Virginia is for beavers

Ok good news. The Apple store genius bar was a mad house, but my computer had been behaving so I just went home. My computer is 95% better and after a weekend away, I’m back to writing about my adventures! So now for the adventures…

This weekend I went to Northern Virginia to meet my boyfriend’s family. On top of that, I had to squeeze in a 12 mile run. Super fun.

We took the train out on Friday, and we grilled steaks for dinner on Friday night. Turns out, they were all super nice, so I didn’t have to worry about that. Now I just had to worry about my run Saturday morning, then I could relax and enjoy the rest of my weekend. I was told there was a really nice running path along the Potomac that would be a good place for me to go. I got up early on Saturday, put on all my gear, and headed out.

The path was not at all what I expected. I thought it would be more like running along the Hudson. There’s a river, some park benches, and some little vendors, in case I needed an emergency Gatorade. But this trail was more like running through the straight up forest, and someone sort of slapped a path (and sometimes some wooden bridges) right in the middle of it. It was pretty cool. There were tons of trees, viney things, spider webs and my run ended in this swamp.

The bikers on the path there were so much more polite than the New York City bikers. They do things like ring their bells or call out to let you know they’re passing, instead of just nearly running you down. Someone was also nice enough to put out giant coolers of ice cold water and Gatorade. I don’t know who did it, but I was grateful. I even saw a beaver. I said “Hi” to him. He said “Hi” back.

Or maybe I was just delirious from all the running.


The run ended well, and I think I'm going to survive the Queens half coming up in just two weeks. The rest of weekend consisted of the following:

A nice relaxing visit to the swimming pool
Lots of food and drinking
A boat ride on the Potomac, complete with weird sunburn
Peeing in the woods
More food and drinks, including a Belgian Waffle with candied bacon and maple bacon ice cream for dessert (yea, it was as good as it sounds)
True Blood
A visit to Mount Vernon Plantation
More food (sans drinking)
Train ride back to the city

All in all, it was a really nice trip and a much needed break from the city. But I’m still glad to be back.