So let's tell the story, shall we?
We left off in Radford, Virginia. I woke up surprisingly refreshed and thinking that yea, maybe I'd just got for the whole enchilada. I would ride the 140+ miles in one day, no matter how long it took, just to get back to Boone. So off I went. The day started good enough, warm, sunny, past most of the steep mountains for a while, and there was an actual bicycle trail ahead of me! Not only that, but it would last for over 60 miles of my trip. Not only that, but, yes, the trip even started down hill!
I surged down the road, got off the main highway and took a nice side road with much less traffic. Then through a small town, and down yet another mountain. By this time, there surely wasn't much of the mountain I climbed way back up in Christiansburg, so I expected it to bottom out and have to go back uphill, which it did, for a bit, but not nearly as much as expected. Then I passed an Interstate 81 overpass for the last time and coasted into Polaski,Virgina. Polaski is important. Why you ask? It's the start of the New River Trail, a beautiful addition to Rails to Trails system. One that hugs the New River for over 60 miles, with a slow, effortless, 1% incline for almost the entire duration, and what's more, definitely my second most favorite part of the whole trip, and a really close second at that.
But good things are sometimes hard to come by, and I actually overshot the entrance to the trail, mistaking it for what else? A railroad line. This ended up being an egregious mistake, as once I noticed, I was already down a steep hill. But luck! Google indicated that the trail would also meet up with the road I was on, and it kind of did, just 30 feet above atop a steep, rocky ledge. There was no way I was going to get on that trestle bridge, and I was too stubborn to turn back, so on I went, thinking that maybe I'd climb a mountain to meet up with the trail again when they crossed by the river, but I went down before I went up, and the satellite communication on my navigation started to get iffy, worse, I was already almost out of power on my first battery. Being an extra long day in rural mountainous, Virginia, I needed to conserve, so I winged it for a while.
And sure enough, up a steep hill I went, which winded up and around the hills in this area. IT was a bit out of the way, but it looked like I'd be at just about the right height when I was going to meet the trail again. I looked on the phone and, ACK! I had misread it, the road and the trail never would touch, but there was this tiny park that may be the connector I was looking for. When I got there, it wasn't looking good. The trail was again up on this rocky ledge, and the park was down below. There was this dirt road that was adjacent to the park, so I took it. After a while, I started seeing signs such as "No trespassing" and "private driveway." I nearly turned back, but after another bend, I saw it, a tressle bridge on the same level as me, there was a problem though. Two houses, two properties, between me and the bridge - lots of signs. I made a break for it anyway. I passed the first house and driveway, then shot through the driveway of the other. There was a car and then a chain that the had put up in their driveway to cordon off the New river trail from their connecting driveway. So I quickly passed the car, picked up the bike mid ride, hopped the chain in one simultaneous leap, and got back on the bike as fast as I could.
SAFE!
On the trail. Not a peep from the house, fortunately. Maybe they were just as freaked out as I was, or maybe they didn't notice at all. I wasn't taking any chances. I got on the bike and started the ride down the trail. It was amazing! Not even but a mile down the road, I encountered a huge bridge crossing the New River. I felt compelled to stop and take a few pictures. Then I had to take a few more on the bridge, you can see them below. I had a fleeting fear that I might have dropped the cell phone off the bridge and into the water, but I think the pictures were worth it.
The trail took me along the bank of the New for miles, just right along beside it. IT would curve and then I would curve. It kept at a very, very slight 1 percent grade all the way up. The trail cut through mountains and got very narrow at times, just barely wide enough to fit a train. You could see the grooves where the pickaxes cut into the rock. I started thinking about all of the workers and how long it must have taken them to make such a wonder through the Virginia mountainside, and how it's still here, being used, albeit for a much different purpose. You could still smell the coal ash on the bridges, I've always been fond of that smell for some reason. It takes me back to a simpler, bygone, era. One where the community that you were born into was likely the only community that you'd ever experience. One where it took tremendous effort to travel any great distance. I often wondered what it would be like to live in those times. I passed through a tunnel, again, with the axe marks, encircling me from all angles, it looked like a rough-cut gem, stained black by coal soot, and the smell! So incredibly intense, like a train had just passed through. On I went, through the rural countryside for another 20 miles, until I encountered a - caboose and train station?
