A Monumental Moment for DCUE and a Museum for Beer

On Saturday evening, after spending the whole day tucked up on the sofa in front of the wood stove and reading QB VII by Leon Uris, I met up with some fellow urbexers to celebrate 10 years anniversary of DCUE. Andrew's parents live in a cool condo complex which had a rooftop party room, very posh compared to our urbexing standards. I was thinking an abandoned asylum or derelict power station would have been far more appropriate, but it was freezing cold outside, and we all knew how to behave ourselves in more civilized conditions, so party room with granite bar, pool tables and crystal chandeliers it was.
Once  I finally obtained access to the building, elevators and then got through the security glass doors to the said party, (the whole episode had been reminiscent of a James Bond or Mission Impossible dilemma),  the first thing I was confronted with was the hugest and ugliest lamp I had ever had the misfortune to encounter. It was monstrously hideous, a piece of furniture that would never be seen,let alone fit, in a regular house. This gargantuan object of grotesqueness from China could only ever be seen in a huge hotel foyer, a conference suite or in the corner of a condo party room.

But I think I did a pretty good job of enhancing it...
The rest rooms were something to behold too,vast empty rooms with showers and lockers, everything so bright and white and stark that it dazzled me, bringing to mind the movie 2001 Space Odyssey.
Unfortunately we only had about 20 people present, because so many folks were likely already at a holiday function, or busy shopping, or had heard about the lamp, but it was a good crew, and laughs were had, as well as plentiful slices of pizza, there were boxes and boxes of the stuff. A TV on a wall over the kitchen area showcased photos of DCUE members and then Andrew showed off some cool light gadgets.

 Brightly lit fiber optics were swirled between fingers, encouraging some oohs and aahs from people,  but his pride and joy was a banner stick which, when being photographed on a long exposure as he walked across the room, would reveal a photo saved on its drive. He projected an image of Port Richmond and then one of DCUE's group dates. Pretty impressive but I couldn't think of any uses for it during an urbexing trip.
I did venture out on to the roof top, curious to see how the wealthy live, and was impressed to see high end barbecues, a wall mounted TV, plenty of lounge seats and a pool. And a very well lit view of Tysons and the new silver line metro rail. Not many trees but lots of cars and bright lights. One of our group was out there with his tripod taking long exposure shots. He was a lot hardier than me and I soon fled back into the warmth.

Andrew with the DCUE birthday cake, which was chocolate and deliciously scrumptious, or delumptious, a new word I've coined.

We had to be gone from the party room by 11pm and some people had already left, so a group shot was quickly arranged of those remaining, during which Cindy made a valiant attempt at trying to block out the lamp. As we began clearing trash away a group of young guys piled in and sat round a table, then promptly began to wordlessly devour their Chinese takeaway.Time to go home.

 Sunday turned out to be another cold and blustery day, so although I took the coward's way out and balked at hiking, I was determined to at least leave the house. I left Kota next to the fire and wrapped Rosie Lee up in a blanket on the sofa; she loves being tucked up and made cozy. Then just grabbing my G15 because I seriously need to clean the multitude of specks from the Sony's sensor, I opened the front door and scuttled to the car. While trying to find an indoor place to explore, I had come across a place just too good to pass up, a beer museum! It had somehow opened in Front Royal in September without me knowing so I was very anxious to check it out. They don't have an actual website but this is their Facebook page. I made straight for it, barely managing to keep within the speed limits, then scurried across the road, busting through the front door into an old, but newly restored, house from the 1900's. I was a little startled to hear the loud voices of children, a barking dog and I smelled burned popcorn. Was I in the right place? In another room I could hear some men talking about beer so feeling reassured I started exploring. With Virginia opening over 200 hundred craft breweries in the last 20 years, and having the longest beer history in the States, this beloved beverage now has a huge fan base, and a museum with a bar can will surely be just as successful.

The walls were dotted with posters revealing the history of beer in Virginia and also revealing some very interesting tidbits. The children's voices slowly disappeared into the background as I worked my way around the walls, reading every article, which I don't usually do in museums, but well, this one is a bit different, isn't it?

 In one of the rooms there's an outstanding collection of beer steins, which were donated by a local collector, who apparently has a huge collection, worth millions of dollars, of this drink ware, in all shapes and sizes. I'm hoping a few more may find their way into this museum as the ones on display were certainly impressive, especially the vessels with bright glinting jewels in them. My 'jackdaw' eyes were drawn to the ones that glinted and glittered immediately.

 There was an old TV in one of the rooms which really drew me in. It was playing a black and white news reel and I would have loved to have sat there, with a beer in hand, enjoying the show. A wall screen was in another room, explaining about the Prohibition period, and everywhere were old beer bottles and cans. It felt quite homey.

