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Blue Ridge & Shenandoah Tour
Day 9 Front Royal to Dullas Airport

We had a 4 PM flight back to Boston.  We left Front Royal around 7 AM.  Dave and Lorraine stayed back in Front Royal to get a new battery installed in the truck.  The morning's ride was uneventful.  Being a Sunday morning, traffic was light.  We jettisoned our panniers into the back of Dave's truck for this ride.   After a week of  hauling our bags around, it was nice to ride a naked bike.

We had agreed to all meet at a small town called The Plains along Route 55.  This is approximately halfway between Front Royal and Dullas.  We wanted to avoid the heavy traffic we'd encountered in the Manassas area. We chose this meeting place because this is where we would deviate from our first day's route. 

Horses
Virginia horse country.
We arrived in The Plains and found Steve outside a small restaurant with a bagel and a cup of coffee.  Steve had been an aerobic animal all season.  He got even stronger on this trip.  Steve had been there for quite some time.  I got a coffee and bagel for myself.  Soon Dave and Lorraine arrived in the truck.

 Steve took over driving.  Lorriane stayed in the truck.  Dave, Mike George and I  continued the ride.  We left Route 55 and took Route 601 (a very pretty back road).  This area is horse country.  We saw many large estates with horses.  I can only assume these properties were owned by wealthy Washington people.

We left Route 601 and crossed Route 15.  We got on Route 234 (Sudley Road) heading East.  Shortly after the town of Carthapin, we rejoined our first day's route by turning North on Route 659.  We arrived at the Airport around 1 PM.   Less than 2 minutes after our arrival, Steve and Lorraine showed up in the truck. Our trip ended as flawlessly as it had begun. 

We loaded the bikes into Dave's truck  We said goodbye to Dave, who visited Gettysburg on his way home.  The rest of us had lunch in the airport while waiting for our flight.  Finally, we got on a very crowded airplane and flew back to Boston.  We said our good-byes at Logan Airport.  And that was that. 

The End

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