“The Mid-Atlantic”
8/12/17, “Back to Virginia”
En route, I-78 W, Pennsylvania
Another summer weekend begins,
and so too does another weekend of seeing National Parks Sites in the
northeast. It is, after all, what I have
been doing for four weekends in a row now.
However, on this weekend, there is no rental car, and I am a passenger,
not a driver, which is what allows me to write this entry.
My mother and I are on our way to Virginia to
visit what will be my last five NPS units in the state. Tomorrow will be spent along the Delaware
River, visiting the three NPS units on the river. Next weekend, when we visit her family on the
Jersey Shore, we will also visit the nearby site of Great Egg Harbor River,
which will at last allow me to say that I have been every NPS unit in both the
North Atlantic and Mid-Atlantic regions.
In further contrast, rather than leaving New York after work on Friday,
we left early Saturday morning, which will get us to our first NPS unit in
northern Virginia around 1 PM. It is now
9:30 AM, and on a weekday, I would usually be sorting through my emails at this
point, while having my first cup of coffee and my breakfast at my desk. We are now two states over from New York, I
am on my second (large) cup of coffee, and breakfast is long gone.
This weekend promises to be an epic adventure,
and while this succession of road trips was not at all what I had planned for
the summer, but I am glad I did it, as I will very much relish the day (a week
from today) when I can proudly say that the nearest unit of the National Park
Service I haven’t visited is in Ohio, that the nearest state capitol I haven’t
seen is in Lansing, Michigan.
Okay, so,
since I am starting this trip on a Saturday, properly on Day 1, the entry
should actually start with Night 0, Friday night, which actually happened to be
my movie night with the K-Man. We went
to see “Good Time,” an edgy crime film starring an almost unrecognizable Robert
Pattison. Raymond’s birthday was
Thursday, so the plan was for him to meet us after the movie, and we would take
him out for dinner. About an hour in to
the movie, the K-Man walked out. I
assumed he was going to the bathroom, but he never came back. I assumed he just didn’t like the movie and
was waiting for me outside. It wouldn’t
be the first time he did that.
After the
movie was over, I had messages from both Raymond and the K-Man. Raymond wasn’t feeling well, and the K-Man
got an urgent message from his boss and had to go back to the office. In other words, the evening was off. The K-Man thought he might be able to meet me
for dinner, so I biked back to my apartment, feeling like I was trapped in a
“Seinfeld” episode. I got back to my
apartment and waited for the K-Man, finishing my Prensado cigar and packing for
the trip. I managed to fit everything
into my small shoulder bag, and I was proud of my efficiency.
At 9 PM, I couldn’t wait for the K-Man any
longer, so I went to CPK on my own.
Rather than my usual pizza, of which I knew I would only eat half, I got
a pasta dish. It was a shrimp scampi
with a mix of linguini and sliced zucchini.
It was quite tasty. After dinner,
I had a VSG and got some stuff ready to put in the car in the morning to bring
to Scarsdale.
I fell asleep before
midnight and woke up around 6:30 AM. I
then got a call from my mother that she was rear-ended at a red light in the
city. We were delayed, but not
significantly. The car could have needed
immediate repair to be roadworthy. It
did not. When she was nearby, I went
downstairs and discovered further complications. Due to Summer Streets, a program in the city
that restricted Park Avenue to bike traffic only during summer weekends, my
block was closed off. I would have to
meet my mother on Madison, which made getting downtown even more complicated. All in all, by the time she got there, we
were only fifteen minutes behind schedule, and I had allotted an hour of Dutch
Time. We first went to Kossar’s Bialys
on the Lower East Side for breakfast, and I got an onion bialy with lox and
cream cheese, along with a coffee, and a bagel sandwich for later.
We had some traffic getting to the Holland
Tunnel, but we were still only twenty minutes behind schedule at this
point. It was a nice drive across New
Jersey, and we stopped at a gas station before we entered Pennsylvania for a
rest break and to get coffee, water, and power bars. By the time we got back on the highway, my
navigation showed a 12:37 PM arrival, which was looking good, as my target
arrival at the first NPS unit is 1 PM.
