Virginia – Page 16 – ToadMama.com

August 7, 2014August 7, 2014

Breakfast and Then Some

The other morning, I had some time on my hands. The weather outlook for the day was decent, so I decided to go for a ride.

It was about 6:30 when that decision was made. Naturally, breakfast was on my mind. And since I really, really like Hardee’s breakfast biscuits, but there are no Hardee’s in the immediate vicinity, I googled Hardee’s locations near me. I opted for the one in Luray, Virginia. It’s not the closest, but it was opposite the direction I’d traveled on a couple recent rides.

Now, I admit, 43.6 miles would be too far to go for a simple, fast-food breakfast if I was in a hurry and/or had to turn around and come right back. But it makes a perfect pit-stop for a loop ride. In my opinion.

Which meant I had to define the rest of the loop.

I’m a map person. I love reading maps and plotting routes. Google makes it so easy, too, telling you how far you’ll be traveling and how much time your route may require.

Here’s a link to the actual Google map of the route I ended up plotting.

At some point, I started wondering if there was anything interesting in that area to see. That’s when I remembered “the parade thing” at Shenandoah Caverns. I’d read about it years before, but had never managed to visit. Hubby isn’t quite as interested in roadside oddities as I am. And some of the stuff I consider to be fun, he just thinks is dumb.

“Why would anyone collect old parade stuff?” he said when I got home and told him what I’d seen.

As it turns out, there’s a good reason. The guy who owns Shenandoah Caverns, Earl Hargrove, also owns a company (Hargrove, Inc.) that has been making parade floats for many years. He’s purchased quite a few floats from famous parades, too. And he thought it would be cool to share his collection.

But I’m getting ahead of myself…

After I got dressed, I walked into Hubby’s office. He looked at me and said, “Are you going for a ride?”

Wonder what gave him that idea? I was wearing my black, Under Armour, capri-length pants, black over-the-calf socks, and my lucky t-shirt.

It was a gift from my mother-in-law. She prays a lot, so I figure the shirt must be lucky, right?

Plus, it’s covered in toads.

I didn’t mention that the route took me across US-211 and Thornton Gap. That’s a road I’ve mentioned here before.

Usually, it’s clogged with cars and other vehicles. That day, I didn’t encounter one pokey vehicle until I’d reached the top. At a point where I had plenty of room to pass.

How awesome is it that we live so close to Shenandoah National Park?

I did get stuck behind a roll-back tow truck on the way down, which was carrying a full-size, smashed-up pick-up truck and pulling a van. It was CREEPING down the mountain. Luckily I was able to pass him, too.

Soon after that, I was at Hardee’s.

After enjoying a leisurely breakfast, I was on my way.

Since I was still headed west on US-211, I got to cross the New Market Gap, too. It’s not as nice or as long as Thornton Gap, but does have some good curves, which I thoroughly enjoyed.

My next stop was only about 20 miles from Hardee’s, so I got there in no time.

You’ll never guess what I saw when I arrived…

I almost didn’t believe it myself. And, yes, I did squeal loudly with delight after laying eyes upon this adorable behemoth.

giant frog2 — It doesn’t get much cooler than that.

The big green guy isn’t actually at the parade place — American Celebration on Parade. It’s across the road at another part of the caverns complex.

Just seeing the giant frog would have made the whole trip worthwhile. Really.

frog_selfie — ToadMama and Frog Together

But there was so much more to see. I decided to keep my helmet on and re-visit Mr. Frog more closely after viewing the parade exhibits.

I do have more images to share, but I’ll save them for the next post.

It was SUCH a fun place. 🙂

July 28, 2014July 31, 2014

Blue Ridge Grocery Country Store

Several weeks ago, my friend, Dottie, and I rode our bikes out to Front Royal, Virginia for breakfast. (Here lately, I’ve decided if I don’t squeeze short rides in when I can, my poor bike will never get any exercise.)

We met at the Clevenger’s Corner Shell gas station about 10 minutes west of town. From there, Dottie led the way to the diner.

I generally tend to avoid Front Royal as traffic can get rather congested, but the diner is off of US-522, south and east of downtown.

