Memorial Day weekend

Most of the weekend was spent chilling out and sorting things ready for the start of traveling next week. I did manage to get to the pool and sit in the sun for a while on Saturday. The apartment complex has a nice little pool on site and on Saturday morning I had it all to myself. :-)

My apartment pool

On Sunday I went for a picnic organized by someone in the department. It was nice and the food was good, though I forgot to take any photos. It was fun watching people on the tightrope someone had set up. I decided not to have a go. Firstly because my legs are broken after my workout on Friday, and secondly, I didn't want to break anything! It did not look easy.

Yesterday was Memorial day here so I finally got a day off. So I tagged along with my friend Steve and his daughter to the zoo at the Natural Bridge. We had a great time and the weather was beautiful.

White Bengal tiger

Goats.

Kids!

We also brought a bag of feed and fed any animal we could find!

Feeding the goats ...

... And the Donkey ...

... And the camels

But my favorite was the giraffe! He/she was so sweet and gentle.

So sweet

Feeding the giraffe

After lunch in Lynchburg and an ice-cream (as we accidentally found a cafe next to an ice-cream shop!), and a bit of a detour (the map was rubbish), we ended up at Boxwood nature reserve which was a great kids section (and made me wish I was 5 again!).

Tree house.

Making mud pies.

Radnom skull

Queen of the castle

The only slightly odd thing was there were lots of bones and skulls lying around, which was a little sinister. But made for some good photos.

It was a lovely day and we stopped at a country food store on the war back, where, if I was around for a while, I would have spend so much money!

On the evening I chilled out with a glass of wine, Skyped friends, and wrote a list of things to pack. :-)

Huckleberry Trail

Yesterday, armed with jelly beans and a bottle of water, I decided to try to run/walk the Huckleberry trail which goes from Christainsburg (I picked it up at the Mall) up to the Library in Blacksburg. It's about 6 miles and honestly I did more walking than running, and stopped to take photos. (But I did complete the whole 6 miles so I am happy just to finish any which way!)
The trail is very pretty and thankfully it wasn't very warm today (though I was not thinking that while waiting for the bus on the way back home).

Trail map

Start of the trail in Christiansburg

 It was also Graduation at VT so most people were in town and I pretty much had the trail to myself. Which was great except when the trail disappeared or split and I got a bit lost. But I generally found it again fairly quickly.
The only other people I saw were a few runners and some cyclists. The other runners I saw were much better than I was, usually wearing "I ran a marathon" type t-shirt (making me feel very inadequate).
Part of the trail goes through the coal mine Heritage Park and over some railway tracks.

Longest coal train. Never did see the end of it.

Old coal cart.

Really cool bench

Stream

View towards the Appalachians

Once I finally found the Library, frankly I hurt. But it did bring me out near Bollo's and they had chocolate cake! So happy.

At home I treated myself to a hot bath, a handful of Ibuprofen, and cup of tea, and then completely homemade nachos with veggie chili and guacamole followed by the chocolate cake with custard (brought from the UK). :-) Good day.

Spring in Blacksburg. Finally!

It looks like spring has finally arrived in Blacksburg. Some of the trees still don't have any leaves but they are trying. This winter has been so long. (Game of thrones 'lasts 10 years' long!) So it's good to finally see the sun and green.

The past few days have been rather cool but hopefully summer will come back soon. :-)

Chocolate festival

One of the best things about Blacksburg, during the summer, they have lots of festivals and most weekends close of College avenue for them. This weekend was the Chocolate festival! Unfortunately it was a British summer day, i.e. it rained most of the day. Luckily while I was out, for half the time it was reasonably dry.

One of the tasting tables

Yum!

 It was $1 per tasting ticket. I has hoping to get one of the chocolate strawberries but they weren't included in the tasting tickets. But I got a triple chocolate a butterscotch one which just as good. (The diet sort of went out the window a little!)
There were also some stalls with gifts and such, and I got given a balloon because someone loved my t-shirt (I was wearing my "self-rescuing princess" one!) which I gave away. There were also some interesting offerings!

Crafts

 The back says it was found on the I-81! Not sure if it's a joke.

Interesting!