Once we entered Pennsylvania, I began writing this entry, which I will
now close.
Vienna, Virginia (Tysons Corner,
Virginia)
At least Edgewater, Maryland gave
me a good establishing shot. The same
cannot be said about this section of Virginia often called Tysons Corner, an
area shared between the communities of McClean and Vienna, where I am now. To think that I actually was worried about
getting to the hotel in time for a day-lit establishing shot. I cannot imagine that this view would in any
way be enhanced by sunlight. It has been
a hectic and chaotic day, but it was a success, and we had incredible luck with
the weather.
After I closed on I-78, we
soon entered Maryland, for 11 miles, followed by West Virginia, for less than
25 miles. That brought us to
Virginia. Three weeks after I left this
state, I was back, this time to say, “Virginia Complete.” To do that would require visiting four new
National Park Sites, plus revisiting Shenandoah, which was not strictly
necessary. The limiting reactant was
getting to the VC at Prince William Forest Park by 5 PM.
It would be a tight schedule, but we pulled
it off expertly. Usually when I travel
with someone, they slow me down. The
same could not be said of my mother, who is well-experienced in doing these NPS
runs with me. Instead, she actually
saved time, by driving while I was posting or getting coffee while I gassed up
the car. The only manner in which she
could not keep up with me was the hiking, and I was shocked that I was able to
fit two hours of hiking into our packed schedule. On that note, I will have to relocate to get
out of the rain.
Well, this view is even worse, as
this establishing shot shows, but I am relatively sheltered from the rain, and
that’s what matters. Due to formatting
when I post, I actually have to put in a few more sentences to allow the text
to round out the establishing shot.
While this is a very nice hotel, its location, along the busy highway,
with no good establishing shots, makes it much worse of a place for me than
some of the dumps I have stayed at with wonderful establishing shots. Okay, that should be enough text.
Our first stop was a National Historical Park
called Cedar Creek and Belle Grove NHP.
Cedar Creek was a rather significant Civil War battle, and the Belle
Grove Plantation served as headquarters for the Union general. They were combined into one NPS unit. There was an unusual amount of traffic, and,
when I got to the Visitor Contact Station, I learned that it was the result of
a 43-mile yard sale. That is not a
typo. 43 miles of yard sales. I did my business at the VCS, and we drove to
Belle Grove Plantation, where I lit up a Partagas, and we took our ceremonial
pictures. It was a very nice manor
house, and it made for a good picture.
I
put the cigar back in its metal tube, and we drove to Shenandoah National Park,
which I had previously visited, but it seems we never took any pictures. My old brochure had the stamp at the southern
VC, so we went to the northern VC, Dickey Ridge, this time, and I added that
stamp to the old brochure and also got a new one. The design had changed in the past 12
years. We went on a little nature walk
with the rest of my cigar, then took our ceremonial picture by the VC with a
great view of Shenandoah Valley.
It was
before 2:30 PM by the time we were back in the car. This was excellent timing, giving us a
tentative 4:30 PM hard arrival at the VC for Prince William Forest P. My reader will recall that I said that that
VC closed at 5 PM. From there, we headed
to Manassas National Battlefield Park, home of the two famed Battles of the
Bull Runs. We both thought that we had
been there before, but we had neither photos nor stamped brochures to support
that claim. I ate my bagel as we drove,
and we were soon at the VC.
I did my
business there, and we walked a bit along the battlefield to get a ceremonial
picture, lighting up an Aroma de Cuba for the walk. Their victory in the Second Battle of the
Bull Run, could be considered the apex of the Confederate war effort. The tide would soon turn after that battle. We were still looking good for our hard 4:30
PM at the Prince William Forest P VC, but I got a scare when Google Maps told
me the VC closed at 4 PM. However, the
NPS website confirmed that it was opened until 5 PM in the summer.
We got there around 4:30 PM and had enough
gas to make it to the next gas station, too, which was a concern. I did my business at the VC, getting an
additional brochure for the Potomac Heritage National Scenic Trail, which I had
not previously included in my count.
