xc trip KHEF-MRH

So, a trip to the beach was in order since summer was quickly coming to a close. I decided to meet a friend down at Emerald Isle in the outer banks North Carolina. I was to take the warrior(pa28140) from manassas(khef) to moorehead-beaufort airport in NC. I filed IFR and got my clearance. The clearance was "arsenal 1 departure to csn, radar vectors to HANEY int, Harcum VOR, Cofield VOR, Newbern VOR, direct. I was in the clouds most of the way at 7000ft. With a nice tailwind I made it down in just over 2 hours. not too bad. As i passed Cherry Point MCAS I picked up the airport. was cleared for the visual and canceled IFR. I landed runway 3 and taxied in to meet my buddies. The way home was equally as fun. I picked up my clearance and departed runway 26 from moorehead. Climbed up to 6000 and was soon cleared direct to cofield and then to Richmond, brooke vor, and casanova before being cleared for the visual approach into manassas. It was a real learning experience for me since i had to divert around several buildups that wouldnt have been a whole lot of fun to fly through. Summer time presents a unique hazard in thunderstorms, and after i flew through the first buildup i decided it would be better to circumnavigate the weather rather than fight to keep wings level and altitude in check while flying through. All in all a great trip. Logged over 5 hours of flight time, 2 landing, vor tracking, 1 hour of actual instrument, and got some great experience talking to ATC. Regardless of what anyone says, Wash Center will, and does, help you out when you need it.