I also went to the Farmers market and couldn't resist a bottle of the Fresh ginger and mint lemonade (which was so good) and the black olive tapenade! Very tasty!

Lovely food!

At lot of the shops down Main Street were also part of the festival and selling bits of chocolates and baked goods. It was lots of fun, almost like a chocolate treasure hunt.
On the way to the Gourmet Pantry (they were supposed to have truffles!) I bumped into Janice, David and his sons and grandson which was nice. So we all went down the the Pantry. Only to find they didn't have any truffles at all! :-( But they did have some chocolate cheesecake fudge so all forgiven. And they were doing their free wine tasting!

Matt pouring our wine

 I resisted buying any wine (though the super Tuscan was very tasty!). On the way back up town I stopped in at the new restaurant which is opening tomorrow but they were showing people around and giving out menus. It looks so nice and I am super excited about it.
I managed to spend my last tasting tickets in College Avenue on a fig and Cognac truffle, a lemon and ginger dark chocolate, and a soft dark chocolate carmel, which I managed to save for this evening. Unfortunately at this point the rain really started! But it didn't stop some people from dancing in the rain. :-)

Dancing in the rain

And walking back to the bus stop, a lot of stalls had sold out signs, so the rain didn't cause too much trouble. :-)

I plan to spend Saturday evening eating with my treats and films. Good night! :-)

Smithfield Plantation

This weekend Cissi and I finally managed to get to Smithfield plantation which is just outside the VT campus. We started out a little late as I was feeling a bit tender. (Serves me right for drinking too much and eating too little Friday night at the Monkey House concert.)
Smithfield is an historic house near the duck pond on campus and very pretty.

Smithfield

We got given a tour around the house by a lovely lady. The plantation was built in 1774 by William Preston (and yes the irony of the name didn't escape me - seems I can't escape that place!).

Drawing room

View from the girls bedroom

Our guide demonstrating how the mattresses work 

Additional pocket - very useful 

Main bedroom

Showing off an apple peeler

She knew a lot of things about the house and where some saying come from. For example, when a gentleman came to visit a lady, he would bring a gift. The most popular gift was a looking glass. Then when he was about to leave, the lady would leave the looking glass out. If it was face up, it meant she wanted to see him again. If it was face down, it was a no and she had "turn him down flat", which is where the saying comes from.

That's a yes.

The house was a lot bigger than I realized and the tour took over an hour. I also found out the Draper Meadows Massacre, where Mary Draper Ingles was kidnapped by Indians and hold hostage for a long time with her son before a very dramatic escape down the river, is very near by, which is cool. (And I brought a good book about it along with an apple recipe book which I am looking forward to testing out.)

The gardens were also very pretty. There used to be a village and lots of housing, including those for slaves but there are only a few left and there is no evidence of where the slave houses even were. (Thought they certainly existed.)

Starting the hops vines

Miller's cottage

After the house, we went shopping. I needed some final clothes and some walking shoes for my summer trips. I managed to get everything I needed and most of it was in the sales, which made me very happy! I am pretty much set now for the summer. And super excited for my trips! :-)
I spent the evening still recovering from the Friday night hangover and the rest of today is going to working! Boring, but at least I had some fun this weekend. 

International food festival

One of the best things about Blacksburg is that during the summer there are lots of festivals going on in town. They shut off the main streets most weekends and the festivals are so much better than the ones in Preston!
Last weekend was the international food festival, run by the international student groups. (I have only just gotten around to getting the photos off my camera.)
We ended up getting there a little late as the guys in the group I went with were playing hockey. So some of the food was ton when I got there, including the Moroccan. :-( which made me sad as I love Moroccan food. But there was still plenty to choose from. To eat and drink. We definitely got our share, including Brazilian, Thai tea, and some others things I can't remember where they were from (but were delicious). :-)

On Collage Avenue. 

Turkish - it was delicious. 

Belly dancers

They also had performances form the student groups. We managed to catch the Lebanese dancing (I didn't see the Lebanese food which is a shame as it's another of my favorites). After they had finished,  people headed up to the "stage" and joined in.

Lebanese dancers

Free for all

It was a lovely day and finally good to sit in the sun. I even started my tan. :-)