Day 1 - On the road again

Today I finally headed of. As it's tradition, I went to the beach and dipped my rear-wheel into the Atlantic Ocean. Same thing with the other wheel in San Francisco.
The first part of the ride was from Yorktown to Williamsburg on the "Colonial Parkway". The road is wide, the traffic slow and it was a joy riding it along the ocean and later through lush forrests. Saw my first turtle! Williamsburg is an unique town. Several hundred restored colonial-style buildings, no evidence of modern technology and even the residents walk around in 18th century dresses.
Wanna travel in time? Visit Williamsburg!
Next I passed historic Jamestown. The park has just few original excavations, all the buildings are fake, so I skipped it. At some point the bike path ended and I had to ride on a busy highway... Three things to mention: people here are great! They just randomly greet you on the street "welcome to virginia!". Of course there is the standard-talk "where are you from and where are you riding to? Are you kidding me?!? Safe trip!" all the time. I was surprised how many people have have been living in Germany (mostly for the military), met at least 10 on my first day. One guy needs to be mentioned: He was sitting in his car at a gas station, waiting for his wife to buy something. When he waved at me and I approached the open window he gave me a 20 dollar bill, "No good reason, go get yourself a pop (popsicle, dt. Wassereis)". How nice is that! Also worth to mention it, the story how I found a place to camp at. There are phone numbers of people who offer their backyard for bicyclists on the ACA maps. When I called one from a public phone the guy told me it's not possible anymore, but he gave me a new number of a guy called Neil. Called him and got told just to pitch my tent in his yard. When I arrived there I first wasn't sure if it was the right house so I knocked the door. It turned out that Neil was the owner of the property but didn't life there. The man living there knew about the bicycle-deal though, I had found a place for my first night of camping on this trip. That's how camping works on the transam!