Carry Us Back to Ol' Virginie

Our title borrows from Old Crow Medicine Show's song "Carry Me Back to Virginia." OCMS was an absolutely epic band till they kicked out their co-frontman Willie Watson a year ago, and their music always reminds us of Todd's home region.....the great Valley of Virginia. But we digress. What, this blog digress? Never.

We left NOLA on Saturday at 5 AM and drove 14 hours to Lexington, Virginia. Kepa was a champ until the last 2 hours when he just about lost it. We were lucky and didn't hit much rain. This picture marks the precise distance (driven) from our front door that we will walk on the Camino de Santiago if we manage to complete the entire walk.....downtown Chattanooga, TN. Yowzas.

Mile marker 180 in downtown Chattanooga.

Sunday was mostly spent helping my mom move her stuff into storage, grading (Bri and I are both still finishing up grading exams/final grades), running last minute Camino errands, etc etc etc.  We did take 2 1/2 hours out in the afternoon to walk the Chessie Trail, a 6 mile walk laid out on an old railroad bed between Lexington and Buena Vista (pronounced "Bewna."  I'm not kidding. Unfortunately). We didn't really have the time but we needed to get out of the house and Mary Ann wanted to see how heavy Kepa felt on her back after all of these months. Apparently, he didn't feel "all that heavy":

A beautiful day along the north branch of the James

Today was more moving, more grading, and more errands.....including a pedicure for Brittany to get the callouses off her feet before we start. Apparently the K-man found this all very exhausting.

Kepa sleeping while Bri pedicures

For those who don't know, Todd's hometown is stunning to look at both in terms of historical architecture and its natural setting in the middle of the Blue Ridge Mountains. In 2009, CNN named it one of America's "Ten Coolest Small Towns." But we really haven't had much time to do anything. But we have managed to eat (two nights in a row! and again tomorrow for brunch) at one of our favorite mom-and-pop dives....Lexington Restaurant.

May not look like much, but that is usually a good sign in our world

A lot of their food is overly fried, overly grilled, average run-of-the-mill Americana diner food. But a couple of things blow you away. They have chicken tenders here that actually taste like chicken--just about the only chicken fingers we ever deign to eat--and their is one of our personal top-four, low-end burgers in the U.S.

Check out the ol-school stools in the background.
Kepa is in the process of polishing off a plate of green beans. 

The burgers are relatively small, and nothing fancy. But they use high quality ground beef from a local farmer, their beef is never frozen, and there is an amazing simplicity to this burger. If I had to choose one meal before death this would be on my top-ten list. It just takes me back to a good place. Other top mom-and-pop burgers in our world can also be found here, here, and here.

We had a crisis last night trying on and weighing our packs. It all added up to more than we imagined. We have now cut out a lot of things.......All three adults lost our jackets (better hope a fleece does the trick!), Brittany's makeup, the iPod, a pair of socks each, MAH's journal, one hairbrush, and various other items all had to go.

Our final grades are getting turned in by noon tomorrow and then we are on our way to Washington, DC. We'll spend the night at a hotel then Away we Go!