Herndon & Shenandoah, Virginia

Herndon in Fairfax County, Virginia, is a lovely place. It is an old town with such a charming look—a museum, community center, library, shopping centers, restaurants and bars, some offices, outdoor shops, parks, lovely homes and yards are all in one place. The whole town is connected by a walking/biking lane.

I was in Herndon during the summer, and the weather was the warmest, at around 90+ degrees Fahrenheit during the day. During lunchtime, going out in the street always transformed us into marathoners, avoiding the unbearable warmth. But late afternoons are the heavenly part where the weather seemed to be Baguio-like, where we walked around old town Herndon and walked back to our hotel, hungry.

Herndon is surrounded by trees, and there are nearby huge apartments, hotels, malls and business complexes in the middle of nowhere. Its wide roads are almost empty, with a lesser number of people walking and driving. The nighttime is also not a problem, because restaurants and bars are just around the corner. The sunset sky in Herndon is one of the best during the summer, when the sky turns a combination of gloomy orange and feisty red. My folks would tell me not to play outside in the afternoon when the sky gets gloomy and red.

Since Herndon is a suburb of Washington, DC, every time we want to shout and dance, we just hit the subway station, and in 30 minutes we were in the downtown DC area. Most of the time, we would hit the road and drive to nearby small towns to eat pistachio ice cream, say hi to the trees, and yell “come and get us” to the unseen people of the George Bush Center for Intelligence, a.k.a. the CIA Headquarters.

One memorable drive was on our way to Shenandoah. It was a wonderful nature trip, overseeing the Blue Ridge Mountains. The John Denver song says ‘/it is/ almost heaven’ because probably the mountains are as close to the sky. We stopped at the Luray Caverns to get a glimpse of the amazing formation of stalactites, stalagmites and columns. We had found a secret underworld city of gold—the cave is maybe the size of the old town of Herndon, and it is shining like gold.

Finally, we reached the river at lunchtime. We were invited to lunch, hosted in a summer house that looked like Barbie’s. The legendary Shenandoah River has been just in the backyard, where we spent our afternoon throwing stones and telling funny stories. Here’s the funny thing: none of us thought of it as the ‘Shenandoah River’, until I recently heard the song.

My bad, because below are photos of great people. Now I want to go back and take lots of photos of beautiful places in Herndon, especially. Enjoy our faces and good times!

 Tom Ford and his crazy roar

  All set to shout and dance

 A very memorable back-to-back concert LOL

 The usual Herndon suspects

 Break time with a tiny devil

 Reading books for my paper

 An unlikely group photo

 One of the wasted nights in Herndon

 Typical day in Herndon

 The walking/biking lane. The big dome is the Herndon Library

 The best roommates

 The bottle’s journey to Shenandoah

 @Luray cavern

 Finally @ Shenandoah River