En route to Nelsonville, we made it all the way to Mt. Orab before having to swerve off the road to try out a new BBQ place.   I just can’t pass up a sign promising “Real Pit BBQ.”  The BBQ place turned out to be “Still Smokin’ Barbecue” where we tried out the brisket, ribs, slaw, mac-n-cheese, beans, and cornbread.   The meat was tender, but still gave me something to chew on as I pondered the deep pink smoke ring that spoke of a long slumber in the smoker.  The owner of the place chatted us up as we ate, so we learned that he was using half pecan and half apple wood to smoke his ‘cue.  Pass on the sauce at Still Smokin’ — you don’t need it and it was a little thick and way too sweet for my tastes.

After the brief detour, we were back on the road and headed east on 32.  Once we hit Athens we checked into our hotel before heading over to Miller’s Chicken for dinner.  Miller’s Chicken is a little hole-in-the-wall dive that serves up really tasty fried chicken.  The Colonel would be jealous, nothing more really need be said.  After shoving more chicken down our gullets than was advisable we made the short drive up to Nelsonville and headed into the festival.  The festival grounds are on the campus of Hocking College and were really quite beautiful.  We spent some time wandering around, checking out the eats and chotchkes for sale before tucking into the “No-Fi” stage.  The “No-Fi” stage turned out to be a tiny one-room log cabin that could seat about 20 where artists would play acoustic sets.  We checked out a couple of tunes from Liz Pahl before grabbing a couple brews and heading to the main stage to see fellow Cincinnatians The Buffalo Killers.  The Buffalo Killers are a three piece band who turned in a solid set of 70′s style folk rock.  After they finished up we made our way over to the “Porch Stage” which is, fittingly enough, a porch on a log cabin.  Playing there was “Those Darlins” who immediately captured our attention with a high-energy set that was like a 60′s girl band managed by Sid Vicious.  They’ll be playing again tomorrow on the main stage, so we’ll be sure to check them out again.  Next we made our way back to the main stage where we caught about half of the Detroit Cobras show and stuck around for a raucous set of funky soul from Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears.  After they wound down we headed over to catch a few songs from The Ragbirds, then caught the end of a strange spectacle going on in the “No-Fi” cabin by Missoula Oblongata.  We capped off the night by listening to some kind of awful racket from a “band” called Weedghost and hung around for a couple of numbers from the unusually instrumented Man Man before heading back to the hotel to get some rest before a full day of music tomorrow.