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First Ride of 2020

Petunia is a BBQ grill at The Apple House in Linden, Virginia.

I started this blog in early 2008. My purpose, at the time, was to have an easier way to document our then-upcoming vacation to Alaska. By “easier” I mean as  compared to manually building/maintaining a group of web pages, like I did to document the building of the WV Place. (Sadly, we no longer own the WV Place.)

Slowly, over time, other people found my blog. Many of those folks also have blogs. I started interacting with some of them on a regular basis and, as a result, established some online friendships. I have even met several of them in person, which is awesome.

Many of the people who found my blog did so because of the motorcycle and/or travel-related info I used to share frequently. Motorcycling is the common tie that bound us initially. As we got to know each other more and more, more ties were established. Even as I posted less and less frequently, people still seemed to follow, i.e., care about what was or was not going on in my life. That surprised me. Especially since I’ve gotten awful about keeping up with everyone else.

Like me, many of my motoblog buddies seem to have lost interest in blogging. (Using social media [Facebook, Instagram, etc.] is so much quicker and easier!) I’m pretty sure all of them are still riding motorcycles and/or traveling.

I still maintain the links to my Motoblog Buddies’ blogs. I thought about deleting those that are no longer active, but decided against doing that. They, too, might find their way back to blogging one day. I suspect all of our lives will be very, very different once we get past the coronavirus crisis.

If any of you MOTOBLOG BUDDIES read this and want me to delete your link, let me know. Otherwise, your link will stay:

CurvyRoads (Lynne): last post 28 June 2019. Very active on Instagram. Facebook, too, so she has said, but I shut down my Facebook account m id-2019.

Find Me on the Road (Sonja): still active

Fuzzygalore (Rachael): still active, but not posting as regularly

Life on Two Wheels (David): still active

Machida Meanderings (Bridget [Richard’s wife]): more-recent addition; active

Princess Scooterpie (Darlene): last post 30 March 2019. Active on Instagram.

Richard’s Page (Richard): still active

Scooter in the Sticks (Steve): still active

Travels with ScooterBob (Various): Bob passed away, suddenly, in late 2014. He had been the catalyst that brought many Moto-bloggers together, so a group of us did a tribute/around the world tour in Bob’s honor, which is now documented on what was once Bob’s blog.

Trobairitz’ Tablet (Brandy): last post 31 December 2018

Troubadour’s Treks (Bradley): last post 28 April 2019

Two Wheels to There (Ry): last post 29 January 2017. Active on Instagram.

Slowly, my blog has evolved. It is now less-focused on travels and more-focused on me. Over the years, I have enjoyed going back and using the blog as a reference. That’s how Hubby and I “remembered” when we visited certain places, did certain things, etc. I have missed being able to do that since I have been blogging less frequently.

I’ve re-started posting a few times over the years. This is the FINAL re-start. Really. If I am not able to manage posting regularly, I’m just going to let that urge to blog rest in peace. Because this should be fun. If I am not enjoying it, doing it doesn’t make sense.

So, you’ll be seeing the new, relaxed version of me from here on.

I kicked this week off with a motorcycle ride. It was a completely spontaneous. As it turns out, it was also very well-timed. While I was out riding, the governor of Virginia announced that this state is now on lockdown, too.

This may be the last ride for a while. Here are a few pics I captured while out.

My first stop was the State Arboretum of Virginia (on US-50 near Boyce). It’s a place I have been meaning to visit for years. We passed it countless times over the years on our way to and from the WV place. So, I FINALLY visited. It was pretty, but there were too many people there for my liking. So I rode through, but did not stop.

From there, I headed to Bentonville at the Shenandoah River State Park. My route took me right past Dinosaur Land in White Post, so I HAD to stop.

My bike with two dinosaurs.

 

Pursuit!

I did not realize when I took that picture that it looks like that dinosaur is trying to eat my bike!

I almost wiped out half a block from home. I forgot the back tire was new.

I did get to visit the state park, but will share pics in a separate post. The state park is only a short drive (15 minutes?) from Shenandoah National Park. So, after I left the state park, I decided to traverse the northern section of Skyline Drive.

Just outside Front Royal off US-340.