So apparently midway through the trail, the have converted an old rail station into the park's gift shop. It had that old timey feel, but inside, in the middle of nowhere, they had electricity and running water! Awesome! I was able to fill my depleted water bottle with cold, fresh water and, after talking with the park ranger who managed the shop, I even got to charge up my cell phone again. Of course, buying over $10 in snacks, chips, peanuts, and candy probably helped to convince her. She told me that they were hosting a triathlon in 3 weeks and that I would be a good candidate to try it out. And I felt like I really could have done it too, so I took wrote down the information to look at later. Unfortunately, I didn't really have a ride to go, but it planted the seed of things to consider some day in the future. I also met a few other cyclists who had apparently seen me at the big trestle bridge earlier, who showed up about 20 minutes after I had arrived, that kind of made me feel good - apparently I was booking it up the trail. They left promptly after a quick purchase, but said that there were going another 10 miles and then turning around. So I waited around a bit for my phone to charge and as a little challenge to myself, I had hoped that I would pass them up before they turned around. So I waited until my phone was a charged a good bit, thanked the ranger and floored it down the road. My phone was telling me that I was going 25km down this dirt trail...my fastest consistent speed of the entire trip. Even with breaks, I was able to hold onto roughly 20km for the entire duration of the New River Trail, about 40 miles. Oh, and I did end up passing those two cyclists right before they turned around too! The trail had some beautiful views, countless trestle bridges crossing the river, and even a few hydroelectric dams to give it the occasional old-industry feel. This is a place that I will absolutely return to at some point in my life.
The clouds came in on the last couple of miles, it had been a clear day before then, but I had heard that it was supposed to be rainy. I knew that I was almost to Galax, but I just didn't know how far. And it was looking like it was going to get bad, and quick...so I needed to race to the end to find shelter. So after 7 hours of riding almost nonstop, I mustered the energy to throttle myself back up to high gear. I had to be pushing 25km/hr and above. I could hear the mytracks ticking back up to an average of 20km/hr, first 18, then 19, then 19.5, and so on. CRACK! Lightning struck the trees on the other side of the water, I could feel the energy in the air, and feel my ears pop ever so slightly. BOOM! As the thunder came not even a second later. I pedaled as fast as I could. Then that ominous wind came bustling through right before the downpour. Then the rain and before I knew it, I was drenched, completely drenched. I had to slow down for the sake that the ground was turning into flash-floody mudslush. The water mixing with 7 hours of sweat turned to salty acid and was furiously burning my eyes to the extent that I had to keep them closed as much as I could to stop the burning. Long straightaways became blind straightaways, only looking when I thought I was close to a turn or when the road got bumpy. I kept on at a relatively quick pace. Galax was fast approahcing, I started to see houses and cabins and parks along the path. I knew I was close. Then came the winds, it was like a full-on instantaneous tempest. The first surge took me from my right side during a right hand turn and nearly blew me and the bike over and took me clear from the inside track all the way to the edge of the trail on the other side. The rain was bouncing off of my face like tiny water balloons. I started to wonder if hail was in my future. Lightning continued to strike and thunder continued to boom shortly thereafter. I must have crossed one of the most severe cells of the storm. All the more fodder for me to hurry and get to a shelter. Then another gale passed by, but this time I was in the forest and the wind hit me more towards my back then to the right, but I heard something eerie. The taught SNAP of a tree and then the creaky moan and the thud of hundreds of leaves and branches hitting the ground. A tree had fallen into the path not but a few hundred feet behind my...where I just had been. I started to actually feel fear for the first time on the trip. I had to get off this path. I raced to the next clearing, and hit....paved road? A parking lot, a caboose, the end of the trail! I had made it! I was in the middle of town. So I quickly crossed the street and sought shelter under the awning of the CVS across the street.
The water had nearly washed away all of the sweat by now and my eyes were pretty much no longer in pain. I rubbed them for the first time since the rain. It felt so good to wick away the rainwater and salt. The little things. I wrenched my shirt creating an instant puddle on the formerly dry sidewalk. Got slightly drier, to the point where I felt it wouldn't upset the store clerks too much, and promptly walked inside, got cleaned up in the bathroom and asked how to get to the next town on my list - Sparta. The clerk didn't know, but a customer did, but the route was confusing, so I thanked him and decided to pull out my phone from the dry pouch (a tennis ball tube that I had bought in Newport News and promptly gave away the unneeded balls that came inside) - the only thing still dry in my luggage. I got a quick idea of where to go and proceeded to down a few energy bars - my dinner for this zealous day.
