Stamps Like Champs: August 2017

It's been a while...
With Steve starting his new job in January, he hasn't been able to build up a lot of PTO. Also, if you don't already know this, we are in the market for a new house which means financially we shouldn't be planning any parks and beer-in-small-glasses trips for a little while. But we've done a couple small things I wanted to blog about.

We celebrated our 11th anniversary on August 6. Due to a family obligation, we actually couldn't do anything that day. But the day before, we went to DC to do more of a park we've already been to and we went to one of the more recently named sites, which was a new park site for us. We started by going to Prince William Forest Park. We were actually here a few years ago, but only had time for the scenic drive. The scenic drive is really just a drive through a forest with spots to park for hikes, so there isn't much at all to see on the scenic drive. When we did this, we didn't really feel like we gave the park a fair shake so I'm really glad we went back and did some hiking.

Our first hike was a 1.5ish mile loop (Laurel Loop Trail) to South Fork Quantico Creek. It was a really easy, relatively flat hike and the creek views were nice. After that we also did the Quantico Cascades Trail to little baby waterfalls. This is about 1.4 miles round trip and pretty easy, but a lot of uphill on the way back.

South Fork Quantico Creek selfie

South Fork Quantico Creek

Quantico Cascade Falls

We grabbed some lunch and then went to Belmont-Paul National Historic Site for the ranger-led tour. This was such an interesting tour! I found myself silently thanking Alva Belmont and Alice Paul (and many other women) quite a bit for fighting for and earning my right to vote. The National Women's Party is still active and is hopefully working on that 70% issue. To my female readers, please go VOTE VOTE VOTE! These women went through horrendous experiences (jail time and forced feeding through a nasal tube, for example) while fighting for this right. If you aren't voting, you are letting these women down. An interesting tidbit about Alva Belmont (not politically related) is that she grew up in a wealthy family and then was married to a Vanderbilt. They divorced, which was unheard of back in this time. After the divorce though, she married into the Belmont family (as in Belmont Stakes). Quite the rich lady she was!

One of the original protest signs from in front of the White House

Pretty door

Joan of Arc statue - this was a gift to Alva Belmont from Mr. Belmont. There is a huge steel column all the way to the basement just to support this marble statue.

Belmont-Paul House

Fast forward a week and we get to the title of the blog post. Steve celebrated his birthday on July 12. I had planned a surprise for him with a few of our friends to go on a helicopter tour through Charm City Helicopters around Baltimore. Despite the murder rate and skyrocketing drug issues, Baltimore really is a beautiful city. I wish the city could be cleaned up so that those aren't issues anymore, but I don't think that will be in my lifetime. Regardless, the city was just as beautiful from the air and we had the most perfect day for flying! After Steve opened his certificate telling him what I had planned, he immediately went online and found the shirts we are all wearing. We spent all afternoon yelling this in Arnold's voice and the CCH crew got a kick out of our shirts! If you're in the Baltimore area, I highly recommend a tour, whether you live here or not!