Coffeeneuring: Buzz Bakery, Slaters Lane, Alexandria, VA

Shutdown has a silver lining – more time for coffeeneuring! What is coffeenuering? The idea is simple:

Ride your bike to 7 different local coffee shops from Saturday October 5 through Sunday, November 17.

You ride your bike to a coffee shop, take a photo and tag it with #coffeeneuring. Simple.

After some research on Yelp, I decided to visit the Buzz Bakery on Slaters Lane in Alexandria. Though it’s right off the Mount Vernon Trail, I didn’t even know it existed. That’s the beauty of coffeeneuring – it gets you to new places.

I cruised down the 15th St bike lane, went around the White House and then encountered Shutdown Theater.

Lincoln Memorial shutdown to visitors.

Shutdown Theater is when the National Park Service unnecessarily shuts down open-air parks, monuments and even bongo-playing hippies. The purpose is not to protect monuments built to last thousands of years (they’re guarding them anyway, as you can see above) but to provide visuals for TV anchors to stand in front of. It’s a political strategy.

But, on a bike I’m free of these petty functionaries, and could escape over the river to Virginia. Crossing my favorite Memorial Bridge, I cruised down the Mount Vernon Trail. This is National Park Service land too but all they’ve done is close the bathrooms. I was joined by plenty of other lawbreakers.

Biking on the Mount Vernon Trail with Capitol in background.

One of the great things about the trail is Gravelly Point, where planes taking off from National Airport pass right over head.

Taking off from National Airport

Continuing down the trail, I passed the airport and the partially closed Dangerfield Marina.

Cyclists on distinctive red Capital Bikeshare bikes near Dangerfield Marina.

Cyclists on the curvy Mount Vernon Trail.

Just before you get into Old Town Alexandria, you make a right off the trail and go up Slaters Lane for less than a mile to get to Buzz Bakery.

A mild October day at Buzz Bakery.

: Patrons enjoy sitting outside at Buzz Bakery.

Menu board at Buzz Bakery

The 9:30 Club is now a cupcake.

While these all looked delicious, I chose a Red Velvet Cupcake.

Yes, it was that good.

And coffee, of course.

It was a great little 17 mile bike trip to a place I’d never been to before. That’s the whole point of coffeeneuring. Here’s the route of my rather leisurely ride, tracked in Moves. Go on your own coffeeneuring adventure!