Leaving behind Maryland's Eastern Shore, the traffic intensified but we still managed to emerge into the heart of Washington DC.

We didn't have much time for the nation's capital today, and seeing as I'd visited previously plus someone needed to watch the dog, the plan was to drop Isy off at The Smithsonian while I drove around and used up time exploring by car.

With only a couple of turns I found myself on a bridge to Virginia and there amongst the heavy traffic, my phone rang with a call from Isy. Apparently The Smithsonian is somewhere where you need to book a ticket or get in line very early in the morning - randomly showing up at 4pm doesn't get you anywhere.

And so I worked to get off of this expressway and make a quick exit turnaround so I could head back the other way. This failed horribly as I exited on to a parkway, then took another exit and ended up back in Virginia again. The fact that I hadn't updated my GPS in 8 years had caused the odd problem here and there in places that rarely change like rural Pennsylvania and Nova Scotia, but here in Washington I may as well have not had a GPS.

After one more go of getting into Washington and ending up back in Virginia, plus a dash of stop and go traffic, I finally managed to get back to The Smithsonian about an hour later.

The only other stop in Washington was for Salvadoran food in the Capital Hill area, across the street from DC's Eastern Market.

Pupusas are thick griddle cakes aka flatbread that is often stuffed with things like cheese or pork. They've come into my life thanks to Isy's aunt marrying a Salvadoran man, and for that I'm very thankful. Often accompanied with a spicy cabbage slaw (curtido) and tomato salsa, Isy's version handed down via her aunt is delicious.

This may come as a shock to some of you, but there isn't a Salvadoran restaurant in Corner Brook. Therefore, I thought it would be perfect to look up the seemingly best one in DC as it is a city where I've had great ethnic food.

Now I could sell this stop as something I did for Isy because I'm a sweetheart, but man oh man, as we were driving out of DC and I bit into these pupusas, I wished on all the stars that Washington's Tortilla Cafe would open a second restaurant in Western Newfoundland. They were so good.

Another stop in the capital region was at the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club (PATC) headquarters to pick up a cabin key.

Of course I didn't explain what we were up to or our accommodation plans, so to Isy, we simply exited the interstate only a few minutes into Virginia without reason, into some strange town named Vienna. Pulling into a strip mall on a side street, I told her that I had to make a pickup, opened the mailbox and pulled out a long envelope, then stepped back into the car and put the nondescript, beige envelope beneath the seat.

She told me I was mad shady and that any girl would be creeped out by my behaviour, lol. I told her to go back to her young adult novel where she had to ask me who "Jodecky" (Jodeci) were and the meaning of a D Boy.

Not knowing how long our Washington excursion would take today, I had a list of nearby campgrounds but nothing reserved. Pohick Bay Regional Park looked like a decent option about 30km south of DC, but as we pulled up there was a campground closed sign, no one answered the phone, and there was a "registered campers only" sign as well.

Just then as we were about to punch another campground into the GPS, this teenager popped up out of nowhere and told me to come inside. Super friendly & efficient, he assured me that we wouldn't have any more trouble with ticks & that he was going to put us in "the best tent site" in the park.

The site was tucked in a grove of trees, with a hilly drop off out back where we listened to bird song, far from any other campers. I think he may have succeeded & left me wondering if you're supposed to tip a teenage campground manager.

It was hot in our tent alongside Pohick Bay, but we still lamented how we forgot the bring a cribbage board.

So we stopped at a Hobby Lobby the next day & I learned that a Hobby Lobby is an arts & crafts store, not a lobby of items pertaining to hobbies. There was a gaming store in the next strip mall though, but stepping inside it didn't look like the type of gaming store to find a quiet game of cribbage. Some guy quickly came over to help me.

"Cribbage? I think I know the game, it's the new super popular game with the druids, right?"

Yeah, I was in the wrong type of store to buy a cribbage board.

Today's skatepark was in Falmouth Virginia. Falmouth was one of those funny parks where it's seemingly been added onto over the years, with wood ramps, prefab metal ramps, cement ledges and DIY cinderblock ledges.

I thought it would be better than it was, but it was still worth pulling out the bike in the 99°F humidex heat.

We left Falmouth and the radio was playing this 1990s southern rap hour, so I was pretty happy to be back in the air conditioning as Master P and Juvenile blared over the speakers.

I was also happy to be on some random country highway seeing more of Virginia, even if it was mostly rolling farmland with thick vegetation where you couldn't see much. It was like this for an hour's drive until we reached the Prince Michel Vineyard & Winery, which I found by looking up dog-friendly vineyards, discovering that dogs can even go in some of the winery buildings down here in Virginia.

What fun for Kingsley!

I used to think it was so dumb and that it was just dog people being crazy dog people, that they try to bring dogs into all these dog-unfriendly buildings - but now I have to bring Kingsley if we need to drive for 2 days to see new states, and my goodness does it help when we can do fun activities where the dog can come along.

That being said, I stepped away to go to the washroom and when I came back the helpful winery lady and Isy were cleaning vomit off the rug as this was just a little too much excitement for Kingsley, lol. The winery lady said it happens all the time.

Dogs, b'y.

