Taking A Walk

by Dwayne Phillips

This day was farther back on the calendar than I remember.

Karen walked with me and we traversed the W&OD trail (this links to the Friends of the W&OD and this links to the Wikipedia article on it) from Virginia Route 28 into the town of Leesburg, Virginia. This took us out of Fairfax County and into Loudon County Virginia.

The walk was ten miles and this took us four hours of walking. That included sitting beside the trail for 20 minutes while eating sandwiches. The weather was pleasant in the mid-60s and cloudy.

This was a nice day. The walking slower as Karen has shorter legs than I and walks a little slower. I would be better served to walk her pace all the time, but I tend to walk as fast as I can. That is to my detriment.

Interesting landscape. Between Ashburn and Leesburg we walked past a rock quarry – Luck Stone. From that point westward, we say large rock everywhere in the countryside and along the trail. They had to have blasted through the rock to build the original railroad bed.

Equipment note:

I wore my new L.L. Bean hiking socks. These are great. My feet feel much better in them than in the regular white athletic socks. I wear these around the house when my feet are tired. There is something about the way they squeeze parts of my feet that is comforting.