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.