First Stop, Asheville

So I decided to leave Boone on Thursday and bicycle it down to Asheville. My first night, I had planned on camping somewhere around Pineola, NC and taking the rest of the trek down the next day. Sadly, my adventure has started out with a bit of a hiccup. My bicycle made it just about 20 miles out of Boone and then chaos ensued. The derailleur on my bike sheared off and took a few spokes with it. This was a completely unexpected mishap, especially after just having the bike tuned up before the ride. So I walked just about the rest of the way to Pineola - 10 to 15 or so miles until about midnight. Fortunately, I called my friend Mischa from Asheville and, bless her, she came all the way up from the Spartanburg area to pick me up, bicycle and all. We ended up driving back to Boone for the night. Perhaps tomorrow will end up a better day to start the journey. I'll be posting the MyTracks data later on.

In the meantime, here's a picture of the bike, sans pack.