Date: 2008-03-29
From: VA 56

To: VA 56
Miles today: 8.0

Happy Birthday Brooke (my youngest niece turns 6 today)!I woke up early to try and pack up before I could be seen from the house way across the field, but as I crawled out of my tent I saw I was less than 100 feet from another house I had not even seen last night. Whoops.I caught a beautiful sunrise from the road, got to Montebello early, and, wanting to connect footsteps, kept walking down VA 56 toward where the AT crosses. I made it through a narrow stretch of road that seemed kind of dangerous to be walking then hitched back to Montebello, unsure how far I had been from the AT.I was sitting on the porch of the general store when a Honda Element pulled up and the lady inside asked if I was Skittles. It was Lois, one of the owners of the Dutch Haus. She said my friends would be late because traffic was being rerouted due to the fire and she quick gave me a ride to the B&B before going up to help direct traffic herself.When Jay and Jolie arrived we had a great time exploring the countryside, driving to Buena Vista, Lexington and Natural Bridge. It was a lot of fun to be with them again. I got a nasty cut on my leg trying to bushwhack from the highway to the edge of the Natural Bridge so I didn't have to pay $12 to see the thing. I got to a fence with barbed wire over it that I decided not to try to cross. (The brochure says the Natural Bridge is one of the seven natural wonders of the world. Come on, really?! This is up there with the Grand Canyon and whatever the other wonders are? I guess I never actually saw it and I'm sure it's impressive, but not that impressive. Certainly not worth $12 )When we got back to the Dutch Haus, Stride and Vagus where there and we had a fun time talking and listening to Jay make bird noises.* * *"For some days several of the boys had realized that if they were to survive they would have to eat the bodies of those who died in the crash. It was a ghastly prospect. The corpses lay around the plane in the snow, preserved by the intense cold in the state in which they had died. While the thought of cutting flesh from those who had been their friends was deeply repugnant to them all, a lucid appreciation of their predicament led them to consider it."-- An excerpt from "Alive," which I just finished reading. Jay said he would want to be with me in a plane crash so he can eat my calves (strangely enough he's not the first person to say this exact thing).* * *Skit's bits:* Odd-ball stuff around Natural Bridge: Foamhenge, wax museum, Pink Cadillac Diner with King Kong and Humpty Dumpty statues, safari zoo, native village, miniature golf.* Food I bought to eat at the country store: 2 ham and cheese sandwiches, 1 liter Coke, bag of Combos snacks, orange juice, string cheese.* Places we visited in Lexington: 3 cafes (we only got something at one), 2 bookstores, a chocolate shop, outfitter (I bought size 12 Keens that were on sale), Wal-Mart, and an art store, where after we raved for a while about the current attendent's woodburning pictures he finally said with a smile, "you know they are for sale, too!"* * *This day in really bad trail poetry:The grandeur of nature,surrounded by the hideousness of man,a marvel made of water slicing beneath stone,encircled by a rusty chain-link fence,the wax figures are trying to escape,they've got the right idea.