Road King Blog

Well, all good things must eventually come to an end, and this trip was no exception.  We got up, and rode out for some breakfast, and to FedEx for Sean to repeat my shipping evolution of the previous day.  Darn those Harley shops - they always manage to separate one from one’s money.

The skies looked threatening, but so far had refrained from releasing any of the moisture they were threatening to unleash.  We checked out of the hotel, packed up the bikes and headed over to Starbucks to feed Sean’s Espresso jones and plan out our trips.  I was headed down to Lorton, to meet up with the Auto Train for the trip home, and Sean was headed out to Annapolis for another series of business meetings before riding back into DC for the night.  Our routes would run together down I-270 (part-time freeway, part-time parking lot depending on the time of day) to Route 495, where he would take the Inner Loop to the east, headed for Route 50, and I would take the Outer Loop to the south, headed for I-95 south.  The intersection of 270 and 495 is known to the locals as “the split”, which was apropos for our travel plans, as we would be parting company there.  On other words, we would split at the split.
And with that, we were off onto I-270, to mix with the lovely morning commute traffic - replete with drivers in cages talking on their phones, reading and even sending text messages on their phones while performing what they call driving. It’s always an amusing experience sharing the road with these folks. The skies overhead were laden with water, and threatened to unload on us at any moment. A distant rumble of thunder punctuated the threat. With time, we made our way down the road to the split where, with the traditional biker two-finger down salute, Sean went his way and I went mine. A unit of two no more, we returned to solo riding mode, traveling down the road avoiding hazards of the fixed and mobile varieties.
The skies could hold out no more as I rode south on the beltway past Fairfax, and began to spit a fine rain down. Hoping that the light rain would satisfy the sky’s need for relief, I pressed on down the beltway to the I-95 interchange, and south on I-95 to Lorton.
The fine rain dissipated as I arrived at the train station, and I parked in the lot and waited for the opportunity to load the Road King for the trip south and home. One plus for the trip home, I had managed to score a reasonably priced upgrade from the coach seat I had booked to a “roomette” accommodation. This was not without it’s trials, though, as Amtrak had massively over-charged me for the new ticket, and I would have to wait until I checked in for them to process the refund of the ~$250 they had over-charged. Happily, everyone was on the same page there, and the refund was processed without any further aggravation.
I was the only rider headed south, so the load process looked to be fairly smooth. I sat by the loading deck and waited for the incoming train (which was 2 hours late) to arrive and off-load. In time, a sled containing two bikes was pushed up to the loading ramp. Proving the axiom that it is a small world after all, one of the two arriving riders lives less than 2 miles from my house. He was headed north on his GoldWing for a family function. In short order, the two arriving bikes were off, and the Road King was securely strapped down in it’s spot on the sled. I headed into the terminal for the wait until boarding time. Luckily, I scored one of the few seats with access to electrical power and got my phone re-charged as I waited.
The roomette was a very nice upgrade from the coach seat, with two seats that fold down into a full-sized bed (and an upper bunk bed for another passenger in the same roomette. I was able to stretch out, relax and read comfortably as we rolled the rails south toward home…