walked 5 miles! We were both really glad to see that truck. Drove out of town and accidentally got on the George Washington Memorial Parkway headed north; took a while but we finally got turned around and headed south. The GW was great. A very smooth ride down to Mount Vernon; then we got on US 1. 1 was fair; had some slow parts but what the hell. Lots of congestion around the entrances to Ft Belvoir. Got home about 17:00. All the pictures are in the Landmarks in DC folder.

Today we decided to go in early & see those museums. We went up to see the Capital and planned to walk back to the Smithsonian. The Capital was pretty neat; we would both like to come back some time and see the inside after our current terrorist blitz is over. There were some people on the Capital lawn who were reading the Bible in its entirety. Amazing! Anyway then we went down to the Smithsonian. We started at the Castle. It is the original building with nothing much in it for the tourist these days. We decided to hit the Museum of American History first and the Museum of Natural History later; the Hirshorn was our third choice.

The Museum of American History was neat. It had lots of interesting stuff and a fair amount of stupid stuff too. There was an exhibit about Presidents and another about First Ladies that was highly recommended. We saw both and thought they were so-so. Liked some of the 'regular' stuff though.

We had lunch at American History then went on to Natural History. At Natural History we got to see the Hope Diamond, a whole bunch of other jewelry, a living insect museum & other stuff. Great stuff. I was really glad that the woman with the insects didn't ask Judie to hold a cockroach; don't know where that would have gone!

We left Washington about 15:20 - got off the train about 16:30 - got to the trailer about 17:15. Not fun! Traffic was really slow & awful but we didn't have much alternative. Yesterday on Highway 1 we got in the big backup caused by an accident on the other side of the road. At least we didn't have any accidents today.

Tomorrow we plan to leave here. We'll get some propane if we need it; gas; go to the library and get the email and leave. We are planning to move to the Skyline Highway in Virginia for a couple of days. Check it out then move on down the Blue Ridge Parkway. We'll check out that area then move southwest. When we get to the end; we'll stop and head for home. Sound like fun!

Go to Shenandoah

Go back to main