Flashback Monday: Reston: The Walking Tour Part II Electric Boogaloo

When we last left our walking tour of early Reston, we were admiring Lake Anne and trying to count its "30,000 bass and bluegill." But it's time to get off our duffs and press onward!

First, we glimpse across the lake at Waterview Cluster, which earlier marketing brochures likened to a "quaint French fishing village." Hold that Gallic thought for a moment, as we approach...

Let's compare the bridge to the Van Gogh painting in question:

Poor Van Gogh. His artistic legacy might have been completely different if he'd taken the time to paint some blocky modernist townhouses in the background. But onward, to...

You can't really see the pool from the path, but maybe if you climb up on the "pulpit," you'll be able to furtively check out 1960s Betty Draper sunning herself poolside. But there's no time for those kinds of shenanigans, because we're about to come face to face with a true jet-age marvel!

Chilled lake water used to air condition houses? Ha ha, that's the kind of crazy thinking that didn't make it out of the 1960s alive.

Oh, wait.

Not sure concrete bench-thingies really count as "furniture," but we'd imagine the whimsical sculptures probably did confound 1960s city-dwellers conditioned to consider underpasses dark, dangerous places. But once you emerge unscathed on the other side, DO NOT ENTER HICKORY CLUSTER. Here there be dragons actual Restonians, who are apparently not to be trifled with. Consider yourself warned, and turn yourself around.

The long walk back to our Dodge Swinger in the parking lot gives us plenty of time to "examine the totality of the Reston concept." But, we are cautioned by our guidebook Virgil, "to appreciate the real meaning of Reston you must live here."

Ain't that the truth.