Brain Melt

The day began in Lexington, Virginia where we said goodbye to our host Andy. We got in earlier than usual last night so we had the opportunity to actually talk to the person taking us in. As opposed to sheepishly smiling for arriving so late, going straight to bed, and getBting politely kicked out when they had to go to work or something like that. Andy has toured as well, and done some long distance hiking, and other cool adventurous pursuits. We took our self timer group photo – each morning with a host I search the yard for something to set the camera on.

We've been on an unending rollercoaster ride. The Appalachians are tough. It's this constant climb, descend, climb, descend, climb, descend. Neverending camel humps. Make some progress, lose it all, repeat. I almost caught a draft from a dump truck but it didn't happen. I told myself I'm getting some good ones in the future.

Our first major stop of the day was in Buchanan. We went to the Fountain, an old-fashioned ice cream parlor kind of place. We sat on stools and ate at the counter. Very down home. Sandwiches and ice cream. Was excellent. We met our first pair of touring cyclists, a couple from Minnesota. We traded a few words about each of our plans and parted ways. There's a boil order on in Buchanan at the moment, so we had to wait a few miles before refilling our water bottles. Our days are largely structured around finding something to eat, going to the bathroom, and refilling our water bottles.

Pressed on as there were miles to go. At one point Adam fell over. He's OK. It was while we were coming to a stop. The bikes are very unwieldy. The day was HOT. Damn hot. We stopped at another gas station and drank a few bottles worth of water before reclining in the chairs outside the place. Everybody has chairs outside their door in Virginia. Some of them rocking chairs, some not. We've taken advantage of many. We pulled into Daleville and ate at a Subway, which for me, was a poor idea. Churning bowels. Our next stop was called Catawba and we really started to suffer in getting there.
We sat around at their general store, gas station, and grocery store combo while the sun baked us into delirium. We started to walk really slowly, and our ability to speak English got pretty poor, someone suggested we take just brief naps. Our brains got soft but somehow or another we started rolling forward again.

Then the rain started. The thought of getting struck by lightning is a great motivator. We put on the rain covers and started to haul buns. Suddenly everybody's mind was sharp, focused, and we started to pull hard toward the finish. Which, of course, was a steep climb that began at around mile 90 for the day. It was a doosey but we got up it and got directions to meet Sean and Rachel who were hosting us for the evening. Christiansburg,VA. Once again, awesome people. I'm running out of superlatives for how great people have been to us. Our hosts drove us to a nearby town called Radford where we dined at a Chinese buffet and Mongolian grill with a giant wok. Needless to say, we gorged ourselves. It may seem like a fair amount of these accounts are dedicated to what we ate, but for good reason.

We were driven back to Sean's and rolled out the sleeping bags for the evening in the living room. There was an outrageous amount of farting and we felt pretty bad about how we must have stunk up the house. Sorry Sean. We have yet to find the diet that will quiet that down. About 95 for the day. Off to bed.

Andy and crew.

Buchanan.

Working on the railroad.

More Virginia.

It starts to get wet.