Original Article: http://dartreview.com/archives/2002/05/22/letter_from_kalb_beating_the_virginia_blues.php
Wednesday, May 22, 2002
Hey from near Troutville, VA,
Actually, I'm closer to Daleville, not to be confused with Troutdale, which I passed through two weeks ago. I'm wondering how long it will be before they run out of names in this state. I guess it's to be expected with a quarter of the Trail in Virginia.
This place, which is really just a huge interchange on I-81 with two big supermarkets and pretty much everything else I could possibly need, is the most urban place I've been to in a while, and it's clearly not set up for pedestrians like me. I found myself wearing my headlamp just to warn oncoming cars of my presence, as there are no sidewalks.
When I got here, I tried to run to the outfitter, the first in 250 miles, because I had to buy some Wal-Mart special socks after my last pair gave out 100 miles ago, and the new ones just don't quite provide what I need. Unfortunately, the outfitter had closed twenty minutes earlier, and they're closed tomorrow too. Had it been a weekday, they would have been open another two hours. I found myself asking what kind of retail business has limited hours on Saturday, but so is life.
Then I walked into the Kroger Super Center. It was the best supermarket I had seen in a while, so I had to walk around the whole place just to see what they had. I'm having pate for lunch tomorrow. I am happy. I also saw Woodchuck Hard Cider for the first time in a long time. After going through an area where Natty Light is considered a potable liquid, and where Bud is considered good, it was reassuring. I guess I'm about 15 miles from Roanoke, a decent-sized city, so things should be semi-civilized.
It's weird coming into civilization from the middle of nowhere, though. When I got into my room tonight, I turned on the TV, and flipping through the channels, I got on C-SPAN, and there was some Ronald Reagan Memorial show on, and after hearing all of the references to him in the past tense (especially Nancy's talk about how his favorite dessert was a snow ball). I figured that I'd have heard something about this out on the trail, and I had to go to the front desk to make sure that I wasn't that far out of the loop. I'm not, am I?
One funny thing about going through all of this federal land is all of the signs one sees. The government has to be really sure that you know that you're on their land. This gets particularly amusing in Wilderness areas, where every single tree has a sign nailed to it informing you that you're in National Forest Wilderness. Doesn't the Forest Service know about Leave No Trace, and how that includes nailing up signs?
They say hikers get the Virginia Blues at around this point, but I haven't really felt it. I guess I'm lucky there. The hike has been going fairly well. I have to take care of little things, but nothing major has come up, and I keep meeting new people.
A couple of days ago, I stopped off at a hostel near Catawba run by an avid outdoorsman who works for Norfolk Southern. The hostel is in a three-car garage with a bunch of cots set up. He has all of his citations from the Fish and Wildlife Management department set up on the wall for all of the notably big fish he's caught, and he's set up to hang up four deer at a time from a pipe running from the ceiling. He has pictures of the twelve point buck his son brought down last year. The place is really laid back. He leaves his pickup truck with the keys in the ignition right outside, and he lets the hikers drive it to dinner at the Homeplace Restaurant (said to have the best all-you-can-eat on the whole trail), which is probably for the best, as he usually has several beers in him by that time, and he's just getting started. He's a really good guy, though.
This weekend is Trail Days down in Damascus, which is supposed to be thousands of hikers getting together to have a lot of fun. I decided not to go mostly because I'm getting a rhythm going and I don't want to break it.
A lot of the faster hikers are passing me now, and some of them started two weeks after I did, but it's strange how I can almost see some of them burning out. I've really started making an effort to have more fun out here. I noticed myself skipping a lot of things and stuff mostly out of laziness, but I've gotta enjoy the ride a little more. It seems like a lot of people out here have the feeling that it's a long ride to the top, so they can't stop to enjoy things because they've got to finish quickly. It's strange that I'm not competitive about finishing this, since I've been competitive about pretty much everything else I've done in my life. I guess that's a good thing.
Wow. It's 11:30. This is the latest I've been up in some time, and I need to be up early tomorrow.
Take care,
John Kalb
Find more letters from John at DartLog.