Beer labels and coasters are being mounted on wooden blocks which will later be fixed to the ceiling. Just like my old bedsit when I first left home. There were many entertaining and very interesting snippets of information throughout the house, one board explaining the 'Bland Beer Era' particularly made me chuckle. I've never understood the fascination for a liquid that surely resembles gnats' piss. Prohibition was also a feature and I was actually disappointed when I'd run out of reading material. I was most interested to learn that George Washington's favorite brew was a porter while Thomas Jefferson favored a pale ale.
Of course, being fully aware that there was a bar downstairs with what I was hoping, a superb local craft beer selection, made me a little unable to concentrate fully on taking everything in, so I had to finally succumb to my beer tasting needs, with a promise to myself that I would return and explore more fully. It was quite apparent that the museum was new and still adding pieces of interest and further information, so of course, I'm going to have to return numerous times to check on its progress, as I'll not be wanting to miss out on anything.
I sauntered into the bar and stared at a wall listing the beers on tap. One of the few dark beers that I can drink was there, Dark Hollow by Blue Mountain, so I started with that. And was immediately drawn into the conversation between the guys there, the owner, David Downes, among them. And so I spent a fair chunk of the afternoon there, with the rest of the day's plans having to be discarded. It was nearly dusk when I left and heading towards home I only had the chance to snatch a couple of photos in the gloom.

I loved the old fashioned singers outside a church and the then stopped to admire an old barn. As I looked through the lens a couple of deer leaped out of the undergrowth and bounced to safety, their white tails held high like beacons in the dim light. Driving down country lanes I saw ice already forming on a small pond and shivered despite the heater blowing warm air into the car.

Abandoned at Mortality's End

Immediately after the parade I drove down to DC to meet up with Emily and Richard for some urbexing. We were exploring a long time abandoned hospital, and for some reason I assumed I was seeing an area for the first time, but when we arrived I realized that I'd been here 4 years previously.

Thankfully it wasn't too cold inside and without any ado we made straight for the morgue. Despite a lengthy time since I'd last visited the place wasn't in too bad of a shape. Opened in 1852, the hospital served as an asylum, a hospital for the armed forces and even at one point housed exotic animals which would later start the National Zoo. At its peak the campus housed 8000 patients with 4000 employees. Reduced to 850 by 1996, neglect began to take its toil on the buildings, and today, in a small area less than half that number of patients are housed here. The part we were in has been empty for years and today stood deathly still.

We moved quietly taking our photos, noticing how someone on a recent excursion had immaturely spilled red paint to resemble blood over the slab and the floor. The drawers were still labeled with black tape reading, 'disposition of body standard form 523-A', 'gloves 6 1/1', 'tubing' or 'autopsy saws'.

A filing cabinet in a corner, which had once held neat rows of blood samples in its drawers, now had them pulled out and scattered by some disrespectful explorer. Some were down on the counter, also splashed by red paint for an 'effective' photo. I sat on the cold concrete steps looking down and tried to imagine the room when it was in use. I'm sure it would have been as cold then as it was now.

Even though there was some damage, the fridge area was relatively intact, The gurneys and racks sat empty and silent inside, the bright metal still gleaming. The lights above the table were also pristine, I loved the blue glass inside one of them and wondered why a blue light was needed. After some research I discovered that it helps to reduce infection in the skin.
I left the others still taking photos, and roamed the rest of the building, coming across the incinerator, also on the lower level.

I used my phone to light up the interior while I snapped a shot and was amazed to see that, attached to the door, the original electrical circuit drawings were still intact.
Upstairs were lecture rooms and labs, with kitchen areas and cabinets, all empty but with instructional pieces of paper still taped to the doors. Sterilizing equipment was still standing in corners. Black mold clung to some of the rooms, an infestation of black pimples crawling up walls that were desperately hanging onto shavings of pale blue paint that curled away and dropped to the floor.

Heavy wooden doors hung open in the hallways although some were firmly closed and locked. The winds flung shut those windows and doors that hung loosely, often causing me to jump. These premises have been used by homeless folks at some point, clothing was left in corners and worse, the remnants of a Popeye's meal discarded in the center of a soggy carpeted room. The sign on a door, 'DO NOT OPEN. NOT HABITABLE' made me shudder but of course I entered the room. A fellow explorer later told me that he had held his breath when passing through the room and I wished I'd followed suit. Too late now...

 I was relieved when we finally left the dismal gloom behind us and tripped down the steps into bright sunshine. I filled my lungs with the cold crisp air and wiped my feet on the grass, trying to dispel any remnants of the place, The red brick exteriors of the buildings have weathered the passage of time better than the interior. Most of the glass was still intact in the windows while large stretches of the clay roof tiles have been moved to protect other areas. The black shingles looked new on the roofing that lacked tiles, it seemed some preservation work had been done here. But I was done with the morgue. I'm not sure if it was the overcast day or the decay inside, but it had been a long couple of hours for me inside that place, and I'd only taken 62 photos. I don't think I'll return again, that's one morgue I can refuse to enter.