 

Me

 

View of the Shenandoah Valley from a Skyline Drive overlook.

 

Such a pretty, clear day! (looking east, I think)

 

Skyline Drive (my favorite shot of the day)

I love that we are so close to Shenandoah National Park.

From there, I headed home via back roads through Little Washington (the first Washington) and Flint Hill. So much nicer than US-211, which Fodderstack Road and Crest Hill Road roughly parallel.

On Fodderstack Road between Washington and Flint Hill.

If you have spare time and are interested, open Google Maps (or click on View larger map below) and look at some street views along there. It’s idyllic for sure.

Finally, here’s a pic I’ve been meaning to capture and share. It’s a barn quilt that was recently installed at a produce stand on US-211, just east of Sperryville.

Barn Quilt!

And that’s it for the pics.

Stay safe and well everyone. The world is a better place with each and every one of you in it.

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Quality Time

In my last post, I mentioned that Hubby and I have been spending more quality time together. I figured I’d share some pics of the various stuff we’ve been doing.

The weather has been delightfully mild, so we have been enjoying outdoor activities as much as possible, such as hiking and bicycling at Shenandoah River State Park.

I’d been wanting to visit that park for some time. I’d seen signs and had read about it previously, but hadn’t managed to visit. It’s only 43 miles slightly north and west of our home in north, central Virginia (about a 52-minute drive). But it’s along a stretch of road we had never traveled. Or maybe we’d traveled that piece of road once, long ago.

Anyhoo… we FINALLY visited Shenandoah River State Park (SRSP) a couple weekends ago. It’s really a lovely place.

We only walked on some of the trails at the park during our first visit. Then, the following weekend, we returned with our bicycles.

Some hiking pics…

Sign at trailhead.

 

Trail marker.

 

Side trail from canoe launch to Bluebell Trail.

 

Shenandoah River

 

Fungus (on a live tree)

 

Fungus (on downed log)

I always thought that fungi growing on trees was squishy, sorta like a dense mushroom. This one looked and felt just like wood. It really intrigued. It’s almost like the fungus invaded the actual cells of the tree and grew, together into a wood-like appendage.

Shenandoah River

 

Artsy

 

Virginia Bluebells (one of the few plants in early bloom)

 

Pretty, little flower.

 

Pretty, little flower with my glasses, for scale.

 

Beautiful, blue sky.

 

River Clams(?)

 

The water was very clear.

 

Pretty, clear water.

 

Walking

 

Lovely place for a stroll.

 

My Honey

 

Pretty view.

 

Reflection

 

Virginia Bluebell, emerging.

 

Tree, growing on riverbank.

I hope you enjoyed the pics. According to my Honey, I stop to look at the weirdest shit. LOL.

The following week, we returned to the Bluebell Trail, where we’d hiked during our first visit. I was hoping to see more flowers in bloom, but it was still too early. Because we were on the bikes, I didn’t stop nearly as much for pictures.

Parts of the trail are a bit rough for bicyclists like us, accustomed to riding on paved or more groomed/well-maintained trails, but it was still fun. It felt a lot like riding through the woods when I was a kid. Bumpy, but fun.

Bluebell Trail (rougher surface than River Trail)

The River Trail is smoother and more out in the open. No dodging trees and/or trees roots. We did encounter some horses, with riders, so had some road apples to dodge along the way.

Hubby on the River Trail

 

Nice rest spot along the River Trail.

I believe that’s the primitive group camping spot in the above pic, behind where Mike is sitting. The park also has an RV campground, rental cabins, and other primitive campsites. There are also multiple river access points along the river so people can easily enjoy the 5+ miles of river frontage.

Pretty spot to stop.

I have no idea if that cabin is for rent. It was very close to the river and River Trail, but didn’t have any sort of signage.

Hubby, at trail’s end.

I am going to try to get back to SRSP when the bluebells are in full bloom. If I do, I’ll be sure to share some pics here. Social distancing is easiest when outdoors.

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Exciting Times

It’s been an eventful month for me. I figured I should give y’all an update. I will warn you, however, that I’m using my tablet, so there may not be many images. Or the format of this post could be mucked up. We shall see.

