Date: 2017-05-19
From: Damascus 

To: Dancing Bear B&B
Miles today: 0.0

From Fatboy:It was wonderful to sleep in a real bed and have a bathroom just steps away.  One of my bigger challenges has been standing upright from lying on the ground first thing in the morning.  My knees don't want to function correctly until I've been awake for a while.  Beds and chairs that are elevated from ground level are a blessing which I will never take for granted again.I made coffee and served Ginger in bed.  That's my favorite way to wake up and she's always grateful and starts my day with a great smile.  We dressed and walked to the fire department for the fundraiser breakfast featuring biscuits with sausage gravy, sausage, eggs, OJ, and coffee.  It was served in the big garage bays where the trucks are usually parked and we saw some friends we'd passed on the trail.  Foghat showed up! It was great to see him and reconnect.  He's about 50 miles ahead of us and it's unlikely we'll ever catch up with him after this weekend.  We will see. After breakfast we went to a large tent for foot massages and free socks that were provided by the Kempsville Baptist Church.  This church has been providing trail magic in Damascus for 9 years and they drive 7 1/2 hours to get here.  It felt indescribably good to have my feet massaged with lotion.  I almost fell asleep!  They even gave each of us new Farm to Feet socks which are made of high grade wool and are very comfortable.  The whole experience was a wonderful treat and was very humbling.  I believe that I'm a good man but I've never dedicated that much of myself to the comfort of strangers.  They really are living their convictions and very sincere in their mission.  We then began exploring the vendors' offerings and I spent a lot of time people-watching.  I'll bet that any crowd this size has some free spirits but hikers seem to take it to a new level.  There were lots of tattoos, piercings, beards, men in dresses, and women with buzzed heads, etc.  It was really a freak show and very entertaining.  We continued to see people who we'd crossed paths with and enjoyed many happy reunions and smiling faces.We enjoyed salads with our lunch.  Eating something that requires a fork is fun because almost all trail food is spoon and bowl style.  It can be delicious but it's almost always lacking texture.  Ginger was on the search for a new pack and had multiple options to choose from.  The vendors are unusually helpful and often are the designers and manufacturers of their unique products.  Her old pack was huge and heavy so it was definitely time for an upgrade in technology.  The hiking industry seems to have benefited from huge advances in fabric technology and offers big advantages in comfort and weight savings.  You can spend a lot of money shaving grams from your load which will improve your comfort with every step.  The trail adventure is difficult enough without being punished by a painful pack or the wrong shoes.  Ginger did buy a new pack and it was fun watching her organize and adjust her load to best meet her needs.  She REALLY enjoys the organizational aspect of hiking and she's also really good at it.  I took my pack to the manufacturer's tent so they could repair the waist belt.  I carry an Osprey pack, which is one of the most popular packs on the trail.  The trouble is: the waist belt adjustment kept slipping because it had a Velcro adjustment that wouldn't hold with big loads under high exertion.  They must have experienced the same issue with many hikers because the service representative understood immediately what the issue was and knew how to fix it.  I left my pack with them and he assured me it would be ready in the morning.  We looked at lots of equipment and talked to a lot of people.  We even had our photo taken for the hiker yearbook.  That'll be fun to see all of the pictures of this strange cross section of humanity in one book.  My legs began to hurt a lot so I went back to the room to get off my feet for a while.  The interesting thing about being off the trail is you still do a lot more walking than most anyone else.  Towns aren't usually designed to be really pedestrian-friendly and often the centers of towns aren't where the desirable stores are located.  We met Foghat for dinner and attended a screening of a documentary movie about a Viet Nam vet who hiked the trail and returned to Viet Nam to find personal closure to his war experiences.  It was a powerful emotional experience for me and I thanked him for sharing his experience.  I've come to believe that wars would never be fought if old men had to do the fighting.I was exhausted, full, tired, and emotionally drained by this point.  Back to the B&B for some much appreciated rest.  It was a good day.From Ginger:One or both of us greeted nearly every person we've met by name along the trail here in Damascus! Not everyone could make it, and, notably, we both missed Tequila Sunshine and Happy Feet tremendously, but I was surprised by how many people we knew by name here. It's been a heartwarming reunion even with people we only spent a night or two with. I'll be retiring my backpack purchased in 2000 or 2001. My new one from a company called Elemental Horizons weighs next to nothing when empty. I was impressed with the couple's presentation, their testing methods, his engineering and the time they spent with me. It'll take some time adjusting to a new way of packing but the weight change will be worth it. My original pack weighed 5 or 6 pounds empty. That's unheard of these days.