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Monday, September 8, 2008, city park, Rainelle, West Virginia
We slept in. I woke up first and went to the store to buy some milk. It was amusing to watch a man in line glaring at his mischievous son who obviously had both parents wrapped around his finger, unable to control him. After monkeying around, he finally drops the soda which explodes over everything within 3 feet, luckily not me. I had to laugh, but those poor parents have to live with him, but it's their own fault. A fisherman showed us his big catfish he caught today and John took a picture with it.
I think the Appalachians started today. Up, up, down a little, up, up, repeat. It was a hard 30+ miles today, pretty though. The kids wanted to go to the library, but it was closed on Mondays; the next town's was too. Oh well. We finally arrived in Rainelle at around 5:30. After finding no nearby campgrounds or police to ask, a nice lady told us where the mayor lived; he might be able to help. So I went to his house and he told us we could camp in the city park. When we got there, there were three horsemen, and two of them, Phil and Patty Dawson, were riding horses across the country from Idaho to Virginia, raising money for families with children with diseases, a great cause, and Dennis was their support man. I was very interested in talking with them, so we camped next to them. Such an interesting group, and they had a lot of amazing stories to tell of all kinds of people helping them along the way. They were a great encouragement and they let me use their grill to cook up some pork chops. The kids liked their puppy, Shortstop, and played with her. Before we went to bed, they brought over a chocolate cake for us, delicious. Before going to bed, I called my mom. It was great to talk with her and update her on our trip. About 35 miles.