Viriginia!

Virginia

Nick lives in a reasonably sizeable town in the middle of nowhere in western Virginia. I arrived late due to horrible traffic out of the D.C. Area caused by floods. It was a pretty big bummer. Oh well.

Once I hit I-81 South toward Staunton, VA, I noticed 70 MPH speed limits. It was awesome, never felt so okay about going 80 before. It was sweet, everyone's going 80. Even truckers. It opens up driving in a sweet way. It's new to VA, though. As I moved farther south into NC where they've had such speed limits for awhile, it was evident that these drivers in VA were “new to this.” Oh well.

I got to Nick's house and crashed. It was late.

The next day, we went to Kathy's (I think, some diner in Staunton that starts with a K and is a female's name) for breakfast. Good country breakfast cookin'. Nick and I got essentially the same thing, just arranged differently. It was delicious.

After we ate, we drove around a bit. We went down to the Blue Ridge Parkway, dubbed the most beautiful road in America. Probably so, it was beautiful. That's why I recorded the first shred vid in awhile here. Yeah, it was pretty amazing. Driving across many mountains over 3000 ft high, not quite “used” to that, you know?

After the ridge, we went back to Staunton, grabbed some BBQ at Peck's for not very many dollars. It was pretty great. The french fries were excellent.

After having most of the tour of Nick's home area, we went off to meet up with Nick's Dad, Sister, and Brother-in-law at the South Street Brewery in Charlottesville, VA, where UVA is. Charlottesville was pretty happening. It seemed like a lot of fun, but it was way too hip and way too southern at the same time. Culture clash. Strange. The South Street Brewery was amazing though. They had a pretty delicious mead, and they had a few other beers that I tried and was impressed by.

I must say, it is really annoying to go get good food and drink in college towns though. College towns usually hire college kids to do their bidding, and in the way of service this was a nightmare. A table of 5 should never have hot food and zero beers. This happened, and persisted for the duration of the hot food. Beerless. I don't know; that, to me, is piss poor service. And even when we left the brewery to tie one on at a place downtown, we ordered our drinks and an appetizer. We got our appetizer before our drinks. That, too, is ridiculous, especially when you're trying to maintain buzz. Can't win 'em all.

The next day Nick and I went to costco to get some supplies for the trip. On our way back, Nick opted for us to take a less direct route home, so we did. We got a little lost and ended up in the George Washington National Forest. It was sweet, there are little campsites off of all the roads in this place. Really cool, really free. Nick wanted us to find an old campsite he and his friends used to camp at regularly. He failed pretty miserably, but when we found someone and asked for directions, we did get to meet the biggest hillbilly yokel I ever did see. I can't quite explain the way that he talked via text, but suffice to say he had a golfball sized dip packed in his cheek, and the word “Maryland” (three syllables,) came out simply as “Merhl” (a mere 1 syllable!) It was as though he would pre-load each word into the loose cannon that was his mouth. He would let the canons blaze, let as much of the word out as could be ordained by the cannon's “blast,” (a pathetic blast, really), and simply let his dip-spit-dripping lips flutter about as the word came to an anything but succinct and distinct finish. “Merhl.”

After that amazing encounter that did eventually set us back on track, we went back to Nick's for one more night. Nick invited a few friends over, and we got really, really drunk all night. It was pretty awesome. Porch drinking a la Pando's house. Great times.

After a solid 2 – 3 hours of sleep, Nick, myself, and others, woke up and began our days. This day, for Nick and I, was the beginning of the accompanied road trip.