King's Dominion
158 Miles
This part of the report has nothing to do with motorcycles :) I was going to run up to pick my my daughter and take her to King's Dominion so we can hang out and get caught up. My brother also wanted to come along and I thought it'd be a great idea since we could all hang out.
Since I have a lot of gear, my plan was to bring the gear with me that I wouldn't need at Erich's, like the sleeping bag, tent, and other tied down stuff. I'm also going to go through my gear and weed out a bunch of stuff to be mailed back home. The bike was heavier than I liked so I had decided to clear out the stuff I didn't think I was going to be using again on the trip. Flip flops, some extra clothes, bottle caps :) what ever else I didn't think I was going to need for the trip.
But with Erich coming along and taking his car, I can just throw the necessaries in his car and I can drop it off at Samantha's. Then when I bring her home on Sunday, I don't have to try and find a good place for her on the back of the bike :)
So I grabbed the tent and other camping gear along with an old army laundry bag with some stuff in it and put it in the back of his car. We bailed out to head up to Fredericksburg. On the way we chatted as normal, family stuff. In Falmouth, I dropped off my gear at Samantha's and picked her up. And we're on our way south again.
King's Dominion is an amusement park that we've been going to for years. I've found that I like to go when it first opens because the crowds are less and then bail at about 2pm or so just at the peak of the day when it's hottest and most crowded. We also beat the traffic on the way out so it's a nice plus all the way around. But, on this day we changed the rules a bit. With Erich along, I didn't have to drive (and driving in Virginia traffic is a nightmare) plus we were going straight south so leaving at 2pm isn't such a big deal.
We got to the park and parked the car. Walked up, got our tickets (Erich has a season pass), went through the metal detectors. Some gang got in a few years back and there was a stabbing. We went that weekend and it was the quietest weekend it had ever been.
We stopped at the fountain inside after arriving. That's Erich, my brother and Samantha my youngest daughter.
Samantha's absolute favorite is The Berserker. That was the first ones we hit. This is the one where everyone sits in a pirate ship and it spins over the top. We always try to get to one of the ends so we can enjoy it most of all. I found myself a little concerned since the last time I'd gone, I was 75 lbs heavier. Now I felt like I was going to fall out.
After that we strolled around the park riding the Grizzly (wooden roller coaster), Anaconda (goes "under" water; more of a ditch in the water than actually going under), Hurler (in the Wayne's World part of the park; really a pretty good wooden roller coaster), Shock Wave (stand up roller coaster; this is the one where the kid wriggled his way out and they family sued because KD didn't do enough to keep him in his "seat"), and the Hypersonic XLC which is the new ride. 0-80mph in 1.8 seconds. Watching the folks as they were launched was pretty cool.
The problem is it was rather hot, so much so that while waiting in the very long line, I was getting a little woozy. We made it without me passing out but I think it was a close one.
We also indulged ourselves. I had a couple of the lemonade slushies and a lame foot long hotdog. Ok, but still.
We wandered around all day, generally getting caught up and having family fun. At 4:30 or so it was really time to go. We'd reached my limit about 30 minutes ago so we packed up and headed on out. We got a pretty nice picture from the XLC ride. Once I find it again, I'll stick it up on the site. (I know it's around here somewhere.
So we headed on back to Erich's place. Samantha was coming so she could see her aunt and cousin and to visit. I think she doesn't get out as much as she should.
This would be my nephew Simon. Just like most kids, he's a camera hog :)
And here's Lori preparing dinner.
This is the table our dad built. When he passed away, I selected the desk. It was a bit wieldy in moving around so I gave it to my older daughter. She basically ran out of space and I had required her to give it to her uncle if she needed to pass it along. Apparently she had a couple of guys who happened to be heading south snag the table and drop it off at Erich's. Bit of a surprise as I understand. She's big into the Craig's list stuff and I seem to remember that she said she just hired a couple of guys from Craig's list and that's how the desk got south.
This cat (and I forget his name right now) basically adopted my brother and his family. In this pic, he's eyeballing the squirrel that's stealing food from the birds. He gets pretty close but ultimately the squirrel actually escapes.
That's pretty much it for the day. We visited of course and toured Erich's new house. Nothing I need to recount here :)