We're Moving!

We are moving! I'm not talking about the website. I am talking about us, physically moving all of our stuff out of the apartment and into a house. While this is great news for us, its bad new for Hokieville since we won't have internet for a while. So sit tight, and I'll try to get posts up as frequently as possible. It just may be awhile. I've got a lot of good stuff to post! See you then.

Quick hiking report

So last weekend, Grammy, Judy and John came for a visit. However, this post is not about their visit. This is a catch up post from a few weekends ago. I am slowly trying to get back on schedule with this blog. Hopefully my summer schedule will allow for that to happen. The Grammy/Judy/John visit will certainly be covered on the next post.

So a few weekends ago we celebrated being done with classes and bringing in the summer with a strenuous hike. We went to Dragon's Tooth with Nick and Mona, packed a lunch, hiked to the top, ate said lunch, relaxed and headed back down. It was about 85F that day, but it didn't feel too hot while we were hiking. It was mostly a shaded hike with a lot of mountain side breezes. I did manage to get a sun burn, however, even though I was wearing sun block. Such is life. Here are a few pictures of the highlights of the hike.

The sun peeking over a cliff

Our view from the top while eating our lunch

Happy hiking family
Ian relaxing with Nick and Mona

Alright Hokieville fans, see you next post!

Adventure in Richmond

When last I posted, we were headed to Richmond for the weekend. We were glad to see when we got there that more family than we expected were there for the weekend. The Boston crew was there, along with John, Judy and Grammy, Ian, and me. We got to see Ian's cousin Hadleigh, who is now almost three although we haven't seen her since she was about 6 months old. We also got to see the new baby, Leo. The highlight of the whole trip was when we piled into Ian's volvo to go out to eat downtown, and as we were pulling into the restaurant, the poor volvo died. As soon as it became obvious we were dealing with a broken down car, the bums came out of the woodwork. We had to abandon Ian's car in Richmond overnight (I am sure it made for a lovely shelter for those seeking to get out of the rain that night), but good fortune was ours when it started up the next day. This was a short two day trip but we really had a good time seeing family, and we are looking forward to the next few weekend when family comes to us.

Oh no our car is broken!

Don't worry, the bums are here to fix it. Actually one of the claimed that he used to be a mechanic. And maybe he really was because the next morning, the car started right up.

New baby Leo (I couldn't get a good picture )

Hadleigh at brunch with a coloring book.

Everyone else out at brunch, not expecting a picture.

At a local park watching Hadleigh play.

Hadleigh and her dad riding in a big red truck.

As promised...

Here we go. Pictures from:

3.2 for 32. This event was a memorial run for those who lost their lives in the April 16th 2007 shooting. I ran it with my friend Mona. We showed up at around 7:30am to register and each runner was given a balloon. The race started with a moment of silence and the release of 32 white balloons. Then the runners (and walkers) released their balloons and we were off. I heard they approximated 8000+ people at the run. I don't know if you have ever looked up to see 8000 balloons in the sky but it is quite a site. Also, I don't know if you have ever run 3.2 miles with 7999 other people, but its crowded.

Here was a professional picture of a whole lot of Hokies taken after the run. Mona and I are in there somewhere.

Later that day, I went to the Chateau Morrisette with some fellow food scientists. We went as a reward for participating in one of our colleagues research projects, which was to test some sensory characteristics of blackberry wine. We each put in a few hours of training for the research, so to reward us Research Conducter Robert set up this pretty cool event. We did a tradiational tasting, and then we were invited to the back of the winery for tastings of the wines that were still fermenting in tanks. If anyone is interested in going to a winery next time you are here visiting, this would be a cool spot.

Here we are at Chateau Morrisette, lovingly referred to as "the chat" (chat? shat? not sure how to spell that).

Behind the scenes: Barrels of wine.

Pulling samples from the tanks

The packaging operation! (nerd alert)

Here I am with my homies: Me, Anibal, and Mona in front of The Chat

All the while, Ian had a fever. Finally on Sunday he got better and we went to Pandapas Pond to get some fresh air. Ian was encouraging Neit to put his paws in the water. It took some coaxing but once he got in, he went full force towards these Canadian geese. It caught Ian off gaurd and he let go of the leash. Neit came "THIS CLOSE" to catching one of those geese when we convinced him to come back to us. It was entertaining, to say the least.

Neit and Ian, post-goose chase.

We are leaving tomorrow morning for Richmond to see Tim and Janet and their new baby. Judy and John will be there too. Maybe even Grammy? So that is what you have to look forward to next time!

New post preview

Wow, April 21st already, and only one post this month. As you may have gathered, things have been picking up for me at school. I am busy every day of the week. We managed to pack quite a few things into last weekend's schedule. Ian had a fever of 101.5F on Friday and had to miss work. I ran a memorial run (3.2 for 32) for the 32 hokies that didn't make it on April 16, 2007. I went to a winery and did a behind the scenes tour with a bunch of food science grad students. Ian recovered from his illness. Neit jumped into a pond and almost caught a canadian goose. I have pictures for all of this. Now, give me a little more time, and I'll get them up here! Hope everyone is doing well. We miss you guys!

Happy Campers

Due to the unseasonably good weather we have been having lately, Ian was dead set on camping last weekend. I finally gave in, and we drove out to Pembroke, VA for some overnight camping in Jefferson National Forest. We decided to camp at a site we have hiked through before, and so we filled our packs with the essentials (food, tent, sleeping bags) and headed out. We hiked about 5 miles in, stayed overnight, and added another 6 or 7 miles out to finish the loop back to our car. Here's a map we found in a book ...

We were only about a half mile away from West Virginia at some points.

When we started our hike, we were greeted with this...Campers, Ye be warned!


Here are the happy campers, each carrying their own pack (even Neit)

We got our tent up and fire started before the sun went down.

The creek that ran right next to our tent. We heard a lot of critters scurrying by outside throughout the night.

Don't worry. Neit was quite the guard dog. Here he is, guard doggin' it.

Passing the time with some bird watching. There weren't really a whole lot of birds out. I guess the summer migrators haven't made their way here yet.

Ian said he "likes to get away from everything sometimes". This was a good place to do so.

Flooded Falls

The good news is that we have ONE computer in the house with working internet. Also, I found a cord that will work for taking pictures off of my camera. So hooray, now you can see pictures. Behold, our hike to the Cascases last weekend, during some major flooding.

Ian by the stream. It was definitely rushing. (Compare with the homepage picture at the top of this page. Same stream. Different amounts of water)

Another stream picture.

Walking on a log. We were the only ones at the falls, for once. It was nice to have some solitude.

Apparently really excited to get my picture taken in front of the waterfall.

We packed a couple of Subway footlongs up there with us, and had a peaceful lunch by the falls. The quantity of water going over the falls was so massive that we got sprayed with mist from pretty much any point the falls were visible. It was a nice afternoon. Every time we hike this place, there is always something different.