After enjoying a great night’s sleep in our comfortable room, it was once again time to embrace the day. Since we were staying at the Hampton Inn we got to enjoy the delicious waffles that you can cook yourself. Hunter loves waffles and they seem to help him get his day off to a good start. Emily joined us for breakfast this day and it was actually one of the busier hotels that we stayed at during our entire trip. I was just fired up because they had my favorite cereal, Golden Grahams! After three bowls I was ready to pack the car and head out.
Our first stop of the day was yet another train museum in Roanoke. It was set to open at 9:00 and we got there at 8:50 and entered the front door that led to a vestibule to purchase tickets. We were kindly asked to wait outside at which point I thought to myself, I might just leave the doors locked until 9:00 if I didn’t want anyone to come in. But I digress. We spent our ten minutes exploring the outside of the museum as we walked around the back to see a train riding down one of the eight train tracks that lined the back of the museum. Hunter just can’t get enough of the trains. After the museum had opened we headed inside to explore. The museum was pretty cool but not nearly as cool as the others we have been to. They had a small train track set up inside which was really cool. They also had a room from the 50’s with old signs and cars which was neat to see. They had some cool train cars and a few neat ones to walk through but many of the trains were featured on tracks that were lined with overgrown grass. I looked in the gift shop for a machete to finish the tour, but they had sold out of them. Emily also browsed the gift shop before we left and made a few purchases and we were again on our way. It was a perfect stop to start the day because it only took us about 90 minutes to see the whole place.
Emily had done some recon the night before and found that there was a cupcake store that was in Roanoke which we were luckily able to find. Emily went in as Hunter and I sat in the car and waited for her. As she emerged from what would be her new personal heaven she had a huge smile from ear to ear. Apparently this was the holy grail of cupcake stores as it not only had delicious cupcakes, it was also pink (a requirement I was not aware of). Quite frankly I was surprised she decided to continue on the road trip with us, but she agreed so off we went. One quick stop at a little sandwich place for lunch and we set out for South Carolina.
The drive was pretty uneventful as we noticed that we had visually moved into the south. We made good time as we pushed our way to Orangeburg, South Carolina. We pulled up to the Best Western which was our last stop on our road trip. I went to check in as Hunter and Emily waited in the car. It turned out that Emily had made the reservation for the previous day as the ever so sweet front desk lady let me know (with her angry eyes). Being that we were in the middle of nowhere I waited for the tumbleweed to pass between us and I asked if they had any availability for that night which amazingly they did. So we checked in begrudgingly and moved our stuff in one last time. Needless to say I was not a huge fan of the entire experience and it just added for my dislike of South Carolina (excluding Hilton Head).
I headed out and picked us up some delicious food from a local restaurant called Fatz that had some really great food. Unfortunately we don’t have any photos due to our disgruntled state, but trust me, it was good. I tried to get online but the string and tin can coming from the wall didn’t have an Ethernet connector so I put down the computer, closed my eyes and called it a day.
