Day 3: Washington D.C.

We agreed to another late (9:00 a.m.) start. As we were in the parking lot we were greeted with a surprise - another riding budding and his wife drove in from Baltimore to have breakfast with us. They were going to join us on the ride, but health issues kept them from joining us. Instead they visit their daughter in Baltimore. We were delighted that they stopped by. We has breakfast at the Bob Evans across from the hotel. After hugs and well wishes our friends headed back to Baltimore. We headed to the Harley Davidson dealer of Washington D.C. for their Memorial Day cook out and party.

Attending biker rallies isn't something I have done much in the past. I have been to tw

o biker rallies in the five yea

rs I have been riding. Both were local. I wasn't sure what to ex

pect. There were at le

ast a thousand bikes at the dealer. There were 12-15 vendor booths selling anything and everything that a biker could consider. There was a lot of free food, and a band. There is NO alcohol. The crowd as controlled and polite. People were friendly. Many talked about why they came to participate in Rolling Thunder. Some have been to all 23. For other, like me, this was their first time at Rolling Thunder. We all admired each other's bikes. We purchased our Rolling Thunder memorial t-shirts and other items of memorabilia. I purchased a flag. It seemed appropriate to display a flag on my bike. After meandering

about for over an hour, we met up by our bikes, mounted and headed back into Washington D.C.

I lead us to our parking area near Constitution and 17th. We came to visit the WWII Memorial and Thunder ally. Thunder ally is a street near the memorial were many vendors set up their booths to sell anything and everything a biker might want. Clearly, the event has become a capitalist success story. There were far more bikes on and around the Mall then yesterday. It was so cool; and overwhelming. O

ne very interesting bike included a trailer for his dogs. He pulls the trailer everywhere he goes and his two big dogs ride in back. The trailer has windows, vents and a fan. I could just picture my dogs riding in one.

After a couple of hours on the Mall we found the Hard Rock Cafe of Washington D.C. We had dinner and shared our stories from the day. It was great to spend the evening with friends. After dinner we mounted our bikes and headed back to our hotel. We visited a local pub to listen to music before checking in for the evening. The local pub, "Apehangers", is named after a common type of handlebars used by motorcyclists. We were at the pub early and there were very few people there. The local band was very good. We packed it in after an hour and headed back to the hotel to turn in early so we could be up early and head to the Rolling Thunder parade.

When I laid on the bed I was both exhausted from the busy day and excited anticipating tomorrow. Many thoughts swirled. Thoughts of my family members who severed in WWII and Korea, a neighbor who served in Nam and the teachers I spent a week with in 2002 learning about Vietnam and the Memorial. What a moving, patriotic day!