10/11/13

We left early, about 6:15 in the morning.  It was dark, it was cold, it was raining, overall some pretty gross conditions.  After packing some extra snacks for the road, and lots of blessings/good luck wishes from my parents, we set out from Linglestown.

Part I: To Roanoke – 300 miles

Interstate 81 South is easy enough to start.  A familiar road through the state capital, into the west shore suburbs, farm country, my old climbing gym, and loads more farm country.  The sky remained gray through the rolling hills of Pennsylvania, the rain continued.

We may have been in Maryland for less than 15 minutes, and it kept raining.

We weren’t in West Virginia for too much longer, but it was pretty sudden when we arrived.  Anthony and I lost our wireless internet service and I began experiencing Twitter-withdrawal symptoms (only kind of kidding). And it kept on raining.  I was relieved to leave the state.  There was some trickery keeping it quiet.

Virginia was boring as hell too, which may be why the roadkill count started.

We stopped for gas for the first time in a little town called Greenville, VA a little before 10 AM.  Reasons cited for stopping and written in my travel log were: “Gas, pissin’, stretchin'”.  The rain had let up, but it was cold and I could see my breath.  About four hours in things did begin to feel a little more southern.  Lots of Duck Dynasty labeled air fresheners, advertisements for truck parts over the urinal, and college football hats were seen at the gas station. Strangely enough, this was the cheapest gas we got on the whole trip.

We didn’t break again until 11:15 when we got to Roanoke, a tiny town in the middle of backwoods Virginia.  It was smaller than Harrisburg and tried its mightiest to have a downtown area.  There was a nice little street market on market street, where a guy said “India?” to me.  I laughed and said, “yup, you got me!” but I was thinking “yup, I’m in the South!”.  To take full advantage of this fact, we stopped by Thelma’s Chicken and Waffles, which is exactly as good as it sounds.  I got the breast and thigh on a waffle.  My chicken was so fresh that some marrow (I think) oozed out of the bone as the waitress placed it in front of me.  I’m positive that chicken was still clucking that morning.

[I’d have a picture here but I’m not a twerp who habitually takes pictures of food]

I originally gave the food at solid 8.5/10, but immediately after getting back on the highway I was struck by “the itis” for a solid hour.  Proof positive that it was some fantastic home cookin’, and the rating goes all the way to a 9.5.  This was the first of many gluttonous food decisions, and I’m pretty certain I gained 10 pounds in 4 days of sitting in a car and eating trash.

Part 2: To Dickson, by way of Nashville, TN – 438 miles + 42 miles

1:52 PM – After waking from the itis we listened to some chapters of the World War Z audiobook.  Enjoyable, but we never listened to it after that. We were driving through Virginia about as long as you could possibly ride through Virginia.  Lots of farms and ranches.  And hills.  Lots of both.  Really quite boring, but after VA I’m entering states I’ve never been in before.

4:13 PM – We stop in Dandridge, Tennessee for gas and I am delighted to see that two Gujaratis (likely a husband and wife) own and run the place.  Shortly after, we leave good ol’ I-81 for I-40.

6:30 PM – We went back in time and gained an hour back! Times now in CST

7:22 PM – Got into Nashville.

I reckon this city the size of Baltimore.  The whole dang downtown strip was all bars and boot shops! But all the bars had two things in common: 1. live music  and 2. some country bumpkins havin’ a real good time.  The music being played in the bars we visited – Rippy’s and The Stage – was really great y’all.  But we was real tired ya hear? So we drove further outta the city to Dickson, Tennessee and got there ’round 9:30. We didn’t stay up to watch that night’s Dodgers and Cardinals game, good thing too because it ended up lastin’ 13 innings! Long day of drivin’ ahead of us.

Total distance traveled: Today -780 miles, Total – 894 miles.

In day 3 of this blogothon, you’ll hear about Keith Davis, who I’m pretty sure was a pimp running his prostitution ring out of that Econolodge.