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Alabama under the rain

Atlanta in the morning
Atlanta in the morning

On the fourth day, I woke up at 6 a.m. to take care of uploading new content to the website and exchange some emails with people I shall see in the upcoming days. I want to take the opportunity to let all of you who sent me an email that most likely I received it, but it will take me some times to answer to everybody. Please be patient, you will hear from me.

Nick and Peter P.
Nick and Peter

The goal for today was to reach Ocean Springs, in Mississippi, where Matt, an early supporter of the trip, will let us park in his driveway and open the tent. Here in Georgia, it is supposed to rain until Thursday, and I hope we will find sun going west.

I want to take care of those brakes, but can’t do it under the rain. So I decided to go one more day along highways before I work on the problem. By the end of the day, we found the sun again.

Between Alabama and Mississippi
Between Alabama and Mississippi
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Entering the South

virginiaAfter another cold and wet night in Lexington, Va. we woke up at 6 a.m., made coffee and went to take hot showers. We only drove 512 miles in the two previous days, because of the slow roads of the Appalachia, and now had a long day of driving to reach Atlanta, Ga.

foodTo save money on gas, we decided to never go faster than 50 mph, meaning it would take us 10 hours to reach the city.

At 7:30, after packing the tent and the cooking utensils, we were on our way. The day was long, and not the most exciting of our life. We stopped quickly to have a North Carolina pulled pork sandwich, and drove the rest of the day.

When we reached the bottom of the mountains the previous day, I noticed my rear brakes were smoking, thanks to the heavy weight of the vehicle. After further inspection in the morning, I figured that the rear brake pads are completely cooked, and necessitate a replacement in the very near future. I decided we could still wait, given that we would stay on the highway all day long, and brakes would not be much needed.

Eventually, we made it to Atlanta, and met with Peter Prengaman, an AP colleague I used to work with before I became a bum. Peter and his wife invited us for diner, and had a real bed for us, which was nice after two days of cold camping.

river