Since we had a shorter ride planned for today and since we couldn’t get into our new Airbnb until 3:00, we had a pretty relaxing morning. We ate breakfast in an old church converted into a café. It was called Beans in the Belfry. It was a fun start.

Our ride today was peaceful and beautiful. I think I’ve hit the point mentally where I can pedal and not think about work or other things back home. Natalie and I mostly talked about every random little thing we could think of. When it’s been silent for a while, one of us will say “What are you currently thinking about?” and we have a new topic to discuss.

Today we saw lots of turtles, sunning themselves on logs. When we stop to take a picture, they would all dive into the water. We also saw beautiful herons, butterflies, and awesome fungus on trees.

We arrived at our very nice Airbnb around 3:30. It has a swimming pool, although we might not use it. It’s in a super fancy neighborhood with multi-acre lots. We are in a nicely decorated loft apartment that was built onto the stand-alone bonus garage. It is by far the nicest place we are going to stay on this trip. We stay here through Monday morning. It was a few miles ride away from the C&O trail.

We unloaded our panniers and rode our bike about 2 miles to a grocery store. First, we stopped by Chipotle and ate a ton of food. I had four refills of lemonade. It was a good thing we ate and rehydrated before going into Safeway to buy food for the rest of the weekend. It is surprising how much we take for granted when we have cars. I loaded up a shopping cart nearly to the top, and then we had to fit all that food into our four panniers and ride home. We now have about 4 days’ worth of groceries here with us.

Tomorrow we ride about 15 miles to the start of the C&O Canal Trail. We may try to go into downtown DC too, depending on the crowds. It will be the 25th anniversary of 9/11.