Mayne's Tree Farm

On Monday, some friends of ours from church invited us to join their family tradition of going to Mayne's Tree Farm to go for a hay ride and pick out pumpkins. Mayne's is in a small but adorable town called Buckeystown, Maryland not far from Frederick.

We were really impressed with Mayne's. It was a truly enjoyable experience. It's out in a very rural area and isn't at all commercialized.

Right after we pulled into the parking lot, the farmer brought out the John Deere tractor pulling a trailer with some hay bales on it. We all climbed on board and enjoyed the ride out to the pumpkin patch to pick out our pumpkins.



We told the boys the same rule as the family who invited us - they each got to pick one pumpkin, and they could pick any pumpkin they wanted as long as they could carry it.

I picked one out, too.

Pumpkin Self-Defense

The boys bent the rules a bit and decided that their stuffed animals should each get a pumpkin, too.

Lotis and his pumpkin

Teddy and his pumpkin

Weighing-In and Paying-Up

After we finished at Mayne's Tree Farm, we had an awesome lunch at a pizza place just north of Buckeystown. Then we did some sight seeing around the Maryland countryside on our way back home.

The farmland up there is beautiful.

I love autumn.

We took White's Ferry back across the Potomac north of Leesburg, Virginia. Then we stopped at a few Loudon County vineyards to do some wine-tasting. There were some gorgeous flowers out in front of the Lost Creek and Hidden Creek vineyards.

Overall, it was a wonderful autumn day out in the country with my family. If you're in the DC area and looking for a nice day's outing to pick up some pumpkins with your family, then I highly recommend Mayne's Tree Farm.

REMINDER: THIS WEEKEND is the Loudoun County Fall Color Tour! Click on the link for a map and list of participating farms and what they will be offering.

Rockbridge

Over the holiday weekend, I went with a group of guys from my church to the Rockbridge Men's Weekend.

Rockbridge is a Young Life camp near Goshen, Virginia, about fifty or so miles west of Charlottesville. We left Ashburn shortly before 3 p.m. on Friday. We had a BSC along the way (Brief Stop for Coffee at Starbucks) and arrived at the camp just after 6 p.m. Registered and picked out our bunks then headed to dinner.

Overall, it was an awesome weekend! I'm really glad I went. Friday evening, Saturday morning, Saturday evening, and Sunday morning there were sessions in the meeting hall. Each session started out with The Riverman giving us funny lessons about being a man. Then the band would lead us in singing some songs of worship. Then we'd get to hear the guest speaker. The main guest speaker who led most of the sessions was Bill Paige, and he was an AWESOME, inspiring, truly remarkable speaker. If you're interested, you can check out a video of Bill Paige here on the YoungLife page. The video is more geared toward the youth group audiences, but it certainly gives you a feel for his style of speaking and his enthusiasm.

The band that played the music for us during worship was absolutely incredible. They were extremely talented musicians, and all the music was fantastic. They said they came from a church in Richmond. They should be Christian recording artists if they aren't already. I actually kept wondering if they already are some famous contemporary Christian band and just weren't introducing themselves that way because they didn't want to draw undue attention to themselves or detract from the purpose of the weekend or Bill Paige's speaking.

When we weren't in the meeting hall for the worship and seminars, there was a lot of stuff to do around the camp.

We played frisbee-golf on their 18 "hole" course.

This is the first "tee." Each "tee" consisted of a rectangle on the ground from which you had to throw the frisbee.

Each "hole" was really a wooden post with the number on a blue sign. You just have to hit the post with your frisbee.

Then some of us did the ropes course.

Gearing-up for the ropes.

On the course.

The staff members kept saying "don't look down." Not sure why.

At the end of the course, you come down via a swing. I was perfectly fine thoughout the ropes course until I got to the swing. It took me a minute to work up the nerve to scoot myself off that ledge. I sent my camera down before I did the swing so one of my friends could take this picture of me swinging down.

Blunoz on the swing.

Totally random aside: Does anyone know why my camera keeps making those thump noises on the audio when I take movies like the one above? If I knew what was causing it, then I would try to stop it from happening.

There's also a rock-climbing wall, a gym, basketball courts, hiking trails. In the summertime they have a lake with a zip-line, but the lake was drained while we were there this weekend. Unfortunately, since we were only there for the weekend, we didn't have enough free time to try out all the different activities they had to offer.

I love autumn.

It was a great blessing to share this weekend with the guys from church down at Rockbridge. I hope I can go again next year, too.

Land of a Thousand Hills

Hat-tip to a friend of mine from church who introduced me to Land of a Thousand Hills coffee. The story behind the coffee is worth reading. This guy was in genocide-ravaged Rwanda and decided to help them learn to work together peacefully and productively in growing coffee.

