Date: 2003-05-17
From: VA 615

To: Damascus, VA, Trail Days Festival
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: broken clouds

Trail Daze was a blur. As soon as is came, it was gone but I'm so ready to get back onto the trail. The town of Damascus is great to hikers, they built a bathhouse on a large plot of land about a mile out of town where most of the Trail Dazers camped. The parade was lots of fun, the local children pelted us with water balloons and super soaker water guns on the beautiful, sunny day. There were a few gear companies with reps at the festival but the most notable for me was the Gregory booth. Wayne Gregory, the founder of Gregory backpack company, was there fitting packs for people whether they had his brand of pack or not. I use a Gregory Reality size large but after being measured by the man I was told that I'm a medium. I don't have the loot to buy a new pack so I think I'll let the pack that took me the last 400 miles take me the rest of the way. I was also able to talk to the rep from Montrail. The second pair of Montrail shoes I had on this trip have fallen apart. He said that the Excelerace I have been using were just too lightweight for backpacking and said I could choose a replacement from the catalog and call him once I make my choice. Leki was also there and replaced my broken section of trekking pole and replaced the tips for free. They also fixed Llama's EMS poles and gave him new Leki tips for free. That's good customer service. Enough on gear.Once into town, Llama, Snackattack, Konkopot Jack, Mr. Spencer and I walked to the camping area and claimed our spot. We chose one that was pretty secluded in a small cove near the river. Shortly after, Otter and The Sherpa cruised in and "Mellow Cove" was born. We all went to Dollar General store and picked up some chairs, tiki torches, a radio, a grill and some coolers. Then we went to the grocery store and picked up food and beer for the day. As with any desirable community in America, Mellow Cove experienced urban sprawl, so the Mellow Cove tentowners association (MCTA) had to come up with some rules for the neighborhood. Since none of us like rules too much we figured we'd keep it simple with only three. First and foremost, you must be mellow. Rule #2: don't get up into anybody else's shit. This rule covers theft, arguing and nosiness. All decidedly unmellow acts. Rule #3: move your feet, lose your seat. This had to be enacted because you can't really have a mellow atmosphere while jealously guarding your eight dollar Dollar General lawn chair. The entertainment in Mellow Cove was top notch. We had lots of big name AT acts from this year, previous and even future years. Johnny Swank, a 2000 SoBo, laid it down on the guitar with songs like "Transsexual Trailer Park" and a damn good acoustic cover of Sir Mixalot's "Baby Got Back". We also had Jake from Radford College who sounded a helluva lot like the dude from Radiohead (Ian and Carrie, you guys would have enjoyed it fa sho). T-bird and Sniper tore it up with cover music and some originals that captivated everyone in camp. Even The Sherpa and Llama showed their stuff playing the guitar and bongos. There were others but I don't really remember who they were. Not all of the Trail Days entertainers made a tour stop in Mellow Cove though. Janachi and Madame Q of Good Grass Consort played some fantastic bluegrass at the Sidetrack Cafe. Damn, they were good! I bought a CD from them I liked their music so much. I don't really know where this should go into this entry but I know it needed to be in here anyway. I was walking around the city park area where there were gear tents, flea market tables, food, music and carnival games when Llama came up out of nowhere and said that there is a place where you can win bunnies if you throw a ping pong ball into a bowl floating in a little pool. It was eight tries for $1 and Llama wanted to play real bad. I asked him what in the hell he would do with a bunny if he won, he said "I'll never win, I just want to play." Yeah right, he won himself a brand new baby bunny on his second throw. I was laughing my ass off. He picked his bunny and we went back to Mellow Cove where everyone else laughed their asses off at him. He kept it most of the day, I think he was really thinking about trying to take it along on the hike until it shit and pissed on his lap while he was petting it. He ended up giving it to some kid that was playing the game a little later on that afternoon. Wise move brotha!A lot more went on but it either slips my mind right now or I can't really talk about it here. I'm off to the woods again.