Southwest Virginia seemed promising, me n' Rox rambled through these parts over four years ago. Took 95S from Baltimore, to the DC Beltway, then got on 66W, to 81S. At some point I got on the Blue Ridge Parkway, which is one of the most scenic drives I've been on. Far too many places to pull over and admire the views. Here's one such view.
Here's another such view.
Got off the parkway at another point, and wandered over to downtown Buena Vista. Everything is closed here, I don't know if it's because it's Sunday, or because it's 7PM. Finally found a place to buy a lighter and some canned sausages. Cooked dinner at the campgrounds, which was $13 for the night without running water or 110VAC. Nuts! But there were lots of resources I didn't use, such as tennis courts and the like.
I drove along the lawn, and set up camp. At first I felt lonely, as all the surrounding vehicles/campers were either couples or families. It was a little unnerving, as this was my first day on the road, and I'd only get more lonely. However, the acts of cooking dinner, pitching the tent, and cutting the ground mylar footprint to the right size gave me some kind of focus, to stop my mind from wandering so much. Dinner was burritos of some cheese and refried beans which I bought earlier in the day. Kind of sloppy to cook, but they weren't so bad.
Wrote in my journal under a lamp post at the other end of the field, getting eaten alive by crawling and flying critters. Trains are rumbling in the background, in a romanticized Americana kind of way. Too many bugs abound, eating me morsel by morsel. As I look up into the light, I see thousands of teaming critters swarming about the light in an orgy of madness.
I retired to the safety of the tent, just after dusk. The RV camper next to me is playing some bluegrass radio station, giving a nice country-ish touch to the southern feeling.
| Location | Buena Vista, VA |
| Odometer | 129,166.6 412.9 Miles Travelled |
| Coordinates | 37° 43.761' N 79° 21.864' W |