Zero #3

Day 0 – 5/11/10
Didn’t sleep too great last night. There was some snoring going on, and someone came into the room really late, maybe 12 or 1, and they weren’t too considerate about being quiet. It’s all part of sleeping in a bunkroom though.

I got up and went down the street to this coffee shop called Mojoe’s at 7:30. Had a tall coffee and a nice big cinnamon roll. Cost me less than 4 dollars for both, not too shabby. After that I went back toward the hostel, past it to the P.O. so I could mail a couple things home. Then I went into a dollar store for some batteries (for the camera) and then an outfitter for some more purification drops. After all those morning chores it was only 10 am so I killed some time listening to music, then at 11 went to the library, which is when it opened. I ended up spending several hours there trying to figure out how to load pictures onto my blog. It was a bit frustrating. I decided to get in touch with Ian about it and he made it seem so easy. Thanks again for helping with that by the way.

It was close to 4 when I finished most of my photo work, so I headed toward that house with the phone and got a chance to call Jen for an extended 10 minutes, but only by about 5 or so. I’m going to leave some money in the donation box there tomorrow when I pass through. The coffee shop was close by so I went in for another coffee, this time iced, and stayed until it closed at 5. As I was heading back to the hostel I met two guys who said there was free food somewhere down the street, so I went with them to this huge backyard BBQ. Burgers, dogs, beans, potato salad, brownies, sodas, all the good stuff. I had 1 burger and 1 dog, an orange soda and a brownie for dessert. I love Damascus.

I saw some other hikers I knew from a few days back so I hung around on the soft grassy lawn and chatted with them for a bit. Then it was back to the library to fine tune my photo stuff. Man it takes a long time to get all these pictures up! But I must say they look a heck of a lot better on a nice big computer screen than they do on a puny camera.

I’ve decided to continue on tomorrow, not going to set any mileage goal though. Trail Days is only a few days away (Th. 13 – Su 16), and if I make it back to enjoy the festivities then I will. If I can’t manage to find a ride then it wasn’t meant to be. Go with the flow, that’s what I’m trying to do. It’s a little past 6 now, so after I’m done here at the library I’ll head back to The Place and probably lounge for a bit.

Just a couple small things. I did end up going to Subway for lunch, in between all the photo work. Spicy Italian with extra pickles! I also went and got another milkshake, I couldn’t resist, but this time I went with creamsicle. I can’t say this enough, but I love Damascus. If I do miss Trail Days I will definitely make it back here some day and experience it. But I’m happy knowing that at least I got a chance to enjoy this awesome town.

NOTE: I posted both today and yesterday’s adventures. Keep reading so you don’t miss out on both! And check out all the awesome pictures too!