Pearisburg, VA

Last night and tonight I'm staying in the Holy Family Catholic Church's hostel for Appalachian Trail hikers.  I've met a number of interesting folks there, pictured at right is me with Zen Dog (his trail name) in the garden where we spent the morning spreading mulch and weeding.  ZenDog is hiking the entire AT to raise awareness for food health, specifically The World Peace Diet.  I'm not enough of an expert yet to endorse, but being conscious of the background of your food is certainly important.

Yesterday, I woke up on the New River Trail State Park - a very nice old trail similar to the Virginia Creeper, where the rail lines had been torn up and the graded path remained as a scenic route. It's almost as easy of a ride, too! The grades were nice, though the bike with the weight sinks a bit where the gravel is too fine, and the scenery was terrific! Unfortunately, the weather didn't permit me to get many good photos, but I did like this shot of one of the trestles, and another of the rolling countryside shot from a bridge.

Coming into the mountains yesterday (after an accidental detour to Radford), I kept pushing myself to find a little town - I really wanted to check "sleep in a police station" off my to-do list! Some of the towns on my map are not even real crossroads! Poplar Hill is NOT a town! Pearisburg wound up being the first place I Could really stop. As luck would have it, Pearisburg is a popular stop for AT hikers, so there are a couple of hostels in town. I found my way to the Catholic Church's hostel to spend the night. Several backpackers were there and told me about "trail magic" - something I can definitely see myself getting into!

 
The hostel itself is a great place, very rustic. I'll have to take a picture of the outside for the next post. To keep you contented until then, here's a shot of the inside:
 

Don't tell mom, but that's about a 4-5 foot black rat snake cohabitating with us.  It tried to poop on ZenDog right before we left for the library - dangled right out from the ceiling and let loose!  I may not be the only one sleeping on the porch tonight!

From here I think I'm headed towards Huntington, WV, roughly paralleling 77 and 64.  Hopefully I should be there within the week!