Day 72: Donut delight

Hiked 6.5 miles, staying in Harrisonburg at the Stonewall Jackson Inn.

 

It was pretty clear when we woke up this morning that the rain was coming.  We broke camp and headed out and hiked up to the summit of Hightop Mountain.  This was our only view for the day and it was nice to get it in before the rain got heavy.  The rain started coming down harder as soon as I left the summit.

 

View from Hightop summit

View from just beyond the summit of Hightop

The rest of the hike was not too eventful.  We were in heavy forest for most of it, so although the rain was coming down pretty hard we were somewhat protected.  Today we are meeting up with Julie, one of Srocket's friends, who runs a B&B in Harrisonburg and has offered to host us for the night.  We met her at a picnic ground just off the trail.  Unfortunately we arrived there an hour and a half before the scheduled pickup.  There was not a single covered picnic table on the grounds, so we all huddled in the bathrooms to get out of the rain and stay warm.  While there we saw Smokes and Smiley, two German thru hikers that had tented on the picnic grounds last night.

9 AM photo

South River Picnic Area

The rain started getting more intense as we waited



Huddling in the bathrooms

 

Julie arrived and picked us up and drove us to Harrisonburg.  The B&B that she and her husband run is called the Stonewall Jackson Inn and is a beautiful four floor inn.  Everything is Civil War themed.  Dip'n'sip and I are staying in the Ulysses S Grant room, while the ladies are in the Belle Boyd room (she was a famous Civil War spy).

 

Dip'n'sip and my room



We stayed in the the Ulysses S Grant room

The living room

It rained even harder after we got off the trail.  It is nice to have the excuse to be under a roof.  Supposedly there is a hurricane moving up the east coast and we are going to have rain for a few days straight.  We spent the afternoon doing our normal errands.  We did make a pit stop at a street vendor for some fresh donuts.  I can honestly say they were the best donuts I've ever had.  It is run by an older gentleman and supposedly he makes a few thousand every day and supplies a number of local stores as well as the stand.  They are all handmade, that must be a hectic schedule.  The guy ran out of bags when I ordered and had to give me my order in a giant box.  In recompense he gave me a bunch of extra donut holes.  I suffered through this ordeal stoically.

 

The lobby

Front porch

The outside of the B&B

 

We also got to stop at a Mennonite whole foods store.  These are a real treat whenever we find them as they have a lot of dried goods allowing us a little more variety in our diet.  After errands we went back to the inn and relaxed for the afternoon.

 

Stonewall Jackson's insignia

Julie put a special message on the sign for us!

For dinner we went out to a great restaurant that has a ton of beers on tap.  The food was fantastic and the beers were awesome.  The "ring of fire" burger was supposed to be very hot but when it came out I didn't think it was that hot.  The waiter came back with a sauce to add to it that would "melt my face off".  They made a pretty good attempt, it was reasonably spicy.  Good food, good beer, good bed, great day.



I had to take a panorama to get all the taps!