Blogs from Fairfax, Virginia, United States, North America

We decided to make a visit to a nearby historic house today and went to see the Civil War Interpretive Center at Historic Blenheim. The site is operated by the City of Fairfax. It centers around Blenheim, a plantation house built in 1859 by the Albert Willcoxon family. Union troops occupied Fairfax City (then known as Fairfax Court House) in March 1862. Soldiers bivouacked on the grounds and the house was used a shelter and as a temporary hospital. The significance of the site today is the myriad graffiti left behind by the solders over a two year period. The inscriptions of more than 125 individual soldiers, left from the main floor to the attic, have been identified. Twelve acres of the original 367 acre farm have been preserved. This is in itself significant, for the ... read more

This will probably be the last entry I make before we leave. We leave tomorrow at noon, with the first stop being my sister's house on our way to Cumberland, MD, where there is a motorcycle salvage. We are going to check if they might have any used equipment we might want. From there we head up to Ohiopyle, PA to raft the river the next morning. I got my bike completely packed! We got camping chairs that I laid flat on the bench-seat, then crossed it with an old Mexican blanket. I put the ruck sack over the Mexican blanket and strapped it down with a rope. Then I put Leche's carrier and the bike cover at the rear, topped it with the full-faced helmet and anchored that down with a bungee net. Dan is ... read more

I am entering my last week at work at Brabo. Friday will be my last day/ night. I am taking the weekend off so I can have time to catch up with friends and sort out any final loose ends. I heard from my friend Saf-T in Detroit, and we have a place to stay there (if anyone can put us up along the way it is well appreciated). We only have two concrete dates as of yet: August 10th in Chicago for the Nationals Vs Cubs game, and August 21st in Banff to meet up with my parents and Grandma to give them Leche (my dog). Everything else is tentative, and only the seasons will be our motivation to keep moving. I replaced my chain and sprockets today, and put the larger sprocket on the ... read more

The months have turned into weeks, and soon to be days. We are keeping firm on the date of August 3rd for departure, and are beginning to focus on tying down all loose ends and organizing possessions that we want to keep and eventually have shipped down to Ecuador (Or wherever we end up!). I (Bryon, it will probably be me that writes all of the entries) just got back from buying my KLR. Its a 2005, with 13K miles on it. I am going to change out the front sprocket for one with an extra tooth to help with gas mileage. I may change the rear with one with a tooth or two less later, depending on how it affects the low-end power needed for trail riding (There will be plenty of this once we ... read more

The first touristy thing I really done was go to Washington DC with Sam. We saw the George Washington monument, which is the really tall building I'm in front of, which Sam still couldnt fit the top into. Im not sure whether you can see from the photo, but about 3/4 of the way up the building there is a colour change in the materials. Local and my personal tour guide Sam was saying that they began to build, but part way through the project the Great Depression hit and they couldn't afford to continue it until after this passed. We walked over to President Obama's White House, took some pictures and got told we had to leave. We thought something exciting was going to happen because they blocked off the whole road. So we waited ... read more