trails, mazes caves and dinner

We picked up Linda about 9:30 am.  It was chilly so we all bundled up.  We had heard that it might snow.  We drove to Shenandoah National Park a little over an hour away. But once we got there we found that the park was closed because they had had a dusting of snow last night.  So we went on to the Shenandoah River State Park and walked a trail beside the river.

overlook view point

at the visitor's center

family photo by the river

Then we drove into Luray for lunch

Odd mix of American food plus Tandoori vegetables in the vegetarian section.  I had a Virgin Reuben (no meat).  It was good.

We drove to the Luray Caverns.  We walked the Garden Maze first.  That was fun.

Then we went to the caverns which were very impressive.

reflections in the water

lit from behind

one room had an organ that plays off of some of the stalactites = very cool

We then went to Susan (George's cousin) and Rob's home for dinner.  That was very nice.  

gas lamp in front of their home.

Susan and Rob and I was trying to include their dog which moved right when I was taking the picture. 

cute miniature daffodil 

It is hard to believe that soon we will be heading home.  Nathan has a 2 day employment networking event that he helped to organize for Duke students.  So he will head off bright and early in the morning.  We will be able to be more leisurely.  

Rain, Rain, Rain

We had a leisurely morning at the hotel.  Nathan had some work to do.

Around 11 am Susan (George's cousin) picked us up.  Linda had walked here.  So we all went to the Dumbarton Oaks Museum.  It has a combination of Byzantine art at one end and Pre-Columbian at the other.

mosaic not quilt

And the pre-Columbian

Nathan

Linda

Then we went for lunch

Nice French restaurant.  We had great sandwiches, soups, salads.  But the best was the desserts

Nathan and Linda shared this

I had the big cup on the right, Linda had the baby espresso.

Then we went back to Dumbarton Oaks Gardens

the l'orangerie.  Sharon & Kris do you recognize this?

fun to see this place again.  I feel like we whizzed through it when I was here years ago.

Cousin Susan and George

blooming quince.

It was raining pretty much on and off all day.  Susan dropped Linda off and then George, Nathan & I off .  We got a few things done.  Then Nathan and George have been helping me to go through my India pictures to try to reduce the number in my file to show. They are ruthless. "...but, but, this picture shows ...", 

At 6:30 pm we went to pick up Linda to go to dinner.

This was a wine bar with very good food.  we stuck with the salads and appetizers.  They sure were yummy.  

we all shared the Parmesan frites.  We had a a bottle of Valpolacella.  Then we went back to Linda's apartment to play some card games.  That was fun.  We taught Linda how to play 10-9-8 and she managed to beat us all.  

weather

We have been super lucky with weather so far.  The rain and hail waited until we were leaving dinner the first night.  It was a torrential downpour. Then every day they predicted storms but we had sunny clear days,  Cool in the mornings.  A little hot and muggy when we were hiking around later in the day, but mostly very nice.  Yesterday was again a very nice day.  Cooler than NC. Again they are predicting rain and then snow.  We will see if that happens.  It seems very spring like with the flowers and the trees are starting to bloom.  But NC was weird since it seemed almost like summer but the trees looked like winter.  

eat hike eat

Breakfast at the hotel.

our hotel - we took a nice walk around the neighborhood.  There was a bike trail we could walk on. Then we drove to Fairfax to meet up with Lou and Paul, 2 high school classmate friends.

Lou, Paul, Nathan, George, me.  It was a delicious Indian restaurant.  It was very nice connecting with both of them.

Paul, me & Lou

Then we went to the Great Falls National Park.  Wow.  that was an impressive park.

We took a break so that Nathan could take care of some school work

We drove home to pick up Linda.  We met some friends for dinner at True Food Kitchen.  Full of healthy meals.  We picked up Linda on our way.

Linda, Nathan, Joan, Steve, Barbara and George

I had Moroccan chicken

A very good wine.  It was organic which was a plus

Steve and Joan

What a nice day with 2 great meals with long time friends and a great hike along the river. 

Happy St. Patrick's Day

After breakfast we checked out and started our drive to DC.  We stopped at the Occoneechee State Park.

We walked a short trail then drove to the lake where they had some picnic tables

We had sandwiches and left-overss.

We went down to the lake.

Family group photo - Rebecca is on the phone - does that count?

We drove on to Culpeper, VA to visit my cousin, Jim and his wife Debbie.  They are out in the middle of nowhere (sort of near Culpeper).  They are on 10 acres plot of land.  

They fed us a very nice dinner and then we headed on.  It took us a bit to get on the right road because we were not getting a phone signal so we could not check the GPS and the little roads were not on the paper map.  We just kept heading north until we finally got a signal.  The rest of the drive was uneventful.  

We got to the Comfort Inn, Arlington about 9 pm.  No glass of port and we did not buy any wine either.  Oh well.