tap tap tapas

Last week the 51 ventured out to the pastoral wilds of northern Virginia. It was planned, no worries. We were destined for a morning visit to Red Truck Bakery – our second visit – in order stock up on whatever might be on offer. Last visit it was the rum cake; this visit it ended up being a lovely lemon cake, two focaccia loaves for dinner, and a few snacks. Even though the bakery was pre-planned, what drove us outside the Beltway was strawberry season, particularly the pick-your-own operations. We targeted Hollin Farms for the mid-week visit. The farm sits in an amazingly beautiful valley surrounded by some early Shenandoah low mountains; a valley full of orchards and vegetables. We ended up with eight-and-half pounds of berries that primarily served the house as strawberry shortcake. We’ll certainly be back out later in the season for peaches and pears.

Mid-week took the 61 to Woolly Mammoth for The Totalitarians – a pretty hilarious yarn about politics based in Nebraska. When one of the leads points out that it has the only unicameral statehouse it harkened back to my youth. Well, that and the huge state capitol prop, mentions of Broken Bow and Blair, and what was a general Nebraska vibe. Since we also marry up activities we were forced to down tapas and awesome drinks at Jaleo. It’s not hard to spend two-and-a-half hours eating and gabbing in a place like that; probably our most reliable destination in D.C.

Moving toward Vermont….only ten days.

Oh, there they are…