Today was a very fun, hot and exciting day. My friend Jen and her friend Sara came to visit me from Minnesota for the weekend. We headed out today to Great Falls National Park to do some hiking (aka walking for me. hehehee...) and to just enjoy the beautiful weather. The falls were absolutely beautiful and full of life.
This is a picture of me, Jen and Sara with the falls behind us.
We watched some white water kyakers trying to work their way up the falls. I can't imagine the muscle strength they must have. I was tired just watching them. ;)
After we hiked some more we headed out to the mountains of western Loudoun County and to Bluemont Vineyard for some wine tasting. It was such a beautiful vineyard and the views were breathtaking.
Sara and I did the wine tasting as Jen doesn't care for it too much. :)
I ended up getting a bottle of the donkey which is a rose wine.
They have this amazing Strawberry wine I was thinking of getting but thought I'd wait to take Eric out there to try it. :)
After we were done we headed back to Leesburg and to the outlet mall for a little shopping. Then it was home for dinner and not long after we all crashed in bed.
It was such an amazing day with 2 very awesome people.
Today we decided to go scope out a new railfanning location down in Front Royal, VA called Riverton Junction. This area is along the Shenandoah River and both the NS and CSX lines. After a stop at RadioShack to pick up a roof top antenna (to strengthen our signal) we found our location and I started to find the perfect spot for taking pictures. While waiting for some traffic I played around with the settings on our camera to get this neat picture of one of the train bridges which crosses the Shenandoah.
This bridge combines the CSX and NS lines to cross the Shenandoah River.
This picture is of the bridge that carries just the NS line over the Shenandoah River. Just to the right on the picture you can see the diamond where the CSX line crosses to the other bridge.
After about an hour or so of waiting and no chatter on the radio we decided to head up to Shenandoah Junction, WV. We took US-340 all the way up to Route 9 and got there in about an hour.
We spent about 3 hours in Shen Junction and got word on the radio that we had a WB train on approach. I hopped out of the car and to my favorite spot in anticipation of a CSX rounding the bend. Little did I know that we were waiting on the Capital Limited (Amtrak). I must say that I was disappointed but happy to have had at least ONE train that day.
Here you can see the engineer giving us rabbit ears.
The day was a bit of a bust but I couldn't imagine spending it with anyone but Eric (well except for maybe my family). :)
A journey is best measured in friends rather than miles. - Tim Cahill
For 55 degree nights in December, dinner with great friends and Christmas carols with the Santa band.
Eric and I spent the weekend leading up to Christmas in Virginia Beach with his mom and sister. We got to have dinner with our dear friends Bryan and Meredith (and soon to be babygirl Lewis). We met them for dinner at Bravo Italian (http://www.bravoitalian.com/) which is located at the Virginia Beach Towne Center. We had a wonderful dinner filled with lots of conversation, laughter and my opportunity to give them the gifts I made for babygirl. We gave them the crocheted blanket that I made an a breast feeding reminder bracelet. They were both totally blown away by the thoughtfulness of the gifts and the fact that they were all hand crafted.
After we ate we headed outside and were greeted by this 4 man Santa band.
They filled the warm (but breezy) night air with sounds of Christmas. It was so fun listening to them play (and made me want to dance).
The court yard that we were in had all of these fun sculptures of reindeer. They were all shaped differently and some were holding shopping bags from various stores there.
It was such a good evening and one that I didn't want to end. It is so hard being a good distance away from those that you want to surround yourself with. Eric and I are blessed to have Bryan and Meredith as friends. I love the friendship that we have with them because it is more like being with family with them and that to me means so much.
"In the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures." -- Kahil Gibran
