June 28, 2014 - Mineral, Virginia (cont.)

Post date: Jun 29, 2014 12:04:00 AM

We spent the night at the Mineral, Virginia Volunteer Fire Department. We set up our tents on their grass and were able to use their showers, kitchen and bathrooms. Two other bikers joined us. Eric was traveling from Pueblo, CO to Yorktown, VA so he was almost done. Sam, from Australia, who we met back in Glendale, VA yesterday also rode in. We invited Eric and Sam over to our picnic table for spaghetti.

We didn’t realize how close we were to the railroad tracks until the 1^st train came by last night. The track was running along the side of the Fire Department’s property. There were a lot of trains last night. We also got to listen to the emergency scanner and heard the fire trucks pull out with their sirens a couple times. It is very nice of the fire fighters to let the bikers stay. In the evening, a couple guys from Italy rode in. They were on the “Race Across America”, so they were going to sleep for 3 hours and keep going. Currently they were in 5^th or 6^th place and a team had already finished.

While we were eating dinner, a man drove his pickup around the grass to the picnic table behind the fire station. He wanted to know all about the trip and gave us pencil souvenirs from his shop in town. They are so used to people staying at the fire station. When we asked if there were people there every night, he knew that riders were there every night except Sunday last week.

We didn’t have any internet connection in Mineral, so we will try to catch up today. The guys are riding to Charlottsville this morning. We will eat lunch there and decide whether to go on or stay. They have to strategize a little due to services offered in the next area and an impending mountain they will be climbing. All the rolling hills so far are nothing.

So far, my priorities are following the map and finding the next bathroom! A Laundromat would be great about now, too. We packed way too much stuff, so, like the pioneers on the Oregon Trail, we may start leaving things along the side of the road to lighten our load. We already sent a small box home. Every time we repack the car, our bags seem to have grown. I definitely could have left some things at home.