Getting out of DC.

You have to take something like Massachusetts Avenue, or take the streets through upper Georgetown, Q, to Wisconsin, there at the light, right turn, left turn, then a few blocks, then another left turn, Reservoir Road, past Georgetown University Hospital, then down, French Embassy on the right, then up the hill, residential, then after Foxhall, German Embassy, downhill, Lab School, crossing left, down onto Canal Road, which leads to ...  Cabin John, Clara Barton Parkway, and that is another way to get to the Beltway, then to, cutting over lanes, the 270 spur, then up that way, still, then on 270 itself...  Onward, toward Frederick, Maryland....

Rising, the road, too long, finally reaches a ridge, a scenic overlook without restrooms, then finally, the Blue Ridge in the distance, the road turns a few times and descends, and after the first glimpse of the farmhouses and farmland and barns of this fertile valley coming down the hill you will cross an innocuous creek for which there is a corresponding Civil War battle.  A creek which runs heavy in the summer rains.

Then when you are past the construction north of Frederick, where once there were only farm fields, corn in July, now vast vast spreads of townhouses, now on both sides of the road, so that now there most be cloverleaf ramp and overpass exchanges, the road leads on into the Catoctin.

Route 15, which then turns to the left, embraces a ridge to the left, then goes on, drops down, rises again, and after Thurmont, where hills like the Basque Country, breast shaped, rise, then you are in the beautiful farmland of knobs of orchard and vineyard, and one of the most scenic vistas of the whole route up to see Mom in Oswego.  Many hours to go.  Gettysburg.  Harrisburg.  Eventually the turnoff left into the mountains, the road climbing, truck route, heavy loads dragged uphill in the right lane, contending with the pace of trucks.

Then you're in the mountains.