I went down to see my sister and my brother-in-law in Suffolk, VA, on my three day break this week. What with my work schedule recently, I haven’t done much on my days off but try to catch up on my sleep so the trip was a nice change. I drove down on Sunday after a few hours of sleep in the morning. That afternoon and evening was just hanging out, lazing in the pool, and chatting. I was good to see Kim and Don who I hadn’t seen since late February or early March. Kim’s friends the Kent’s came over for dinner which was based on some awesome ribs that Kim did in the oven. We even got to break in Don’s new Cornhole boards.
On Monday, my intent was to go down to Virginia Beach (VB) in the morning, have some lunch, and head back to Suffolk to kayak. I hoped to stop in at the Beach Brewing Company to check out their establishment and taste their beer but since they were only open on the weekends that did not pan out. I did get out on the beach for a couple of hours where I read the paper and enjoyed the scenery. Since I haven’t had good experiences lounging and swimming at the beach with much of a drive in front of me I didn’t make it into the water. They don’t have much in the way of changing facilities at VB and I didn’t relish the thought of making the drive back to Suffolk with a bathing suit full of sand.
I did have a tasty Starr Hill Brewery Northern Lights IPA and chicken Caesar salad for lunch at the 11th Street Taphouse Bar and Grill. They had quite the beer selection that made me want to grab a nearby hotel room and just hang out for the rest of the day and night. As it was, I head back west only to encounter traffic slow downs and blockages due to bridge openings and car fires. I was able to get off the highway onto a road I recognized and planned to get on eventually so that worked out okay.
By the time I got back to back to Suffolk, I decided not to kayak and headed toward a local place called Cogan’s Pizza where they have a pretty good beer selection. I missed my turn and ended up at Buffalo Wild Wings which wasn’t a bad thing. There I tasted the Beach Brewery Pale Ale but was not impressed. I did enjoy immensely the O’Connor Brewing Company Great Dismal Black IPA. Black IPA’s are quite the rage in the craft brew community this year. I have had at least four different ones this year and enjoyed them all.
Monday night was relaxing. We did leftover ribs and such and watched a movie that I didn’t make it all the way through. I was still running on a sleep deficit and despite that fact that I should be awake nights because that is the shift I work, I still had to crash. As it was, I woke up early and tossed and turned before finally giving up and getting up.
I did my two crossword puzzles for the day and read a bit of the paper before heading out to kayak on Bennett’s Creek which is just a short drive from Kim’s, and if you read anything I write, you will recall is one of my favorite places to paddle. I put in at the local park and either paddle upstream until I run out of creek or paddle down to the James River and back. The journey was a good as ever with numerous sitings of wildlife including Great Blue Herons, Great Egrets, Green Herons, Belted Kingfishers, Red-winged Blackbirds, Ospreys, and one Muskrat.
Since it was Don’s day off, we got together with Kim for lunch where I finally did make it to Cogan’s Pizza and we enjoyed a tasty Supreme pizza and I had a Bell’s Two Hearted Ale, always a favorite. We had a bad experience there earlier in the year when the service was iffy and the pizza cook seemed to be having a bad day but they were back in good form on Tuesday. Later in the day we caught up with friend’s of Kim and Don, one of whom is a preacher, at the movies to catch “Horrible Bosses.” That was an incredibly raunchy, but very funny, movie, albeit interesting to watch sitting next to a preacher.
We had a quick dinner when we got home which was about 1830. I was tired and called it a night early. I wanted to get up early in the morning to get on the road home w/ a stop en route to paddle.
I stopped at one of my new favorite spots on the James River, Deep Bottom Park, in Henrico County off Route 5. Unfortunately the tide was out and I couldn’t get all the way into this large pond off of the river that I wanted to go into. I have seen hundreds of herons and egrets in there and wanted to see if I could get some pictures.
The birds there are very skittish so I hoped to just float around and minimize the disturbance. That was pretty much a no go since there were huge mud flats exposed due to the low tide. I ended up paddling back past the launch and up a creek I had seen previously but not yet explored. It wasn’t a bad paddle overall but it was hot and my boat was leaking so I wrapped it up sooner than I intended.
Thankfully, I had an easy trip home and got a few things done before I had to go to work. I had a productive and relaxing three days and it was great to see Kim and Don.