Marshall Marches Magnificently in their 2016 Parade

Saturday morning I stood on Marshall Main Street with hundreds of locals waiting for the Christmas Parade to begin. It was freezing cold and a fierce wind ripped down the road nudging the temperature down even further. But faces were animated as I passed, folks had come prepared, with folding chairs and fluffy blankets over laps, scarves and hats, while a few others had turned up really early to find a parking spot by the road where they could watch the parade pass by from warm interiors. The resident vultures slowly soared across the wedgewood blue sky while a lone beagle trotted back and forth across the road, causing me to wonder if he had escaped the fox hound pack who would be parading down Middleburg's Main Street in a couple of hour's time. The Ford dealership had a huge shiny truck on its forecourt, all the doors open with Christmas music playing, adding to the air of excitement and anticipation that was filling our little town.

I walked up and down trying to find a good spot, finally plumping on a sunny patch looking towards the parade when it arrived, and which would feature the new Gentle Harvest store in the background of my shots. I also wanted the huge electrical poles with their many wires in plain view, as these will disappear next spring when Marshall loses its identity and has them removed, sidewalks ripped up to be replaced with thousands of red bricks, making it look like every other town and village along Rte 50 or in our area. Yes, I'm pissed about this, and plan on taking more photos of the town as it is now before it becomes 'Mini Middleburg'. But enough of my rant, back to the parade, where I had found my sun spot to stand in and was patiently waiting for the action to start. I sipped on coffee from Red Truck Bakery, because I hadn't been there for a while. Within a stones throw from where I stood there are 3 stores now serving fresh coffee, and I have a hard time choosing one since they're all good. Red Truck won today because of late I've been shopping more in Gentle Harvest, loving their products but also their exemplary customer service, where 'please' and 'thank you' are words often used. I do have to confess that the tasty beers at their bar are a draw too...
 Children chattered and munched on Christmas cookies, occasionally scurrying over to the other side of the road to tag a friend. The crowds were building and there was barely a free space along the sidewalks. And then we heard the sirens from the emergency vehicles and the Parade was here!

I love the blue and white Marshall fire truck. Remington, The Plains and Warrenton were also in attendance.

So many of Marshall's businesses and social activities were represented here, all kinds of vehicles hummed, growled or roared their way past us, accompanied by dancers and musicians who leaped and twisted, banged or blew their way down the street. With the yells and cheers coming from the crowds I'm sure we were heard from miles away, it was a great atmosphere. Joe's Pizza honked his way down to rapturous applause, especially when they stopped to hand someone a free pie. And the beautiful wagon from The Hunter's Head, also representing Gentle Harvest, was gorgeously decorated with its shining pair of Shires clopping past, coats shining and their brushed feathers floating around their ankles.
But of course, the children stole the show. I knelt down on the cold tarmac to capture them at their level and they didn't disappoint.

Whether they were wrapped up snugly in thick winter coats or in costume, smiles were bountiful, except for a couple, but they just made me laugh, they looked so comical. Some looked a little bewildered, some wistful, no doubt looking forward to their rewards of hot chocolate and sugary snacks, while others were thoroughly enjoying their individual spotlights, shimmying a dance down the road, or banging on a drum, or waving fanatically from a truck. Some chose to just sit back and quietly observe, but they all made fabulous photos.

Animals and adults alike, reveled in the attention too, happy to stop for a stroke or join in on a laugh.

I have no idea why Chick Fil A were there but being my favorite fast food I was happy to see them. I'm guessing they were from Warrenton, but sadly, although they were happy to give fans a high five, they didn't hand out any snacks. Boo! And then the parade ended with Santa waving from a vintage fire truck. The whole event had passed by in less than 45 minutes but I thought it had been longer, there had been so many colorful participants. The photographer ruining my Santa shot above was from Fauquiernow.com, an ignoramus, who on more than one occasion walked directly in front of me as I was setting up a shot. No apology or acknowledgement that he was preventing me and others with cameras from getting great shots. I nearly kicked him up the arse to make him topple over but after a mental tussle I managed to stop myself.

There had been a Christmas Tree Competition between buildings on Main Street. the Whole Ox won the event but I preferred the uniqueness of this snowman tree, which hid behind a pillar. It should have been down on the sidewalk, I thought it was wonderful. And as I walked back to the car, with my hands thrust deep into warm pockets, I had to stop and grab this last shot of a woofer with a waggy tail, peering up at everyone who strolled past. He's made a right mess of that glass, ha ha! Love Marshall!