So they've got the good cause going for them, but is the coffee any good?

Apparently the soil in Rwanda is similar to the soil in Ethiopia, so looking at other companies websites, you will see Rwanda coffee grouped in with Ethiopia and Kenya. I ordered a pound of Rwanda Blend and a pound of Rwanda Medium. I've been drinking the Rwanda Medium in the mornings all week, and it's really good. I like it a lot.

For a while there, I had regressed into a bad habit of laziness and was spending $2 every morning for coffee on my way to work. Now, I'm getting back into the good habit of setting up the coffee maker before I go to bed at night. My wonderful wife got me an awesome new thermos that conveniently fits in my backpack, so I have been using it to take my coffee in to work with me in the mornings.


The price for Land of a Thousand Hills coffee is comparable to several Starbucks varieties and it's cheaper than Caribou or Kona coffee. I did a quick inventory of the price for 1 pound of whole bean coffee on the internet and found:

Kona coffee on Amazon.com - $29.99
Caribou Kenya - $16.95
Caribou Columia -$13.99
Green Mountain Ethiopian Fair Trade - $13.58
Starbucks Rwanda - $12.95
Starbucks Kenya - $11.95
Starbucks Ethiopia - $11.95
Green Mountain Our Blend - $11.32
Land of a Thousand Hills - $10.95*
Starbucks Verona - $10.95
Dunkin Donuts - $7.99

Okay, yes, it's more expensive than the Dunkin Donuts coffee we normally get, but it supports a good cause and the coffee tastes good, right?

* Note: You can bring this price down to $9 per pound if you buy either a 3 or 5 pound bag.

So hey, if you would like to try some good flavorful coffee and support a good cause, you might want to give Land of a Thousand Hills a try.

Disclaimer: As always, these are MY own opinions. NOBODY PAID ME to write this.

Pentagon Gouge: Flu Shots

Update 10/6 @ 1155: Just got an email saying they are running short on flu vaccine, so they are only giving the flu shots to active duty military.

Heads-up for folks in and around the Pentagon: Flu shots are being given at the DiLorenzo Clinic in the Pentagon this week (5-9 October) from 0800-1500.

Great Allegheny Trail bike ride

Saturday I went for an awesome bike ride on the Great Allegheny Passage trail. This was with the same friend from church that did the C&O Canal bike ride a few weeks ago. This time though, we had both our families drive us up to Meyersdale, PA. They dropped us off there, did some sightseeing and had lunch, parked one of the cars for us in Cumberland, MD, and headed home in the other car. That left for the two of us bicycle commandos to make the 33 mile trek from Meyersdale down to Cumberland to find the car and drive ourselves home.

Arriving at the Meyersdale train station.

This is another one of those rail-trails - a former railroad that was converted into a bicycle / jogging / walking trail. The old train station in Meyersdale has been very nicely refurbished thanks to generous charitable donations, and they have a pretty decent museum inside considering the size and charitable funding source of the operation.

Getting underway from Meyersdale

The trail is hard-pack dirt and fine gravel, so you don't get any of the Lance Armstrong wanna-be speed-demons like you do on the W&OD Trail through Ashburn.

The first 9 miles was uphill from Meyersdale up to the Eastern Continental Divide. However, thanks to it being an old railroad, it was a gentle slope. I got a good workout from it and was breathing heavy when we got to the top, but it wasn't too tough. According to my GPS, we averaged 8 mph on the uphill leg.

Keystone Viaduct

The highlight of the uphill leg of the trip was seeing the Keystone Viaduct. This magnificent structure was refurbished recently to help complete the Great Allegheny Passage trail from Pittsburg to Cumberland.

Autumn is in full swing up there in Allegheny County, and the trees and windmills just beyond the Keystone Viaduct were gorgeous.

This is the small bridge-tunnel at the Eastern Continental Divide. There are nice murals on both sides of the tunnel.

The view looking back down the way we came.

Statistics at the Eastern Continental Divide.
8.42 miles 0.0 mph current speed
59 min 30 sec moving 8.5 mph moving average
15 min 29 sec stopped 12.3 mph maximum speed
2394 feet altitude at Eastern Continental Divide

Altitude Profile.

We overheard someone on the trail say that for the downhill section through Frostburg to Cumberland, you don't need pedals on your bicycle - just brakes. Whereas our average speed was 8 mph going uphill, we ended up averaging between 13-15 mph going the rest of the way down to Cumberland.

We saw a lot of caterpillars along the way - mostly either black & white ones or black & red ones. Something struck me as odd though. They all seemed to be crawling WITH the flow of traffic on the trail. I would think a caterpillar would want to spend as little time as possible ON the trail and would try to CROSS the trail to get to where the green stuff is that they can EAT. Every single caterpillar we saw was crawling along the trail as if they were going the same place we were (or back the way we came).