This allowed me to jump my count from 313 to 315 units. I was concerned I wouldn’t be hungry for the
6:30 PM dinner we planned, but I figured I could work up an appetite by
then. I relit my cigar, and we went for
another nature walk, the destination being a bridge that was about half a mile
away. My mother stopped about 1000 feet
from the bridge, and I told her I would catch up with her if she went back to
the car.
I made it to the bridge, which
had a great view, crossed it, turned back, and made for the car with all haste,
catching up with my mother just as we got to the parking lot. We had one last stop: Wolf Trap National Park
for the Performing Arts, where we were scheduled to see an outdoor concert at
the Filene Center. Rain was forecasted,
and we had been lucky to have escaped it so far. I’m sure my reader can guess what would
occur.
We stopped for gas and were at
Wolf Trap a little after 6 PM. The
ranger station would remained staffed until the concert ended, so there was no
real time concern, but the concert began at 7:30 PM, and we wanted to do our
walk and have dinner before the concert began.
We parked and walked to the Ranger Station. One problem.
No brochures. I kept getting the
runaround from a nasty volunteer who was staffing the RS, but I found a proper
Park Ranger, and he told me he could get more from the office. I thanked him profusely when he brought me a
brochure, and then I got my stamp.
We
went to claim our spots on the lawn with our chairs, and then we went for a
walk. My mother was spent, and I still
didn’t have an appetite. The concern was
not so much missing out on dinner, but rather that, if I didn’t eat now, I
would be hungry later, which would be a problem. I lit up a PDR, and we took our ceremonial
picture from a nice spot behind the Filene Center. That was it.
Virginia Complete. Finally. After all these years.
It was now about 6:30 PM, and we made
arrangements to meet at the buffet for dinner at 7:10 PM, unless we decided to
call an audible. I went on a pretty aggressive
walk to build up an appetite, and I found a great view of the river and saw a
family of deer. It was very scenic, and
the walk restored my appetite. I
calculated that I must have burned at least 1500 calories on my walks
today.
We met at the buffet, and I
helped myself to a plate of modest portions of the items that looked most
appealing. There was next to no service,
and it took forever to get a seltzer, which was flat, anyway. My cigar had gone out, so I was able to keep
it with me.
After dinner, I relit my
cigar, and the plan was to meet back at our seats. That’s when the rain started. Before it got too bad, I headed to the gazebo
at the bottom of the hill, which I knew would shelter me from the rain. My mother went back to the buffet to get out
of the rain and went overboard on dessert while I smoked my cigar. The concert had already begun, but we could
hear it from where we were. It was absolutely
pouring, but it was the kind of rain that never lasts. I was almost done with my cigar when the rain
broke, and we met up at the top of the hill.
I ditched my cigar, and we returned to our seats, which had blown over
from the wind, but that actually kept them relatively dry. We stayed for a few songs, but my mother was
afraid that the rain would come back. We
packed up our seats and went to leave, but the ushers convinced us to stay
saying that the rain had passed and wasn’t supposed to come back. We set up our seats again and decided to stay
until dusk.
A little before dusk, Lucinda
Williams sang a politically charged song, particularly relevant to today’s
events in nearby Charlottesville, which had actually been on our original
agenda for today, before I wound up going to Monticello during my trip three
weeks ago. The trade-off was that we
would visit these sites today instead of going to Monticello. It was good that we made that decision. Today would have been a very bad day to go to
Monticello. However, it wasn’t the
politically charged song that bothered me, but rather the audience’s
self-righteous reaction to her anti-Trump lyrics. After they cheered in response to her singing
that we needed a world without walls, I said that it was time to go.
We were at the car before dark, and it was
good timing, too, as it started to rain again during the short drive to the
hotel. We checked in and resituated
ourselves in the room. My mother then
went to bed, and I went outside to the bench in one of the smoking areas, where
I sat down, lit up an Ardor, and proceeded to write this entry, relocating once
the rain started, which I will now close so that I can publish and get to bed,
as we have an early day tomorrow.
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