Day 8 - Beckley WV to Lexington VA

October 9, 2019

No rain this morning when we hooked up and left Beckley. We did have something of a scare. I always try to remember to check the trailer brakes as I’m pulling out of a campground. It was especially important in Beckley because of the step downhill grade, and 90 degree turn, exiting the campground. NO TRAILER BRAKES! I crept down the hill and pulled off in an empty parking area before entering the street. The trailer taillights and brake lights worked properly. I unplugged and replugged the 7 pin connection several times. Didn’t seem to make a difference. After several trips back and forth in the parking lot the brakes seemed so work some of the time. We headed down the street and by the time we got a couple of blocks they seemed to be working fine. The only thing we could think of was that somehow the multiple days of rain had gotten them wet. Thank you Jesus that the problem went away.

We drove from Beckley to White Sulfur Springs and stopped to tour the Greenbrier Bunker. When I made reservations yesterday the earliest time we could get was 2PM today. We arrived early and looked around the Greenbrier a little. It is WAY to uppercrust for this redneck.The facility is beautiful, and so are the grounds. I bought a ham & turkey “wrap” and a cup of coffee. They cost me $16.75, $5 more than my GOOD, earlybird, Texas Roadhouse, 6 oz sirloin and baked potato. This wasn’t in a restaurant, the wrap came out of cooler in a gift shop. The lady in front of me bought a bottle of Coke. She paid in cash. I didn’t see how much she gave the cashier but when she got a few coins in change she just stared at them, like she was waiting for more change.

We watched the 1:30 tour depart, there were over 20 people in it. There were 26 in our 2:00 tour.

The tour was 90 minutes long. It was quite interesting. Some of the high points. The 100,000+ square foot bunker was built in secret in the early 60’s. It was built as a radiation shelter to house Congress, not their family, for 45 days. The capacity was 1,100 people. 100 Senators, 435 Representatives and one staffer for each. It is a concrete box with 3-5’ thick walls and roof. The roof is covered by 15-20 feet of earth and then a 6 story wing of the Greenbrier Hotel. It was built in conjunction with the 6 story addition to the Greenbrier. People were told that the addition would contain several underground conference/exhibition areas. There were conference/exhibition areas that were used by the public, but if the need arose the public would have been evacuated from the areas as Congressmen came in and 4 or 5 concealed blast doors would have been closed and locked. One interesting point was that when this was built airplanes were the system used to deliver nuclear weapons. It would take 8-9 hours from the time a plane left Russia before it could have been in position to bomb the DC area. Within 5 hours most members of Congress could have been transported to the bunker. All members of Congress had a designated place to go should a national emergency arise. They knew they would be taken somewhere, but they didn’t know where. Tanks in the bunker contained 75,000 gallons of fresh water, and there was a water purification system. 42,000 gallons of diesel fuel was stored to run one of the 3 -750kw generators (2 were backups). The equivalent of 45 days of MRE’s for over 1,100 people were kept in storage. 4 days worth of fresh food was always kept on hand, for 30 years. It was routinely rotated up to the main Greenbrier kitchens so that none was wasted. When I have a decent WiFi connection I need to do some more reading about the facility.

The Greenbrier is owned by CSX. President Eisenhower and the head of the railroad cut a secret deal, but that is another story. In order to make use of all the space CSX started a division named CSX IP, LLC. It specializes in storing highly sensitive data (trade secret type stuff) for companies. We couldn't take cell phones, electronic devices, bags, etc. with us. The tour guide used a card to unlock numerous doors along our travel path. He regularly did a head count to make sure we were still all with him.

After the tour we continued on to Lexington, VA. The scenery is AWESOME! I64 has some real hills in it between White Sulfur Springs and Lexington. Not just up and down hills, but up, up, up and down, down, down hills. We came down one stretch that was over 5 miles of continuous 7% grade. We way a lot of very slow semi's traveling westbound. 

Tonight we are staying at a TA truckstop campground. It isn’t fancy but has everything we need and it’s a deal for $31.50/night.

Parked at the campground.

 Looking down on the truck stop. It is surprising at how little noise we hear. We can hear a few semi's running, but the sound isn't loud enough to bother us.

Weather was great today. Partly cloudy, I don't think the high hit 70, and tonights low is forecast to be 49. Tomorrow we head east again. We have driven 904 miles.

God is good. May He bless you and yours.