Self portrait with orange autumn tree

There were three tunnels along the way. The first and by far the longest was the Big Savage Tunnel.

Big Savage Tunnel

There's a wonderful view just as you come out the other side of the Big Savage Tunnel.

Crossing the Mason-Dixon Line back into Maryland

Shortly after we crossed the Mason-Dixon Line, I decided I needed a drink. I tried flipping the valve on my Camelbak bite valve open to take a drink, and the yellow part of the valve popped out! Doh.

This resulted in the contents of my Camelbak bladder spewing all over the front of my body with nothing to hold the water back. I squeezed hard on the brakes. Note to self: Bicycle no stop quickly on fine gravel. I must've left 15 foot long skidmarks on the trail as I came to a screeching halt. I stuck my finger in the hole where the bite valve used to be and walked back up the trail to retrieve the missing piece. Luckily it popped right back into place and I didn't have any further troubles with it.

Borden Tunnel

A Frostburg church steeple peeking out above the trees

Our plan had been to stop and eat lunch in Frostburg, MD. Unfortunately, we did not realize that the path does not run through Frostburg. It actually runs BY Frostburg, but at the bottom of the hill from the town. If we wanted to go into town for something to eat, it would have been a steep half mile climb up into the town.

Frostburg Rest Area

There was a nice rest area alongside the trail there in Frostburg though, so we just ate the snacks we brought in our backpacks and kept going down the trail.

Brush Tunnel

After leaving Frostburg, the trail runs right alongside the railroad tracks for the Western Maryland Scenic Railroad. From this point on, we noticed a higher number of bicyclists on the trail. It turns out, you can ride the railroad from Cumberland up to Frostburg, then ride your bike back down the hill again. That sounded like a pretty cool idea to me - I may try that someday with my family.

Near the Brush Tunnel, we stopped to find a geocache, only there was a snake guarding the geocache. He looked peaceful enough at first...

...then I poked him with a stick. I expected him to scurry away. Nope. He didn't like me one bit. He hissed and inflated himself to twice the diameter he was before, then adopted this coiled S-shaped spring posture and tried snapping at me. I've been trying to identify him. I think he's either a garter snake or a ribbon snake.

The trail is well-marked with mile-markers along the way. The numbers tell you miles from Cumberland, so I took this photo to show we were in the home stretch.

We saw lots of the same flowers alongside the trail - very small white flowers and purple flowers mostly.

Toward the end of the trip though, I spotted only a couple of these, and I thought they were the nicest flower we saw on our trip.

Then in the last mile before Cumberland, we spotted these purple flowers with Monarch butterflies all over them.

The Allegheny Trail ends in Cumberland right where the C&O Canal Towpath begins.

Western Maryland Scenic Railroad Station

Beginning of the C&O Canal Towpath

Turning Basin at the end of the C&O Canal

Overall Trip Statistics
33.1 miles 0.0 mph current speed
3 hours 26 min moving 9.6 mph moving average*
1 hour 32 min stopped 20.3 mph maximum speed
632 feet altitude in Cumberland

* This average speed includes the uphill segment. We actually did between 13-15 mph most of the downhill portion of the ride.

We stopped and had an excellent dinner at a place called the Crabby Pig right next to the end of the C&O Canal, then we piled in the car and headed back home again. Overall, it was a great trip and I hope to do it again someday, especially the downhill section with my family.

Statistics for today:
1,790 feet elevation drop from Eastern Continental Divide to Cumberland (approximate)
1,320 caterpillars spotted on the trail (give or take)
165 pictures taken
33 miles ridden on our bikes
3 railroad tunnels we rode through
3 hours driving to Meyersdale / hours driving home from Cumberland
1 bug in the mouth (I spit it out)
1 bug in the eyeball because I didn't put my sunglasses back on when we came out of the Big Savage Tunnel

NOT Guaranteed Ride Home

Dear Commuter Connections,

GO SUCK AN EGG!!!!

Sorry, I just had to get that off my chest.

According to the Commuter Connections website, they offer this great program called Guaranteed Ride Home (GRH). Here's what their web page says (I have added some emphasis by highlighting portions of the text in red):

Guaranteed Ride Home (otherwise known as GRH) provides commuters who regularly (twice a week) carpool, vanpool, bike, walk or take transit to work with a FREE and reliable ride home when one of life’s unexpected emergencies arise.

Commuters may take advantage of GRH up to four times per year to get home for unexpected emergencies such as a personal illness or a sick child. GRH can also be used for unscheduled overtime when your employer mandates that you must stay late.

GRH is designed to rescue commuters who are worried about how they’ll get home when an emergency arises. Knowing there’s a guaranteed ride home allows one to use commuting options like transit and carpools with peace of mind and confidence.

