Leg 4 to 5: Birmingham to Abingdon aka "No You Can Not Sit in the Back of the Cop Car"

I awoke, head pounding, to see a coffee next to my bed. Thank God. I shotgunned my Starbucks and set sail for our destination: Abingdon, Va. Our thought process on picking this place is explained in the next post. Let's just say it was not because of the large number of attractions in Abingdon.

We waved goodbye to the last big city of the trip and exited for the interstate. Now, there are two roads out of Birmingham: I-20 East and I-59 North. I don't know if you're familiar with the layout of our country, but Virginia is actually north of Alabama, not east.



Two hours into I-20 East, Marc once again had a navigator-seat epiphany. We were lost. We needed to get to I-59 North or risk ending up in Atlanta. A quick peak of the map, and a stop at a local gas station pointed us to 77 North, a connecting road heading straight north. To be fair, Marc picked the absolute perfect place to find out we were lost. The next exit from our current one was the junction for 77 North, meaning a quick detour through an Alabama back road was next on our agenda. "Just when I think you can't get any dumber, you go and do something like this...AND TOTALLY REDEEM YOURSELF."



77 North is a long, bumpy road with scenic views and condemning billboards. We drove over our fair share of bridges and stared longingly at endless stretches of still water. We even passed through Rainbow, Al. before finally reaching our destination. It was, as per usual, a pleasant departure from the norm. Marc took tons of pictures while fighting off the nausea induced by his pork rinds (which actually have less calories than a bag of Doritos).



Lunch was next. We stopped at Collinsville, a random departure from the highway, to try and find a lake and hopefully a spot to eat some country cooking. Collinsville was a town where they may have filmed "The Crazies." The only two things in the one-horse town were a Mexican grocery store and a kaboose. Marc made one of the few astute observations in his lifetime by pointing out that we had little chance of finding a lake if we were headed uphill. Elementary, my dear Watson. We never did find that damn lake.




Before hooking up with the highway, we stopped at a small eatery called Smokin' Joes. We opened the door and heard the screech of a record needle. You'd think it was the first time two Pittsburghers on a road trip stopped in there...err...nevermind.

I ordered a cafeteria tray full of sweet country goodness, and Marc took his chances with a barbeque sandwich. Rule of thumb: if you see this written in the bathroom:


"This is a real s*** hole. And your a real bastard"

You can be sure it's going to be a good meal. For something like 4 pieces of eight, I ordered a country-fried steak, fried okra, fried squash, a baked potato, and two pieces of cornbread. If it was possible to fry an entire baked potato, they would have done it. The okra (probably one of the first times I had ever eaten okra) was soft and had a taste similar to fried zucchini. The country fried steak was drowning in white gravy, and although it wasn't the best I had ever eaten, I could safely say that it was fried in the country. The biggest disappointment was the corn bread, which I half-expected to change my life. Instead, I got a dry piece of salty bread. Bummer. Luckily, Marc's sandwich made up for this. The beef was tender, and the sauce had enough bite to startle my taste buds for the ride ahead. Before we left, we got a picture with arguably the two most intimidating men I had ever laid eyes on (despite the appearance, they could not have been nicer).




The final stretch of road from Alabama, through Tennessee, and into Virginia was fairly mundane. Tennessee, based on my observations from the interstate, is known for two things: fireworks and having the most unoriginal city names of all time. This was the first time in the trip that I felt like the destination was more welcome than the journey. I wish I could say stopped to go skeet shooting with Santa Claus, but sometimes it is what it is.




Our Virginia sign pic leaves something to be desired, (no) thanks to a slow trigger finger. We passed through Bristol, hoping that the racetrack somehow intersected with 81 North, but were disappointed. As we passed through the outskirts of the outskirts of Bristol, we noticed the small sign for our destination: Abingdon, Va.




Wait, that's not the Puerto Rican flag,

CPS