4_diner_breakfast — A Light Breakfast… LOL

The food was good. We did NOT eat all of it, in case you were wondering.

As we ate, I told Dottie I’d spotted a cute little store on the way to the restaurant that I wanted to visit on our way home. She was game, so we stopped.

6_DSCN3211 — I’m a sucker for cute country stores.

It was hard to tell whether or not it was open, so we went ahead and parked. Judging by the hours listed on the door, I still don’t know.

10a_DSCN3224 — The hours of operation were a bit vague.

I’ve thought about this place a lot since then. I still don’t know if it’s a hobby store (as in we sell stuff and are open when we feel like being open) or just REALLY cool yard art.

I mean, how fun would it be to have a little model store like this solely as decoration?

I think I’ll submit it to the RoadsideAmerica.com folks so they can check it out. I think it deserves a listing, don’t you?

They even have a Oreo Pig for photo ops. Although, really, the whole thing is sort of a photo op.

Dottie couldn’t resist posing with the pig. I’m teaching her to appreciate roadside weirdness.

Isn’t it just the cutest little place?

We didn’t have long to linger. Plus, it was getting hot. So off we went.

11_DSCN3228 — Dottie and some pretty blue wildflowers on Ben Venue Road.

I couldn’t resist stopping for that flower shot.

So what do you think? Is it an operational store or yard art? Either way, I’m glad we happened upon the place.

June 12, 2014

Washout

I’m traveling from home to Chesapeake, Virginia this afternoon — leaving in less than an hour — to attend my nephew’s graduation. I had REALLY hoped to take the bike.

But it’s storming.

See that map? If I were a crow, I’d be following the black line.

Rain doesn’t scare me, but I don’t have much time to spare.On a bike, you can’t hurry through rain. Not to mention torrential rain/thunderstorms.

If I’m late, I either miss the graduation. Or make everyone else late.

So I’ll be caging it.

Oh well, it’s still a road trip. 🙂

May 20, 2014

Foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains

Old Town Warrenton [(c) Denise Schefer. All rights reserved.]

I often tell people that Warrenton is the perfect spot for Hubby and me to live. It is away from the crowded, noisy, busy madness we left behind in Maryland. It’s big enough that most of the essentials are available right here in town. And it’s close enough to the densely populated area known as Northern Virginia (NoVA) that, with a 20-30 minute drive, we can pretty much obtain whatever it is we want or need.

According to the most recent Census data, Warrenton has a population of 9,803. The entire county only has ~67,000 people (that equates to 100.7 persons per square mile). The population of our Maryland county (Anne Arundel) was 555,743, which is 414.9 people per square mile. The town where we lived — Severn — by itself had a population of 44,231 in 2010, which equates to 2,497.1 people per square mile. That’s a lot of people.

Although the town of Warrenton has 2,136.3 people per square mile, it is surrounded by rural area. So it FEELS far less crowded. It is certainly more picturesque. Check out my Old Town Warrenton photo collection on FLICKR if you don’t believe me.

It is also surrounded by great motorcycle roads.

This past Saturday, my friend, Dottie, and I did a nice loop of just under 150 road miles. My last post features a nifty slideshow of the last part of the ride leading into town. There’s also a video of Dottie, who only recently got her motorcycle license, leading the way across Thornton Gap.

I just finished editing another video from that ride that I wanted to share. This Google MAP shows the route covered in my highlights video.

Look closely, and you’ll see Warrenton on the right-hand side of the map. Hopefully this will help you appreciate just how close we are to the AMAZING roads featured in the video below.

Are you ready to come for a visit yet?

May 18, 2014May 18, 2014

Piedmont Loop (A Day of Firsts)

Yesterday was a gorgeous Spring day in the Virginia Piedmont. Since I knew Hubby was bound for the WV Place — chores called — I figured it would be a good day to take Dottie for a ride.

You “met” Dottie before. She was the Elf who joined me on the Christmas ’13 Santa Ride. And, in this March post, I told you she’d gotten a motorcycle for Christmas and had her motorcycle learner’s permit.