It was after 5pm now and the rain had stopped. The sun came out through the clouds and gave the whole area that shimmering angelic clarity you sometimes get after the rain has cleansed the air and made everything new again. It warm sun added some much needed energy and I got on the road again. I went down the downtown bypass and started up the mountains again. I had been spoiled from the slow, relaxing 1 percent grade up the mountains for so long, and it was tough acclimating to actual climbing again. It didn't help things that this happened to be a particularly steep road. "Skyway Rd" or something like that. It was starting to get to that golden hour and the sun would be going down soon. I pondered bypassing Sparta and the short route and taking the windy, curvy, steep up and down road that is the Blue Ridge Parkway, it would be safer for bicycles, but at the same time, the time it would take to conquer it would be nearly double, so I forewent the parkway for now and opted for the highway. I thought back to climbing that mountain in Christiansburg and it gave me the determination to keep climbing this slightly less monolith, it seemed to go on forever, but finally my secondary road came up. It was a relatively unused road that straddled the peaks of the mountains. IT gave some more clear, crisp views of the mountains in twilight, but I didn't get to enjoy them as much, since my brakes were wet from the road and weren't handling the down sections all that well. I had to keep at a slower pace going down, especially with the way the road curved and followed the mountain peaks.
The road kept going through the rural mountains for a few miles, I started to see Christmas tree farms. The road started to plateau now, for a few miles. I passed a small village, consisting of a small diner that was in the center of a few of the farms, but the diner was closed for the night. But right after the diner? Welcome to North Carolina! I had hit the border! I was back in the area I had started from! Not only that, but I was less than 10 miles from Sparta, and what's more, I made a right turn back onto the main highway and it was a steep downhill! So I flew once again - the road was straight so I didn't have to worry nearly as much about braking. By this time, I was hoping, practically begging, that the road was going to be all downhill to Sparta. It was nearly night time now, the sun had set behind the mountains and I realized that I was tired of riding for the day.
But this road was just like all of the others, and eventually it bottomed out somewhere between the fourth and fifth mile it bottomed out and I was once again climbing. I was starting to get angry at inanimate things. Cursing the hills, cursing the road, cursing any cars that passed by, cursing the stream, the river, the bridge. It was almost a game finding anything I could curse at, but it kept my mind off the aches and pains from nearly 10 hours of riding - there was no one really around to hear anyway.
I got to the top of the hill and started down again. Hoping once again that this would be all downhill to Sparta (I originally thought Sparta was in a valley - and it kind of is, but more like a plateau). Alas, this downhill petered out after about a mile. I needed a rest, so I pulled over at the next road. Night had fallen now, and I was still a long way away from my destination. So I broke down. I called a few friends to see if I could get a ride, and I only got some maybes, and I kind of convinced them out of it anyway. Regardless, it was nice to talk to everyone, get a rest, and get some energy again. I checked the map on my phone, and oddly enough, it was telling me to take the road I stopped at, but Sparta was straight ahead? Was I to bypass the town? I kind of had wanted to rest and maybe eat something at a restaurant in Sparta, but I wanted to be done even more. So, I took the road.
It was a very dark and somewhat busy road, very up and down, so I was wondering what could have been so much worse about the other way. Google often tries to give you the easiest route, so the other way must have really been a nightmare, because this was no dream. I passed through more tree farms and suburban houses, climbing roads that were nearly as steep as the one by Ashland. There was very little downhill reprieve and I was starting to move at a sloth-like pace. Finally, a gas station sign in the distance! I had hit the highway on the south side of Sparta and I was done with that terrible road.
The gas station was closed. So I got out my last few remaining snacks and sat down in the rocking chair in front of the store and started to work on my bicycle's brakes. The clerks were counting the cash inside. A guy drove in finagled with the gas pump and came to the door. The automatic pumps weren't working so he knocked on the door and asked the clerks. they got him working and saw me in the chair. I guess they took pity on me because they let me in the store to buy snacks after they had closed down the registers. I bought some chips, a juice, and a few packs of peanuts for the road. I thanked them profusely and then went back to sit in the rocking chair to enjoy my feast. As they were leaving, I asked them about directions to the Blue Ridge Parkway. These busy rural highways were freaking me out and I didn't want to get sideswiped by a car on my last day of riding. They told me it was about 10 miles down the road, but the asked me which way I was going, I mistakenly said north (because Boone is northwest of Sparta?) and they said good, because the south route is closed. So I had to make a decision - to take the Blue Ridge or take the mapped out way that turned just 5 miles down the road. This time I opted for the parkway.
