The Novice Backpacker: Day 7.

Slept surprising well last night, dispite the damp tent and you know, camping conditions obviously... It's crazy how much moisture there is during the night, it may as well rain!

Today was going to be a long day, we had ALOT of driving to do, about 7 hours (I'm talking as if I'm driving!? All I do is sit, sleep and eat peanut butter M&M's!?) so it was a case of a quick bagel and straight into the van.

We had two stops today, we had Shenandoah which is a national park on the Blue Ridge mountains, we were passing this on the way to Virginia which is where our camp was. I've been looking forward to the national parks, I think the excessive nature in contrast to the bustling cities we visit regularly is a nice and relaxing change. Gives you a chance to recharge almost (again, not like the hours in the van don't allow you to do that? GOD IM LAZY!).

We drove for about 3 hours along the wide industrial American highways, unfortunately with not much views to be seen, luckily wifi was in full swing! So that kept me occupied... When we pulled up to the entrance of Shenandoah, I literally saw the most American man I think I've ever seen! You know the kind of image you see when you think of American park rangers? Beige flat rimmed hat? Green uniform? Country bumpkin accent? THAT WAS HIM! I tried to snap a photo of him but the little bugger slipped away from me!

I wasn't sure what I was expecting.. As most nature sites in the UK, there may be parking available at the bottom, down a few streets on the left if your lucky. No. Americans don't do that. They build a road right the way through all the way to the top! How American... They actually describe the Skyline drive we went on as 'narrow' 'dangerous' and 'old'... It was a brand new frickin' road by UK standards! They say it was built in the 1930's, well it was smooth as our motorways, not a pot hole anywhere, it was about as wide as our dual carriage ways and it had trucks going through it galore. So clearly the 1930's American weren't sharing some trade secrets. If they wanted to see a dangerous road they should tackle Fliss's lane in the dark at winter, now that shit is dangerous!!

We pulled over at the side of the road because we caught sight of a great viewing point. From where we were stood you could see for miles, the hills in the background over lapping, endless views of vibrant green and blue skies. It was pretty cool! We snapped a few pictures and carried on up to the top. Beca lead us to was to be the first trial of the day. A trial that meandered through the heavily dense forest, Shenandoah has the highest population of black bears in the US, so I was on high alert. Not incase of an attack but so I was ready for a selfie with that grisly!! It was nice to see the group mixed up this time, everyone had seem to swapped around and were talking. We all seem to be starting to make friends! Now we didn't see a bear, but I did find this pretty cool plant! My camera couldn't really capture it properly, it was a translucent rose like flower but it was bent over like a teardrop shaped flower, it was very unusual, we later found out (by a very eccentric and camp park ranger) the name and the reason why it's translucent is because the flower doesn't have any chlorophyll and will feed off only dead things already within the ground... Pretty cool useless fact! We then finished out trial because it was time for lunch. This was when we bumped into the man who insisted on giving us all a map (even though we all had a huge one already open?) and then wanted to guess where we were from because apparently he's very good with his capitals... Yet thought Swansea was the capital of Wales. Yeah, real good Sir!

We couldn't have asked for a better spot for lunch, we literally just pulled over on the side of the road, prepared it all on the small stone wall and sat facing out across the huge valley. You could see an eagle circling in the distance and we even spotted a monarch butterfly, which are huge!

I was a bit disappointed after lunch, I thought we'd be doing another trial, but due to time and the fact we had another 4/5 hours left in the van until camp! It was a shame we didn't get to see more, because both me and fliss were looking forward to hiking some American wilderness! Hopefully Yosemite won't be the same...

Considering the drives are long relentless stretches of motorway, it's goes surprisingly quick, we arrived in Virginia in no time, but we first had a stop at Walmart. I wasn't sure there would be anywhere bigger than Target... Then God made Walmart. Its a frickin' air craft carrier! We split ourselves into groups for food shopping via a 1,2,3 system. I was 3, 3's are fabulous. 1's were given dinner, 2's were given breakfast and 3's were given lunch. Then alcohol was a free for all! Now these lists were all well and good, However! Me and fliss had a different agenda altogether! It didn't include food, it didn't include alcohol. It included American memorabilia!! Anyone who knows us, knows we're unhealthily obsessed with the USA so when Beca told us Walmart do a lot of flag shit, I almost passed out! So I threw all the food crap in the trolley and bolted over to the clothes section. I raked through the rails... I couldn't find any? Did she lie to me!? Then I saw it, the holy grail... A sale rack! In it I found two fantastically American tops for $1 each!? $1!? Isn't that obscene! Everything is so cheap here! Then I found my most prized possession... An American flag bandana!! Literally obsessed!! Literally never taking it off. No Ma'am.

After grabbing 30 cans of Bud for $14, we headed off to camp to set up for the night. After passing countless churches (you can tell we're getting more southern) we pulled into a scenic camp site and were escorted to our site, it was a spot with a campfire, a few benches, surrounded by woods and lodges. I've started getting used to scanning the site as soon as I arrive for the best spot, I saw one, under a tree, on a slight hill, very dry with two rocks on the side perfect for drying. IT WAS GOING TO BE MINE! And boy was it mine.

After being all settled in our Wythesvilles camp site (yeah, try saying that with a lisp) team 3 had the first night off! So while team 1 cooked our burgers and Lewis made the guacamole (later giving him the name Mr Guac because it was delicious!) I grabbed a bud and took a seat! While watching fliss attempt to flip burgers in a wok!? I piled my burger high with the goodies and tucked in!

A few beers later we were ready for a game of Beer Ping Pong and time for a costume change! Everyone knows I love a good costume! So we ran off to the tent, changed into our cheesy patriotic Americana crap! Now being the only ones in costumes is usually awkward.. Not in America guys!! The group couldn't have been more foreign if we tried! Beca tried her best to explain the rules to us, but being honest, I think everyone just wanted a game which made us drink the quickest! So we adapted it to our own rules, 5 on each team and for every ball in a cup the team drinks (and then me and fliss some more) and you take the cup away until you are left with none. Sounds simple? It's so hard! And I am TERRIBLE! I just kept hitting Laura. So it's safe to say I wasn't poached by the other team! We played for about an hour until it was way past Quiet Hour, after being told to continuously keep it down we buggered it off and went and sat around the benches in a corner. Kinda like naughty drunk children!? The night carried on until about 3am, and with a 7am wake up call beckoning it would be rough! But the night was a hilarious laugh, sitting round electric candle light (this is the 21st century after all!!) listening to Lewis play guitar and probably having way too much Bud. It's nice the group is a lot closer now, there's no better way to get to know people than to get them drunk!!