Since that time, she’s gotten her motorcycle license. A fact she’s quite proud of. Dottie told me she grew up on dirt bikes, but hadn’t ridden in years. She’d always wanted to get a motorcycle that she could ride on the street, but her hubby, Jim, isn’t really into riding. So she never did.

Then she met me. I’m a bad influence, I think. After I took her for a ride through the Virginia countryside and she did the Santa ride with me, she had a bad case of the “I really want a motorcycle” blues.

Jim, being the awesome man he is, decided, after seeing how happy riding made his wife, that Dottie should have a bike.

Yesterday was the first chance we’d had to ride together since Dottie got her license.

I planned a route, rode down to her house (about 20 minutes outside of town), and off we went.

In my opinion, it was a beautiful day. Temperatures hovered around 60 degrees (F), the sky was blue, the sun was shining… perfect. Dottie, who has fibromyalgia, was cold. Of course, I didn’t know she was cold until we were in the middle of nowhere.

We stopped for a bit to soak up some sun. At that point, we were on the Old Blue Ridge Turnpike (VA 231), about 15 miles south of Sperryville. It was a gorgeous spot.

I, of course, had to take some pics. Dottie is learning what it’s like to travel with a moto-blogger. And she’s adapting well, as evidenced by that photo bomb.

She even joined the photo-capturing fun.

We talked about stopping in Sperryville so she could buy a sweatshirt, which we did. But Sperryville is short on clothing stores. So Dottie suggested riding across the mountain into Luray. She recommended a spot for lunch, too.

downtown_luray — Looking west from downtown Luray.

I’d never actually gone into the town of Luray before, so it was my first time in Luray.

Uncle Buck’s made an awesome lunch stop. So awesome, I’ll have to take Hubby there. Soon.

While we were waiting for our meal, we started chatting about apparel (I need a lightweight jacket for Summer). I found one on-line that I like, and that got good reviews, but, as I told Dottie, I wanted to try one on before ordering. Since we hadn’t planned on going to Luray, a town I’d only ever driven past previously, I decided to google motorcycle dealerships to see if there were any nearby. That’s how we found Outlanders.

As we were getting ready to mount the bikes, a local lady, also a rider, stopped by to chat. Dottie asked her about Outlanders. She told, without hesitation, that we should go there. She said it’s owned by a woman, so they have a nice variety of gear for women. We were already planning on going, but that sealed the decision.

In all fairness, Outlanders can’t be called a motorcycle dealership. They do sell motorcycles, parts, accessories, apparel, etc., but it’s so much more. Here’s how they describe themselves on their Web site:

Established in 2004, the Outlanders brand was created as a way to celebrate and share the owner’s Scottish heritage and love of motorcycles with kindred spirits. Outlanders store has now become a favorite shopping destination for locals and Luray, VA guests by specializing in unique gifts, jewelry, apparel, powersport equipment and motorcycles. Outlanders also offers a grocery store and lunch deli where you can dine indoors or outside.

Dottie found the perfect hoodie there, too, which saved us from going to Wal-Mart (yay!).

sky_too — Sky above the convenience-store part of the HUGE complex.

sky — Sky as seen from Outlanders’ parking lot.

From there, we headed back east. We hadn’t gone far before we had to stop for some more pics.

First time I got to stop and visit the Luray dinosaur.

serious_toadmama — I just HAD to get a pic there.

After that, it was time to finish our ride.

I let Dottie lead the way over Thornton Gap. I even shot video, which I’ll post later after editing.

For now, here’s a slideshow, the majority of which is from the last part of our ride. (The slideshow may eventually have an audio track, but YouTube is being REALLY slow on the processing.)

It was a good day. 🙂

UPDATE: Here’s the video of Dottie leading our ride across Thornton Gap.

I have a favor to ask of all of my friends that ride. Can you please leave a comment critiquing Dottie’s ride?

She’s only had her license for about a month and, in my opinion, is doing very well. But I do have one recommendation. I don’t want to tell you what I see (that would be too leading), but I will tell you it’s in the second half of the video. It’s a challenging road with variable radius curves (the radius changes mid-curve).

Jim, we’re not going nearly as fast as the video would lead you to believe.

