Day 4 in Virginia

Today was a day of country cruising, just long sweeping country roads. From Glade Spring it was to Chilhowie, Marion and then rt 16 south to the Crooked Road through Volney, Independence, Galax and over to Hillsville. Didn’t get a lot of pictures but it is beautiful country here; there are streams, creeks or rivers everywhere.  

Day 3 in Virginia

Today was the Back of the Dragon and it is so much better than the Tail of the Dragon on NC. This is 32 miles and I believe I counted 8 serious switchbacks, climbing and descending with more twists and turns than you could count. And again, no traffic! There was one Jeep that I caught up to but he just moved over and let me go.  If that wasn’t fun enough, Garmin found me a short cut off rt 91 down Hogback Rd which turned out to be a single lane dirt farm road splattered with hay patches; glad that was only a couple of miles then back on rt 91. Heading down rt  91 to Saltville the rt suddenly turns to a hard packed road with gravel; somebody forget to finish paving? This went on for about 10 miles with switchbacks on gravel, not real fun but oh well. Finally made it to Saltville and wanted some lunch so I pulled into a small store for water and while waiting in line I had to listen to this lady argue with the cashier that the coins she was giving her were dollars because it said so right on the coin. But is says “quarter dollar.”  Well to her it was a dollar so the cashier passes it to the lady in front of me and asks her if it is a dollar, and she actually passes it to me and asks s this a dollar? Holy Hokies Virginia it’s a quarter! So I found some lunch and right next to it was the Museum of the Middle Appalachians. Very interesting museum especially the history of salt mining and the impact on the civil war. It was a great day of riding to include the challenging off roading. No explanation on the abandoned house taken over by goats. 

What?

 

Rode by this old abandoned home and the front porch had goats hanging out. Mr. and Mrs. Goat and their kid! boooyaaaa

Heading to VA

Another beautiful day for riding, cool and overcast, just the way I like it. Again, the traffic was very light except for a short few miles around Knoxville. Once reaching Abingdon VA, I could leave the highway and begin some enjoyable riding. Heading south toward Mt Rogers elevations quickly rose to 4,000 ft+, the highest elevated road in the state of Virginia, then just as quickly descended with many twists and switchbacks. It was fun until I came upon a car that braked to about 5MPH on every curve and even braked on a downhill straight away. Obviously not use to these types of roads and looking close I saw it had a Florida plate! Continuing on I ride a small section of the Crooked Road before heading up towards White Top Mt. Those last 50 miles was just a small sample is to come over the next few days.  Tomorrow is the Claw of the Dragon!

 

Day 1 to Virginia

Got off to a nice early 0600 start figuring I would beat the Holiday traffic, or some of it. After only two blocks it looked like it was going to be one of those “Garmin” routes where it develops its own maps and doesn’t want to go where you want to go. This went on all the way through Andalusia and then I had an epiphany. Check to see if the avoidances are checked, sure enough they somehow were all checked. Unchecked all, Garmin recalculated and all is well. It was hard to believe the lack of traffic especially rt 65. For highway riding, my least favorite, it was a good ride until rt 24 in Chattanooga, the traffic got thick and the temperature seemed to go up about 30 degrees. Since it was the last 20 miles or so of today’s ride it was a piece of cake. It was a long 400 miles and tomorrow it’s off to Glade Springs VA via Mount Rogers National Park.

GOPRO test