Pounding the Pavement (With Your Boots On)

By Steven Ginsberg
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, August 22, 2008

The Heart of the City 2.5 miles

Laris and I met at 13th and U streets NW-- strategically located next to Metro and a Starbucks. Our plan was to walk straight up 13th, but we took one look at that hill and decided it'd be better to grab a little breakfast first. Nothing a quick detour over to the Florida Avenue Grill on 11th Street couldn't solve. Loving this urban hike thing.

A half-hour and a plate of biscuits and gravy later, we ascended 13th (Laris was panting the whole way) and stopped at Clifton Street, where we turned back toward the city for a sweeping view of downtown. We then zigzagged through Columbia Heights and Petworth, cutting east on Harvard Street, walking north for a stretch on 11th, crossing Georgia Avenue on Park Road and then hitting Otis Place.

We saw signs trumpeting black pride, a front yard that looked like an eclectic yard sale (except that nothing appeared to be for sale), a wrought-iron gate straight out of New Orleans and a morning soccer game just getting underway.

Some streets looked more inviting than others, but if we weren't intrigued by one, we just went up another. Before we knew it, we were walking uphill on Rock Creek Church Road, next to the U.S. Armed Forces Retirement Home's golf course, an odd site in the center of the city that I later discovered is a nine-hole course for residents of the home, though the public can join for a $450 annual fee.

At the gate of the complex of beautiful historic buildings, some of which date to the 1850s (Abraham Lincoln used one as a summer home), a veteran crossed in front of us, an American flag attached to the back of his wheelchair flapping in the wind.

Florida Avenue Grill

1100 Florida Ave. NW.

U.S. Armed Forces Retirement Home Rock Creek Church Road and Upshur Street NW.

President Lincoln's Cottage at the Soldiers' Home Rock Creek Church Road and Upshur Street NW.

Open daily for tours. $12, ages 6 to 12 $5.http://www.lincolncottage.org.

Rock Creek Cemetery 1.5-mile loop

Arlington Cemetery gets all the publicity in the region, but this one is definitely worth a look. We entered through an ornate iron gate and immediately saw sculptures (including the statue commonly referred to as "Grief") and grave sites that looked like tiny versions of homes spread over 86 acres. From one vantage point, we could see row upon row of the small, white tombstones of veterans, laid out just like at Arlington.

Laris and I took a little risk and headed downhill toward the back of the cemetery, gambling that there would be an open gate on the far side. Wrong. We ended up making a wide circle through a maze of streets to get all the way back to the front gate: a total of 1.5 miles. But we didn't mind. The cemetery had a distinctly international feel with American graves followed by Russian ones, followed by stones with Chinese writing. This is where we saw a deer. The cemetery sits on some of the highest ground in the city, giving us a good look to the northwest at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. It was easy to imagine that there would be spectacular views when the leaves drop from the trees.

Rock Creek Cemetery Rock Creek Church Road and Webster Street NW.

Endless Northwest 2 miles

We left the cemetery and headed west along Webster Street. The roads were quiet and mellow on a Saturday morning. People on their stoops said hi. A couple of guys with boxing gloves sparred in an alley. The randomness and diversity of the city were on show here: In one moment we saw the stately St. Gabriel Parish off the wide and pretty Grant Circle, and in the next we saw a beat-up car parked behind a locked chain-link fence outside someone's house. Pretty sure it had been there since about 1983.

By now the midmorning heat was getting to us, and we were thirsty. A quick stop for a drink at Flip It Bakery and Deli at Buchanan Street and Georgia Avenue revived us. But about 20 minutes later, I was regretting not getting a couple of cookies and an extra bottle of water for the trek across Rock Creek Park.

St. Gabriel Parish 26 Grant Cir. NW.

Flip It Bakery and Deli

4532 Georgia Ave. NW.

The Park 1.7 miles

Laris is a great guy to take a hike with because he knows all kinds of facts about the city, including where Chandra Levy's body was found. We apparently walked right past there as we crossed through Rock Creek Park.

We entered the park near the tennis center at Carter Barron Amphitheatre (there are bathrooms there!). We walked into the woods and quickly picked up a trail for what was definitely the most strenuous part of the hike. Up and down we went through the park, from about 100 feet above sea level to 300 feet, crossing the creek and winding our way out to the other side of the city. We didn't pass too many people, except along Beach Drive, and the trees provided a shady and quiet respite from the rest of the city. The final stretch was a steep decline along Grant Road.

Rock Creek Park Tennis Center 16th and Kennedy streets NW.

Suburbs in the City 1.3 miles

We exited the park onto Davenport Street, and there was a moment when I felt a bit like Dorothy in "The Wizard of Oz." It seemed like we weren't in Washington anymore. Instead of blocks of rowhouses, we looked up into the trees at modern homes with walls of windows built on giant steel poles.

Our goal was to find the city's high point in Fort Reno Park, which turned out to be a long, steady climb up Davenport. The houses soon got a bit more conventional, but conventional in the McLean or Potomac sense. By the time we reached Fort Reno Park, we were muttering the hiker's motto: "There's no such thing as too much water."

Finding the exact highest point in the city required a little hunting, but we kept heading up until we found the nondescript round plaque in the ground heralding that we were a whopping 409 feet above sea level.

I gotta say, the view from there could most charitably be described as very, very lame. A couple of trees, a radio tower and a road off somewhere. Mount Everest (a mere 28,626 feet higher) this was not. But I bet Mount Everest doesn't have a Whole Foods filled with cold drinks and hot food nearby. That's where we headed, the perfect way to wrap up our trek through the ecosystem known as Washington.

Fort Reno Park

3800 Donaldson Pl. NW.