Best of all, the GRH service is FREE!

Some restrictions apply so be sure to read the PARTICIPATION GUIDELINES

Questions? Call us at 1-800-745-RIDE.

Yeah, notice that nefarious little "some restrictions apply" caveat at the end???

So there I was...

It had been a looooong week. I had missed the last bus home from Crystal City most of the week, so I had to take the Metro over to Rosslyn to catch my backup late bus from there. My wife was not happy about eating dinner without me multiple times last week.

Along came Friday. My last appointment of the day on Friday was a 1 p.m. meeting in the Pentagon. Given what a tough week it had been, I said to myself, "Self, I'm gonna go home early this afternoon as soon as I get out of that 1 p.m. meeting."

"Tee-hee, we'll just see about that," said Murphy.

Then all-hell broke loose at the meeting, and next thing I knew I was frantically running around like a chicken with my head cut off, gathering information and writing urgent action memos for flag officers.

I made it back to my office the first time about 5:30 p.m. As I walked in the door, I was alarmed to discover my phone was ringing. You know what they say about not answering the phone after 4 p.m. right? (Especially on a Friday!) Well, I missed it - I picked up the phone right as the call went to voice mail the first time. I said to myself, "Self, if it's important, they'll call back."

Ring ring.

I picked up the phone. One of my coworkers coming back from our urgent tasking around the Pentagon was apprehended by the Pentagon Police because he didn't have his courier card.

Doh.

I was the ONLY one left from our office. Everybody else had gone home for the day. I had to rescue my shipmate from the clutches of the Pentagon Police. So I dropped my stuff in my office, turned around, and headed out the door jogging the 3/4 mile stretch back to the Pentagon. I had to talk to the duty sergeant and sign for custody of my shipmate and the documents he was carrying without his courier card.

No sooner had we been released by the Pentagon Police then the cell phone rang. The admiral's executive assistant (EA) recalled us to the Pentagon to bring back the materials we had just finished reviewing in the admiral's office. Back we went into the Pentagon.

By the time we got out of the Pentagon, got back to the office to drop off the important stuff, picked up our personal things, and got to the Metro, I knew it was going to be too late. The absolute very last bus I can catch home is at 7:30 p.m. I got on the Metro about 7:20, and arrived at the bus stop about 7:34 to an empty bus platform.

So, tell me, dear readers... Wouldn't YOU consider this an example of "unscheduled overtime when your employer mandates that you must stay late"???

I sure thought so.

I reassured myself, "Self, NO PROBLEM! THIS is EXACTLY why you signed up for that Guaranteed Ride Home program with Commuter Connections!"

Flipping out my sometimes-trustworthy, not-all-together reliable BlackBerry, I googled Commuter Connections and dialed the phone number to ask for my FREE and GUARANTEED ride home.

The GRH customer service representative answered the phone. I said, "Hi, my name is Kevin. I had to work late and missed my last bus home, so I need to get my Guaranteed Ride Home."

The lady on the phone said, "Well, that's only for family emergencies during the day."

I said, "Uhhh, NO it's NOT. Your website specifically says it covers unscheduled overtime."

She told me that in order to get a GRH in the evenings after overtime, you have to call during the work day and make a reservation to get the ride home that night.

Um.

Excuse me???

How the HECK does THAT qualify as "unscheduled" overtime??? If I KNEW in ADVANCE that I was going to be late, then I would have driven my car to work that day. If I KNEW in ADVANCE that a coworker was going to be apprehended by the Pentagon Police, then I would have said, "Hey, don't forget your courier card!" If I KNEW in ADVANCE that the admiral's office was going to call and ask us to come back to the Pentagon, then I would have taken my backpack with me from my office so I could leave on the Metro directly from the Pentagon. If I KNEW in ADVANCE that Commuter Connections wasn't going to HONOR what their WEBSITE says for the GRH program, then I wouldn't have bothered signing up for the program or promoting the program to other people on my blog.

I tell ya, up until Friday, I'd been singing the praises of Commuter Connections to every shipmate of mine who has transferred to the DC area.

In the end, I ended up calling a friend who lives near me in Ashburn to drive out and pick me up from the Herndon Monroe Park-n-Ride.

After looking into it, I see they require a "supervisor" at your business to confirm that you were working on approved overtime. Ya know, I can understand the need to have a supervisor certify that you were officially working on unscheduled overtime so that people don't abuse the program, but requiring reservations in advance to get a "guaranteed" ride home for "emergency" situations is just RIDICULOUS!

Why don't they have your supervisor confirm that it was unscheduled overtime on the NEXT business day??? If you don't turn in something signed by your supervisor the next day, THEN charge the person's credit card for the cab fare. What a concept!