Report; Grayson County Fall Festival, Sept, 2012

[L.D. Cakes]

My mom and Gutter are on the up hill swing now, and I'm sure glad as the driver that I didn't eat it

I hope that I didn't embarrass you and L.D Cakes with my/or our compliments

Oh no I took it as a compliment so thank you! My hair is something almost spiritual to me. My Great Grandmother didn't believe in cutting her hair and went by the bible verse that a woman's hair is her glory. She never cut her hair in her life. I'm proud of the fact that I reflect her influence on my life walk.

Boy I'm glad I didn't have the roast beef! But sorry Dakota & your Mom had to endure that, and you too for such a rough drive home. Did anyone else have it!?!

I'll have to work on my pics tonight because I went out to eat with my family last night for a belated birthday dinner and man oh man did we have a good time! If any of you are ever in Johnson City, Tn I recommend The Fishbone Cafe. Excellent food!!! And I got a huge chocolate brownie cake with ice cream drenched in hot fudge and drizzled with raspberry sauce and even topped with whipped cream free just because it was my Birthday! They really liked the story I told them about the surprise you guy's gave me with the big pile of Little Debbie Cakes! I brought a couple home too!

More later......Cakes

[Bonepile]

This was my first group hang and it was great. I really enjoyed meeting everybody and appreciate all the help and advice. I've only had a hammock for a few weeks so I have lots to learn. I wish I could have stayed the whole time and look forward to many more hangs. Thanks to y'all for making me feel so welcome.

[Rockdawg69]

Thanks to everyone for coming and helping out at the hang. Glad everyone had a great time. Remember NEXT YEAR is coming.

After 7 hours of driving and 15 miles from TN home, the truck gave up the ghost. Had to get a neighbor run over and collect my sorry self Sunday night. Truck is back in operation today, so I should be good for a while. Not many pics to show but once I get back to GA house I'll download some pony pics.

Thanks to all the vendors for the great stuff you sent. Can not believe how wonderful our vendors are. Please remember to thank them.

We collected $420 from the raffle. This will go to the Friends of Grayson State Park from HammockForum members to support their work at the state park. Thank you to all who contributed to the cause.

[Rockdawg69]

Regarding our adopted hikers (formerly groundlings), I shuttled them to their vehicle in Damascus at noon Sunday. They are off to New Orleans for the next adventure.

[Hickery]

What a mighty fine time.Will be looking for this hang again next year.Thanks to Homerun,Gray Jay & Rockdawg for hooking us up on all those fine eats. Slowhike for getting us together.Cakes and all the vendors that made the raffle a success.DivaB,the driver should always eat something different ,have'nt you seen any of those airplane disaster movies.Anybody else get jammed up in 81N traffic?Met alot of great new hangers,a combined effort saved a couple from the ground.Looking forward to the Mt Rogers winter hang.

[slowhike]

Yep, it was indeed good to meet new friends & see old ones.

I'm hoping that when she gets time, L D Cakes will name all the contributors to the raffle. I'm afraid I will miss someone & I want each & every one to know how much they are appreciated.

Speaking of vendors contributing to raffles... I had been putting off asking anyone to contribute because I have seen other hangs they have contributed to (even recently) & I know there has to be a way to limit before our gracious vendors become weary.
Maybe something to talk about on another thread????

[Detail Man]

D1 and I had a great time visiting with everyone. You just can't beat good friends, good food, hammocks, and a beautiful location. Thanks to everyone that came to make it a great time.

[gunner76]

Grayson Hang 28-29 September 2012

First...a link to the pictures I took....
http://s1050.photobucket.com/albums/...20Fall%20Hang/

Attended...(from the sign in sheet)

Bonepile
D Crew # 1
Detail Man
DivaB
Gee
Gray Jay
GrumpyAttiture
Gunner76
Gutter
Hickery
Homerun
L.D. Cakes
Loki
Mothership
Mrs No Feather
No Feather
Rockdawg69
Slowhike
The Terminator
USMCStang
Sadego (our new convert)
Redleaf (our new convert)

We had hangers from NC, Va, Ohio, TN, Florida and GA. For several this was their first group hang and for a couple the first time in a hammock (more on that later). Met some new hangers and some old hangers. Now if I could just keep everyone’s name and face straight.

My account of the trip and how we adopted a couple of hikers and converted them to the dark side...

The Terminator and I left home at O dark thirty (4:30 AM) as it is at least a 6+ hour non stop drive and we have to take breaks. Stopped at Wilber's BBQ for breakfast. They must have remembered my eating there before because when I opened my menu, it was blank. Took it to the counter and told them they gave me the diet menu. Had a good breakfast and hit the road again. Got stuck in Raleigh due to morning rush hour traffic and a 5 car pile up. Stopped at REI in Greensboro to look around. Fun to be able to pick up stuff and try it on but did not see anything I had to have. Wife insisted we stop by her brothers house in Winston Salem for a quick stop that turned into a longer visit as we had to stay for lunch.

Once we go into VA our GPS and Google Map directions went screwy. Both kept trying to turn us the wrong way. Finally made it to the camp site about 3PM. Found that the spot we set at last year was still available so we set up there again (wife liked it cause it was close to restrooms). Saw two hikers stopping by to talk to one of our hangers before they set out on their hike.

Wife and I met up with other hangers and we fixed dinner. Good stuff.