I’ve been doing little stuff around the house to keep myself busy. One of those things was starting to neaten-up my side of the basement. I didn’t finish because I got sidetracked by a couple of projects.

The first project was making LOVE. Hubby helped. 😎

My town is a bit late to the Virginia LOVE program. There’s a LOVEwork outside of town at the Airlie House and Farm (that’s where Earth Day was born!), but I would really like to see one in the historic downtown. I’d heard that the Town Council quashed plans for a LOVEwork in Old Town Warrenton (OTW) so I started kicking-around the idea of making my own. Hubby had enough scrap plywood for three of the letters, but I wanted to figure out an easy way to make a different sort of “O.”

Back in July, when I was having my hair done, my hairdresser was telling me how the move to her house and unpacking was coming along when she mentioned needing to remove an old satellite dish the previous owner had left behind.

“Can I have it?” I immediately asked. She looked at me like I had a few heads and asked why I would want that. I swore her to secrecy then explained that I needed something to make the fourth letter in my own personal LOVEwork.

A couple of days later, there was an old, dirty satellite dish and hardware in my backyard, much to Hubby’s chagrin. We no longer have cable TV and are perfectly happy with analog TV and streaming other entertainment, so he had no idea why I would want or need an old satellite dish!

I outlined the letters on the scrap plywood and Hubby cut them for me. Then I painted everything and hung it on the wall in front of our house. It turned out quite cool, in my opinion.

I had a bit of fun with the thing. I even texted pics to all of the kids, saying “Look, we made love last last week and I am sharing pics!”

Other people like our LOVE, too. So much so that we made the local news. If you’d like to read the article, this link will take you to the story on FauquierNOW.

The next project was painting this old end table that’s been in the to-do queue for a long time. I decided it would make a nice table for the porch, and I added a Barn Quilt to the top. It turned out so nice, I think I may keep it in the house.

Speaking of barn quilts… a friend and I have decided to start a barn quilt trail. We are just in the planning stages now, so I can’t say much. I thought it would be fun to have one here in Fauquier County. In July, we met with the ladies behind the Blue Ridge Barn Quilt Trail in nearby Greene County. Their trail already has about 70 barn quilts in all shapes and sizes and it’s only been around for about a year and a half. The one pictured below is at the visitors’ center.

Barn quilt LOVE in Greene County, Virginia. #blueridgebarnquilttrail

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That is a barn quilt LOVEwork. How cool is that? 😊

I’ve been visiting LOVEworks, too. I’m now up to 96! My log page is not completely up-to-date since I turned in my work computer. You know, the one that belonged to my former employer. They were kind enough to let me borrow it for a couple of months so I didn’t have to conduct my job search from this tablet.

It’s been pretty hot, so we have not done much motorcycle riding. Instead, we’ve been visiting breweries in our spare time.

Another date night with Hubby. ❤️

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Visiting breweries is a much more expensive hobby. Local breweries don’t give you tours and such like big commercial brewers do, it’s really all about tasting their beer. We’ve both decided it’s fun tasting so many different beers.

Last weekend, we actually did something really different. We did a long weekend centered around bicycle riding. We drove to Farmville, Virginia, about two and a half hours south of here.

I’d been to Farmville a couple of times previously, once to see their first LOVEwork and then just passing through. I knew there was a bicycle trail there with a cool bridge and had said several times I wanted to return. So that’s what we did. They have a second LOVEwork now, too.

It’s a LOVEly day for an adventure. LOVEwork 90! #loveva

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The High Bridge Trail State Park was the center of our visit. I pasted the description from the state park’s website below:

High Bridge Trail is 31 miles long and ideally suited for hiking, bicycling and horseback riding. Once a rail bed, the trail is wide, level and generally flat. Its finely crushed limestone surface and dimensions make it easy to enjoy. The park’s centerpiece is the majestic High Bridge, which is more than 2,400 feet long and 125 feet above the Appomattox River. It is the longest recreational bridge in Virginia and among the longest in the United States. High Bridge, a Virginia Historic Landmark, is on the National Register of Historic Places.

It’s a really nice trail, and the bridge was fun to see.

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Check out out this short video from the bridge:

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We visited a few breweries, too. Trapezium in Petersburg had my favorite beer, a white ale. The brewery in Farmville — Third Street Brewing — was nice, too, and in walking distance from our hotel.

