Vacation: Wednesday

Wednesday was a Charlottesville day. Being out in the intense heat 10 to 5 Tuesday at Monticello roasted our bodies and fried our brains. So in the morning we walked a few short blocks to Main Street Market. On the outside it looked like an old cinderblock gas station painted brown with two small glass doors in the front. Enter one door, and you're in a bright, funky kitchen gadget shop that leads back to a shop aptly named and punctuated Feast! In France it might be called an epicerie, or small shop for groceries. The small produce bin contained local fruits and veggies. The cheese and sausage counter contained locally made products, too, and we bought some chevre with ash. There were some sauces, jams, nuts, chocolates, wines, and other bottled beverages. I didn't recognize any brands, so Feast! was a true foodie adventure. Also nearby was a fish market specializing in sushi. We finished shopping and then realized we hadn't gone into the other small glass door in the front of the market building. WELL. It turned out to be a gourmet chocolate shop named Gearhearts. We each bought a piece of the Maya variety: rich, bittersweet chocolate ganache flavored with cinnamon, Ancho chili and orange, dusted with cocoa. We ate these on the spot ... mmm.

After enjoying our lunch of Feast! products back in the air-conditioned hotel room, Francoise headed back to the historic old town to buy more T-shirts for her family in France, and I made several little jaunts to the nearest CVS to have some photos printed. We both finished writing postcards.

More evidence of the heat and humidity: If you laid a postcard on a table, you could actually see the edges curl up in a few moments. If you held a postcard with your fingers, the card would soon be ridged. And I saw what seemed to be an emery board melted to the sidewalk.