Wife and I went to listen to the Park Ranger give a talk about the Park and have some marshmallows. Talked to the Ranger's assistant who is from Russia. Two hikers showed up at the end of the presentation and turned out they had gotten lost (same two hikers we had seen earlier). The Ranger told them they had gotten with in a couple of minutes of the shelter they were headed too and they did not look too happy about hiking back up the trail in the dark that late at night. The wife and I saw them a couple of minutes later in front of the camp store and we asked them what their plans were. After talking to them I invited to set up camp with us for the night. Turned out the did not have a tent, only a very small tarp as they were hiking shelter to shelter. We found a spot for them and one of our fellow hangers (whose name I can not remember) lent them a tarp so they had some protection in case it rained.

Friday night was a good night, no rain, maybe a few sprinkles, only got down to 64. Used my BB with an Old Man Winter tarp in porch mode, Arrowhead Jarbridge 3S UQ and Owyhee 1S TQ Would have stayed in my hammock except I had to answer natures call in the AM.

Saturday AM we had a group breakfast, scrambled eggs, pancakes, venison sausage and store bought sausage. Good Stuff.

The group prepared for the hammock demo and most rode to the Festival and a few hiked over.

Very overcast but nice. At our demo site (same spot as last years) we set up a table with some binders on Hammock Camping 101 for people to look thru and a variety of hammocks and tarps. If someone looked interested I did my best to get them to take a closer look. USMCStang and others did a great job of explaining the UQs. TQs ect they had set up. We did have several people give some hammocks a “test ride” and one guy came back a couple of times. Then the rain started and got to the point we closed up shop as most of the spectators left. Had several people ask if we were selling the hammocks and one lady asked if were renting hammocks so she could take a nap (how much do you think we could charge for 30 minuets in a hammock ?). Talked to Slowhike about a doing a pop up canopy with large color posters explaining hammocks. People could come in and walk around and see the posters explaining hammocks, TQ's, UQ's ect.. Then go look at the real thing.

The wife and I were the first back to the camp site and by that time the rain had slowed down to a few sprinkles so we got the fire going and filled up the water jugs. Dinner was Taco Soup, Pork BBQ, Dutch Oven Corn Bread and some more stuff I can't remember. Only problem was that the corn bread went fast. Good stuff. LD Cakes also fixed some peach cobbler in the Dutch Oven. Wish I could report on how good it was but I did not get any.

After dinner we had the raffle. Detail Man's daughter D Crew # 1 was the official raffle ticket selector and she did a great job. Lots of great prizes to include several hammocks, stoves from Tato, Dutch gear, 2QZQ Gift certificate, a tarp from Wilderness Logics, a stove and pot cook set and more. Wish I could remember all the stuff on the table.

After the raffle we gathered for a group photo. Then it was back to setting around the campfire. D Crew # 1 must have had a rough day as she fell asleep in her camp chair.

As it was L.D. Cakes birthday we sang Happy B day and Rockdawg69 broke out boxes of Little Debbie cakes (well, what did you think L.D. Cakes stood for)

I think I went to bed about 10 PM. At 1 AM I woke up in part to the night music (snoring) going on. Found Slowhike and Hickery down by the fire and joined them for a couple of hours. The sky was clear and the moon was out. We did hear some owls and there was a discussion as to what kind they were but no one was sure. Also found for future reference... Do not hang near USMCStang as his snoring is loud.

Went back to bed about 3am and found my self a bit chilly so I broke out my BigTurtle FL UQ and set up under my Jarbridge. Plenty warm for the rest of the night. Got down to 46 Saturday night.

For breakfast we had another group effort using left overs. If you went hungry on this hang it was your own fault.

Sunday was nice as there was no rain like last year. I won a White Mt Hammock at the raffle (thanks guys). I have read about them on the forum and checked out their web site but have never seen one. Detail Man and I set it on a picnic table to check it out. Stitching is excellent and the ends are very well reenforced. Will have to set it up in the backyard and check it out more closely.

We left about 10AM, took showers and went back to the festival where the wife bought another wood bowl and I got some blackberry jam. Saw 3 guys picking and singing so I recorded a couple of minutes of their playing. We drove to Damascus as we have never been there. Then we started the long drive back to the coast. Got home at 9 PM and went to bed, Did not unload van, went to bed.

Had great time. Hope to make it next year.


How We convert two innocents to the dark side....

Our two hikers joined us for breakfast Sat and there was some talk on their part about how hard that ground was. We told them that if they wanted to spend Saturday night with us we had enough extra gear between the group we could let them try out hammocks for the night. They went to the festival and came back to join us. My self and others talked to them and showed them about the different types of hammocks and tarps, the purpose and differences of TQ's and UQ's ect. We set them up with a Hennessy and a BB with a gear guide tarp and a UQ for the BB. My wife kept checking on them to make sure they were OK. I told her she had adopted them. Sunday AM I asked them if they liked it and told them that if they didn't it was OK as not everyone likes hammocks. Both said it was great and asked where could they buy hammocks, TQ's and UQ's ect. ( I think we successfully converted them to the dark side ). We let them buy raffle tickets and they won a tarp and some Dutch Gear. I told them about the forum and how to join. I also told them if nothing else they needed to join the forum just so they could read all the lies we were going to tell about them. Of course the group did tell them...Pictures or it didn't happen. As they are from Florida we recommended to them to get up with our fellow hangers down there.

[flatline]

very nice report gunner. thank you.
sorry we couldn't make it up there this year, was looking forward to meeting you and the rest of the group. i'll be there next year.
maybe there will be a hang down your way soon?
__bob__

[grannypat]

Enjoyed the trip report. My computer is being pookie and won't let me look at the pictures right now, but I'll keep trying.