The LOVEwork just happened to be in the vicinity of a brewery or two.

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Hubby was kind enough to drive about a three-hour loop on Saturday to see some more LOVEworks while we were in the area. Then Sunday, we detoured through Bedford, Virginia, on the way home to visit the National D-Day Memorial. I created a Google Photos album of the pics from the D-Day Memorial, which was even more impressive than I anticipated. Click Here if you would like to see the album.

Next week is my last week of freedom. I start a new job on September 10th. I’m excited about the opportunity, which is similar to what I’d been doing, but slightly different. It’s hot and humid here, so we’ll be playing indoors for the next couple of days. Monday, I’m off to the beach for 3-4 days with a girlfriend. Then on Sunday, September 9, I’m off to Minneapolis for a week of job training, meet-and-greets, etc. Back to reality, in other words. 😎

A different sort of bike vacation!

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Motoring Along

Scenic Route

In case anyone is wondering, Hubby and I are still riding together. It’s just that it is summertime, which means it gets hot. It’s worse for Hubby on his big-ass Victory with it’s 1,740-cc engine. I’m usually fine up until the thermometer his 85 degrees (~29.4 C), then I start to get really uncomfortable.

The other day, Thursday (?) maybe, I needed a prescription from Costco. The store closest to us (Manassas) didn’t have the med in stock. The next-closest stores are in places like Chantilly, Fairfax, Woodbridge, and other places in the dreaded Northern Virginia metropolis (one giant, heavily populated suburb of Washington, DC). Since I have spare time on my hands, I chose to go to the Winchester store because I knew it would make for a much-nicer ride. Plus, it would make it super-convenient to visit the unlisted LOVEwork I’d recently driven past on I-81 southbound near Clear Brook.

LOVEwork at I-81 SB Welcome Center

It actually made for a very nice ride. I didn’t leave early enough, though, because it started getting hot during the ride back. By the time I got into our garage, I was READY to get all that gear off. So ready, in fact, that I didn’t fully extend the kickstand. That meant that, when I got off of the bike, it fell over. It didn’t fall all of the way to the floor, it just leaned right up against Hubby’s pretty red Victory. Due to the angle, I could not get the thing standing up, so I had to ask Hubby for help.

It was embarrassing, but he didn’t give me a hard time. Luckily, it didn’t even scratch the Victory.

Yesterday, Saturday, we went for a nice little loop ride together. I planned a route to include four LOVEworks, so now I’m up to 81 visited!

LOVE in Stanardsville

Stanardsville is in Greene County. Within about the last year, a barn quilt trail was established there, which is why the LOVEwork has a quilt theme. One day, when we both have time, my friend Kelly and I are going to spend a day following the Blue Ridge Barn Quilt Tour. At the time of this writing, there are 59 barn quilts listed in the brochure! That’s a lot. Trails usually start small, maybe 10-20 barn quilts, and then slowly grow. To have that many so soon after establishing the trail is quite impressive! You can read more about it here.

The Stanardsville site was the last on the list. Temps were hovering around 80 at that point, so I adjusted the route on the fly and we headed home. Just in time, too. It was 83.3 degrees (28.5 C) when I pulled into the garage.

I made absolutely sure the kickstand was fully extended before I got off of the bike.

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Looking for LOVE, Still

Those of you who follow me on Instagram may have periodically seen LOVEwork images popping up on my feed. Even though I haven’t been posting as regularly here on the blog, I have still been looking for LOVE signs. In fact, I visited some on my impromptu getaway back in June.

When I came up with the idea of visiting LOVEworks around Virginia, one of the “rules” I set for myself was that a picture was required. Not just any picture, an image I captured myself, or that someone else captured with me in the shot.

A couple of years ago, during one of my solo excursions, I went far out of my way to capture a shot of the Gate City LOVEwork. That’s in FAR southwestern Virginia, a five-and-a-half hour drive from here (highway driving). On the same day, I also stopped in Abingdon to capture a picture of their LOVEwork. I stopped at two places in Bristol, Virginia, too. It was HOT that day, like in the 90s (F). And I was on my bike, all suited-up, sweating my rear-end off. I was really unhappy to discover that the Gate City sign had been temporarily removed, not sure why, and that the Abingdon sign had been damaged and carted off to be repaired.

