Glen Echo and Great Falls

The carousel still runs

Glen Echo is filled with Art Deco buildings

The Facade for Crystal pool

The locks of the C&O canal in Great Falls Nat'l Park

The Falls

more falls

even more falls. A crane like bird kept swooping in for the fish. I think it is a darter.

Last Friday night, I figured I could return to Soulmate's house without  a GPS. I was almost back but somehow took a wrong turn that had me drive along the dark, exitless Palisades for quite some time before I could find a turnout to regroup. Out of the darkness, a bright neon, Art Deco sign: Glen Echo. I figured it was some kind of casino but no, it was once an amusement park that the National Park Service has converted into an arts colony of sorts to preserve its unique buildings. We returned the next day for a stroll through it.

From web

My last day in DC was a busy one. I returned to the Bethesda Pool to park for my last run on the Capital Crescent. This time I headed for Chevy Chase where the pavement turns to gravel. Good thing I went early (to beat especially high heat and humidity) as the parking lot was full beyond capacity when I returned. A swim meet. An interesting chant trying to make things rhyme with Bethesda.
 Since my hosts were not up, I stayed outside on their porch swing drinking my many water bottles and reading the NY Times. Unfortunately, the Swedish Spitz had spotted me and went crazy. I thought he accepted me as part of the pack.

Later while we were walking him, a very large black lab without a leash came up to sniff Ruskin. The streets are especially busy where we were and we were afraid Churchill (as his tag said), would become a speed bump. I got a garbage bag from a nearby restaurant to fashion a leash while we called his owners who turned out to be out frantically looking for him. A happy ending.

In Ann Arbor, we used to have a speciality liqueur maker that made excellent mountain blackberry liqueur that tasted so good. Leopold Brothers moved to Colorado but has outlets in a few states (not Michigan!!!) including DC. I was able to find what I wanted at a small very upscale store near my hosts though they only had 2 small bottles left. One for my hosts, one for me. Hopefully being in my trunk for 5 days didn't hurt mine.

After our stroll through Glen Echo, onto Great Falls Nat'l Park driving through very wealthy suburbs of DC. Money, money, money. The Potomac at this part drops dramatically resulting in waterfalls galore. The nearby C&O canal drops too so lots of locks. You can operate some of them or go on a canal barge or ride a bike along the canal. They gave out free bikes for a 2 hour ride. But we were too tired for that.
The C&O canal starts in Georgetown and goes 200 miles or so to Cumberland Maryland where  the Great Allegheny Passage starts up and continues to Pittsburgh for 145 miles. Last year the ride included both parts though a train option was given to go up the steepest part (the last 15 miles which I ended up going down in a deluge.) The Falls themselves were pretty.

Back in DC, Afghan food (my favorite of the different cuisines we sampled during my stay: French, Thai, Peruvian) and we settled down to watch Lincoln while imbibing the blackberry liqueur. But I was antsy. I was going to get up at 4 am for my ride and had to repack. I was busy obsessing about things that could go wrong and just couldn't get into the movie that seemed terribly slow..


The next day, The Ride.