Zooming In

The trip is full of small adventures. Our intended route from Roanoke Falls to Washington DC was along Interstate 95. Unfortunately, a tour bus driver fell asleep at the wheel, killed four of his passengers, and closed the highway for several hours. The only good thing about the tragic accident is that we happened upon the back end of the tailback just as we got to an off ramp, so we got to explore a bit of the Virginia countryside from a smaller highway.

As it turns out, that was the extent of our touring (aside from getting lost in Washington DC as we tried to find our hotel). Washington's temp was 98 in the shade, and we'd already seen most of the monuments anyway, so we were not tourists ... just weary travelers looking for a room at the inn ... and for me, eight hours of uninterrupted sleep. Wyn didn't fare quite so well in the sleep department, but she got to enjoy the good shows on HBO.

In the morning, we again explored Washington DC (Arlington, actually) thanks to hopelessly inadequate road maps and some pretty poor urban planning in my opinion. We were looking for Johnny Rocket's restaurant in the Shirlington area, and eventually found it, only to discover that our friend Yoko wasn't in that day. We telephoned Yoko, told her that we meant to surprise her, but would love a visit anyway. Ten minutes later, Yoko showed up at the restaurant (she and her husband Kevin manage the place) and we had an early lunch and a nice visit.

I was determined not to get lost again, so I finally turned on the GPS on my cell phone, and we had a wonderful female voice who navigated for us, and never got cross when we made a wrong turn. However, she had some competition. Wyn decided it would be really nice to have some lamb for dinner, and of course none of the highway rest stops have restaurants that serve anything besides fried chicken, hamburgers and pizza. But you wouldn't believe the serendipity ... or if you know us, maybe you would believe it.

We turned off the New Jersey Turnpike to look for the hotel we'd booked in Freehold New Jersey. Less than half a mile after we turned off the turnpike, we came to a place called Basil's Lamb Chop Grille. Wyn got her lamb chops, the GPS lady quit squawking about our missed directions, and we found our hotel just as a torrential downpour and lightning storm ended.

Tomorrow, we have a leisurely day as we finish the initial "getting there" part of our road trip, and begin the "being there" part of life's journey.