That first experience going to sites only to find the LOVEwork missing left a mark. I faced a similar dilemma last year, when I was on my way home from down south. I’d seen a LOVEwork listed at FloydFest in Patrick County. I had no idea what FloydFest was or where it was, but Google maps got me there. It’s actually a big outdoor music venue sort of adjacent to the Blue Ridge Parkway, not far from the town of Floyd.

I think there’s only one festival a year, in late-July, but it’s a big one, spanning multiple days. I was there in early May. The place looked and felt a bit deserted, but the gate across the driveway was open, so I went in and puttered around the very empty place, looking for LOVE, to no avail. I saw a man at the edge of the property, near one of the buildings, so I motored over to him. He gave me one of those “are you a deranged alien” looks and asked if he could help me. Once I explained my mission, he said the sign had recently been unloaded from a truck after being moved.

“Can I see it anyway?” I asked, explaining that I’d been driving all over the state taking pictures of the things.

“Sure,” he said. “It’s way over there behind the bandstand. You were bold enough to come in here, you might as well go back there, too!”

I couldn’t help but laugh at that, saying, “The gate was open!” in reply.

He laughed back and I went on my way.

That’s how I managed to capture what I like to call “Scrambled LOVE.”

Scrambled LOVE

The large building in the distance with the green roof is where I encountered the man. I think we both ended that day with a semi-interesting story to tell our friends.

Here are pics from some of the other LOVEworks I’v captured over the last year or so…

Lynchburg LOVEwork (one of at least three in that town)

 

LOVEwork in Marion (near the southern end of VA-16, the Back of the Dragon)

 

Highland County LOVEwork in Monterey (they have an amazing barn quilt trail, too)

 

LOVEwork in Narrows (by the community’s duck pond)

 

VA Welcome Center LOVEwork at Rocky Gap (southbound I-77)

 

Smith Mountain Lake LOVEwork (one of my favorites)

If you wanna see all of the pictures I have captured to date, you can go directly to my LOVEwork Log Page or click the “LOVE in Virginia” link in the navigation bar at the top of this page and follow the link provided in the All of the LOVE in One Spot section.

I think it’s kind of fun to see all the different signs in one big list. I’ll be adding more soon, I hope!

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Spruce Knob in West Virginia

When Hubby, Mike, and I still owned our WV place, every now and then, when we weren’t busy actually constructing the place, we’d take rides around Romney. The roads in that area are pretty nice. Sometimes, we would go a bit farther, where the roads were even better. On two separate occasions, we tried to visit Spruce Knob, which is the highest point of elevation in West Virginia. Both times, the road up the mountain was closed. I forget why. Anyway… I’d been wanting to return. So that seemed like a logical target when I left the house on Friday, June 8.

One of the cool things about it being so high is that the plants are not like those you’d see in nearby lower elevations. According to a sign I read, there was “…flag-formed red spruce, heath barrens, and wildflowers typical of a more-northern climate.” There’s a nearby place — the Dolly Sods Wilderness — I’d visited in 2016, which is also within the Monongahela National Forest. If you’d like to read more about the flora and fauna of the region, please visit that post. Ironically, I took that trip after accepting the job offer from the employer that just laid me off.

Not only is it beautiful in that area, it’s usually cooler, and the roads are pretty awesome, too. Win-win, right?

Lucky for me, it was open!

I realize 4,863 feet (~1,482 meters) isn’t, like, the highest mountain on the planet, or even in North America, but, relatively speaking, it’s a nice-sized hill. And, most important, I REALLY enjoyed getting there and being there, finally. Plus, I was not at all rushed, so I got to enjoy the scenery and capture some pics to share here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The road to and from Spruce Knob is way nicer than the road to and from Dolly Sods.

After taking my good, sweet time enjoying the place, I continued west toward Buckhannon. It actually started getting dark sooner than I anticipated, so I stopped in Elkins, West Virginia for the night. The bugs get really big at night in the mountains, not to mention the fact that the deer and bears tend to wander around a bit, too.

All in all, it was a good first day.