I hope y’all enjoyed the slideshow and video.

April 19, 2014April 19, 2014

This and That

I’ve gotten really bad about posting regularly. Even worse keeping up with friends’ blogs. I blame it all on the smart phone and how it’s changed my routine. Back before I had a smart phone, I’d have my computer on my lap in the mornings. Now, I use my phone for morning entertainment as my brain slowly warms. I can read blogs with it, of course, but I can’t always comment successfully. That frustrates me. So I wait until I’m in front of the computer to read blogs. But time gets away from me and, before I know it, a week or two may pass. Time just goes by WAY too fast. Sigh…

It’s mid-April and gardening season is upon us. Riding season, too. Sort of. Our strange weather continues. Although Hubby and I did get out for a ride last Sunday (April 13), temps dropped back into Winter range. It’s warming up slowly, but yesterday, a holiday for my employer, it was still in the mid- to upper-40s in the morning, so I didn’t ride. Instead I ran errands.

I did multi-task a little bit.

Visited a National Park

You know that smart phone I mentioned? I have a cool app — Passport to Your National Parks phone App — that let’s me make a checklist of national parks I have visited.

For those not familiar with the parks passport, it’s actually a passport-like booklet that…

…makes it easy to learn about and explore all of our national park sites. The Passport® to Your National Parks includes maps that are color-coded for specific regions in the country, pre-visit information, illustrations and photographs. It also includes a free map and guide to the national park system.

Spaces in each region are designated for you to collect rubber stamp cancellations at each national park site you visit. The cancellations, similar to those received in an international passport, record the name of the park and the date you visited.

It may sound a bit geeky, but it’s a great way to keep track of not just the parks you’ve visited, but when you have visited them.

Anyway… the other day, after creating my list of parks, I realized I’d only visited three of the 16 parks listed in Virginia.

And the closest national park — the Manassas National Battlefield Park — is one I had NOT been to. It’s 16.24 miles from where I sit. How bad is that? I’ve driven through it many times, since one of the major routes to DC and points north cuts through the park, but had never stopped.

I had to go to Manassas yesterday anyway, so I decided to stop at the park. I didn’t want to spend much time there, I just wanted to, 1, be able to say I’d been there and, 2, grab some info to plan a future visit.

I did walk around a bit after my stop at the Visitor’s Center. It was a bit cloudy and cool, and I had things to do, so I didn’t linger.

MNB2_IMG_1493 — Stonewall Jackson Memorial

MNB3_IMG_1496 — View from lawn at Visitor’s Center

The view is nice and, I thought, impressive. Looks like it’s out in the middle of nowhere, right? It isn’t. It’s right on the edge of Northern Virginia, one of the most densely populated regions in the US.

If you click on that image of The Stone House, you’ll get a bit of history.

Passports are typically sold at park bookstores. You can buy them on-line, too.

Now that I’ve been to Manassas NBP, I can say I have visited 66 US National Parks. But there are many more to see…

Shopped at Costco

I’d been meaning to visit Coscto for weeks. It’s not close (about 20 miles away) and is usually very crowded. I try to time my visits for off-peak hours, but never seem to succeed. I didn’t take any pictures, though.

Visited a Garden Center

No pics there, either. I must be losing my edge. LOL. I did buy a few perennials, though. Most importantly, I got the info I needed to schedule a delivery of mulch. I even ran into a friend who might be willing to install it for me. Oh, happy day!

Now I just have to get everything planted so it’s in the ground before the mulch arrives.

Miscellaneous Stuff

I’m glad Spring is here. It’s so nice seeing colors again. Here are a few pics I captured this past week.

Warrenton’s Old Courthouse bathed in golden evening light.

One of my favorite old buildings on Ashby Street in OTW.

Photoshopped image featuring my frog planter.

While we’re on the subject of pictures, this shot from a friend’s blog post made me chuckle aloud with delight…

Bob lives in British Columbia, outside of Vancouver. This shot is from a camping weekend of his last September.

That’s it for today. I have GOT to get busy. I need to visit the Farmers’ Market and a nursery center or three. And then I have to start digging. And weeding. Sigh…