Throughout the day, while Isy was tending to the dog or in the washroom, I'd been pulling out the cabin envelope to write down coordinates or punch in the routes where we'd need to go - before quickly stashing the envelope back under the seat.

From the winery, we went uphill and over the Blue Ridge, to the western, more rugged side of the mountain. Turning on to backcountry roads where every additional turn brought us on to a lower grade road, we passed bungalows on narrow country lanes without shoulders, until we eventually crossed Naked Creek and found more trailers and homes with things like broken down cars and tires out front. Obviously by now, Isy was fully confused as to where we were headed, trying to figure out what abandoned thing could be out here and have the grass cut enough where I wouldn't be afraid of snakes.

Then I pulled into a gravel driveway and jumped out of the car to punch some numbers into a locked gate.

The PATC maintains 42 cabins that range from backcountry shacks, to full-on houses in small cities, to rustic cabins like the one I chose. Although many of these cabins require a hike of some length, by selecting the Humphrey Cabin we would instead be taking advantage of the driveway to get our things inside.

I couldn't believe how amazing this was and all for $40¹, which is cheaper than some of the cheapest fleabag motels. And it wasn't just the monetary savings either, how cool was this cabin that we had all to ourselves in rural Virginia. I couldn't help but think of how lucky outdoorsy people are around here to have this cabin network and how much I can't wait to return to the area to visit additional PATC spots.

1 - Part of the reason the rate was so good was that we were there on a weekday.

Tonight was the Robert Humphrey Cabin though, built in the year 1800 of chestnut, pine and oak logs (chestnut for the bottom to fend off termites). The cabin was moved sometime after the Civil War, then became the homestead of the Joe Lamm family and also the Weaver family.

The cabin saw some restoration work in the 1980s which led to it being used as storage, but the work of Thomas Jorgensen and his son in the 1990s, led to the cabin being listed amongst the PATC's extensive list.

After a few trips back and forth bringing stuff into the cabin, I soon cracked my cold 40 that I sought out and made sure I had for this experience. Sitting out on the porch's swinging bench, I peered out at the orange lilies, listened to the strange wildlife noises I didn't know, while also studying the sizable snake skin left behind (which I chose not to point out to Isy).

Later on we got into the history books, photos and instructions that came with the cabin and there was a picture and notice that "Bob" the Black Snake is totally harmless and that any cabin occupants are requested to leave him alone and definitely not hurt him. Although large, these Black Snakes help control the mouse population around the cabin.

I mean, Bob is a cute name for a snake, but I was also happy not to encounter any giant black snakes popping through the floorboard as that Colt 45 was savoured.

We probably should have brought the items required to have a grand breakfast at the cabin, but as it was, we had a bit of a drive to get somewhere with some restaurants and I figured why not head to the local county seat.

And so, we sipped cold beverages and lounged on this outdoor patio with a great view of my first Virginia county courthouse - the Rockingham County Courthouse in Harrisonburg.

Our lunch here at Jack Brown's Beer and Burger Joint was damn good. I hold the burger joints of Detroit as having the best burgers in all the land and Jack Brown's was very similar and almost as delicious.

With everything coming together here, we even splurged on the deep fried Oreos, which were good and came in a fun little Chinese takeout box.

This afternoon it was finally time to stop at Shenandoah National Park, a personally attainable national park that I've been around numerous times over the years.

Starting at the Swift Run Gap entrance, we drove about 2/3rds of the Skyline Drive which bisects the long, narrow park as it follows mountain ridges. All along the way were pullouts with great overviews over the Virginia countryside.

The highest point of Shenandoah is Hawksbill Mountain which is reached by a meagre 2.4km hike, although they say it is an entirely uphill, steep trail. Hilariously enough, something my Newfoundland readers may appreciate is that Hawksbill Mountain is one of the few places in Virginia where one can see Balsam Fir, lol.

I've never been fixated on national park highpoints though (outside of Isle Royale's Mount Desor), so we instead picked a random, arbitrary trail amongst the 500 miles of Shenandoah hiking trails. It was so hot and muggy that I told Isy that I'd quickly trail run it just to satisfy my need to hike one trail in any national park I encounter, but Isy insisted that it would be fine for Kingsley. They then bossed up and got it done.

We hiked the short and easy 2.6km Traces Trail to say that I've hiked a trail in Shenandoah National Park. We saw no wildlife, but there were a few rock walls that came from former residents.

Shenandoah was contentiously created through eminent domain and pressure on the owners of over 1000 privately owned land parcels. The federal government did things such as refusing to allow the elderly to simply run out the years on the property where they'd lived their whole lives.

In recent years, there has been an effort to tell more of the mountain people's stories and highlight the impact the national park on them. The Traces Trail information board mentions how the rock walls (and old road beds we missed) are from former residents.

Shenandoah emptied out into Front Royal Virginia, where we went right by the lovely Warren County Courthouse.

Front Royal also had a fun downtown with a bunch of strange mid-century buildings, old motels with classic layouts, plus I knew they had a decent skatepark. The city left me hoping wherever we stopped tonight would be as great as Front Royal, because Front Royal seemed like a great place to spend the night.

Anyway, up in Winchester Virginia there was hardly a better way to celebrate conquering the hardest of trails that Shenandoah had to offer.

Continue to Part 4...