Virginia hospitality redux

28 April - Farmville-Alta Vista VA: sunny and bright, ~50-low 70s, 9:00-7:00, 74.3 miles
Virginia is finally making its bid to enter the pantheon of friendliest states. Everywhere we turned, people asked about our trip or offered help. Several people in or around Appomattox took an interest in how far we'd come. At Concord, one man biding time before an appointment chatted with us, mentioning he'd considered bike touring this summer - and was there anything he could do to help us?
Late in the day, as I climbed one of our last hills, an elderly black woman sitting on her porch called out, "How you doin'?" I stopped to jawbone with her while I waited for Tim, asking her and her neighbor how far into town and where to eat. Her neighbor recommended Perky's, then offered to take us and our bikes up the last big hill into town. We politely declined.
Since Perky's appeared a mile before the motels, we stopped to eat, accepting a twilight ride for our last mile. The staff were all smiles as we came in, and our waitress Janet asked all about our trek. "I love my new road bike, but no way I could handle a ride like yours!" Moments after taking our order, she came back to inform us the owner had comped our meals. Then she delivered our food, every bit as good as we'd been told. When we finished we had a patron take our picture with Janet and Gaye, and gave them a copy of my book.
Luckily we got a room. Both hotels were fully booked, but Karen - the harried but cheerful clerk/receptionist/gal Friday - squeezed us in. As she found as a roll-away cot, she amused us with tales of her pet ducks Ducky, Doodles, Aflac, and Buffy (or Buffarino when she eats too much).
Beyond the people, the region also impressed us. For our tourism stop, we hit Appomattox Court House, 'where our nation reunited' - the site of Lee's surrender to Grant, effectively ending the Civil War. The village is well-restored, imbuing the area with feeling that history truly happened here.
For the biking: we followed a 4-lane superroad again for 40+ miles, but low traffic and a workable shoulder made it fine. By the time we found our awesome side roads, we had definitely entered the Appalachian foothills. We regularly hurtled down from the heights to cross a creek, then grinded our way up the other side. Occasionally we could see higher peaks looming in the distance, promising harder climbs to come.