We've left North Carolina now for our first stop in New England- Providence, Rhode Island. We are staying with Lisa's best friend Regan who is a biologist at Brown University. However, before thinking about what awaits us in the North Eastern United States (and beyond), it's worth mentioning what we got up to in our last weeks in Winston-Salem.
Firstly there was my first taste of college American football with a game between local Wake Forest and Stanford Universities. Lisa's friend Ryan got us some tickets for the game and made sure that we sat with the students (rather than with the regular fans) as this is where all the singing and general rambunctiousness goes on. The game was really quite good with Wake Forest staging a big comeback in the second half to win 24-17.
Entertaining as this was, it was merely a precursor to our leisure activity the following weekend. It should be recorded for posterity that, on Saturday 19 September 2009, Richard Waggott attended his first ever chili championship. Frankly, it was wonderful. There were about 40 vendors giving out samples of their chili hoping for votes for the people's choice award. I'd really started to think that my chili was good but now realise just how much work there is to do - these people were serious. There were smoky chilis, beef only chilis (i.e. no beans), chilis with a hint of cinnamon and fennel and all manner of other varieties. I felt that my status as a chili expert was borne out somewhat as the vendor I selected as the best was duly awarded the people's choice award. The day was rounded off with some country music and Lisa, Janet (Lisa's friend from work) and I went home very happy indeed.
After some frantic packing (and a rather expensive visit to the post office to send things back to the UK) Lisa and I boarded our plane to Providence on Monday (21st), We plan to stay here for a week relaxing with Regan before kicking on with the rest of our trip.
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