After passing the road that Google told me to take, and another 2 miles thereafter, I realized my mistake. I was to be going south, but it was once again too late in my mind to turn back. What's more, I realized after not stopping in Sparta that I wouldn't have enough battery left to navigate my way back to Boone and the parkway was a sure shot. I wanted to take the Blue Ridge Parkway.
So there it was, the onramp to the parkway, and there also it was, the sign telling me that the parkway was closed a few miles up ahead. I decided to give it a go anyway, if it was a bridge out, hopefully I could climb the mountain on foot to the other side. If it was a bridge over a stream, my bike and I would cross it. So on I went, with more and more ominous signs along the way. One car actually passed me along the way. I was afraid it was going to be a ranger telling me to turn back, but it was just a guy with Florida plates, and I saw him again about 10 minutes later going back in the other direction. I hoped that I would be more fortunate, and by this time, over 12 hours of riding, I honestly just didn't really care anymore. Only one thing was on my mind, getting back to Boone, and I really felt like I was close....maybe even just another 30 miles, that wouldn't be so hard, right?
And there it was, the barrels starting to block the road, there was a lookout point on the left, so I laid down, took a break, and thought really hard about what I was about to do. I wondered where I was, it was dark, I found a sign but couldn't read it. I checked the cell phone, about 30% left. I turned off the navigation, turned off the maps, texted a few friends about the general idea of where I was and then turned off the ability to make calls so that I could conserve power through the night. I turned on the light for a moment...stone mountain overlook. "Stone mountain? Isn't that by Winston Salem?" I thought. Well fortunately for me, it wasn't that far, but was still much further from my destination that I thought, over an hour by car. I put up the phone, got up, decided that I was ready to do this, and made my way past the barrels. There were still work zone signs after the barrels, which I thought was interesting, you know, just in case you happened to barrage through all of the barrels standing in your path. I also missed the sign that was apparently next to the road blocking barricade I went under that said "this area is dangerous for cyclists and pedestrians" hmm, oops.
So on I went, maybe illegally, but hey at least there wasn't going to be any cars. I took it nice and slow, I was spent by now anyway. I kept going, but the road was no different then before the barricade, strange ideas started popping into my head, like maybe I'd encounter some sort of secret alien meeting ground, or military training exercise. About 5 miles down the road I started encountering boulders in the middle of the road. One side of the road would be littered in them and the other side would be clear then the other side would be littered in boulders and the opposite lane would be clear. I saw drainage ditches and masonry work. They were merely doing shoulder work. They had lines drawn to make partitions, like road markers? I dunno, but it went on for miles, up and down the mountains. Then an area would be clear, and then I'd see construction equipment large enough to carry boulders, then boulders, and of course, the occasional work truck - which I kinda feared may have the occasional person in one.
So on I went, for over 20 miles. It felt eerie being the only person around in the area. Solitary, and with the roads, it almost felt post-apocalyptic. Fortunately, no bridges were out, just the shoulder work. The road work ended with the barricade on the other side, the side where I did actually notice the "dangerous for cyclists and pedestrians" sign. Whatever. It wasn't that dangerous. The construction work dumped me out at Doughton Park, where there were actual RV's in the campgrounds. Civilization again! SO on I went, down a hill, and wow, actually even passed a car going the other direction at 2am on the Blue Ridge Parkway! I'm sure he was actually even more surprised to see me.
So one I went, up and down the mountains, in the dark, well after midnight. The parkway was windy and foggy, just as it always is, but I was able to keep a good pace downhill by riding in the center of the road. From driving the parkway at night once before in November 2010, I learned that there are almost no cars traveling at night, and the ones that do, you see and hear from a mile away. So on I went. Even in the middle of the though, I started smacking into spiderwebs. Now this was a new thing for me. These webs that stretched across the parkway must have been massive, and if that was the case, then the spiders, well I don't even want to think about how big these spiders must have been. Seemed like one of these fellers must have hitched a ride with me too, because every so often, I'd get a web shot into my face, or on my hand...yea, it was kinda freaky. I started flailing around a bit, trying to smack the hitchhiker off while I road, this didn't help remove the spider, but it did help me stay warm, as traveling on the parkway at night in late summer was starting to get a little frigid. I sped up down the hills, maybe the wind would push him off of me. No luck it seemed, but after a while, the web spinning just kind of stopped.
By this time, it was after 2am and I was beat, I'd been riding for 16 hours, that's two eight hour shifts for those of you in the working world. I could not longer pedal up the mountainous terrain anymore, so I started doing what I did last time I rode on the parkway, I hoofed it up the steep parts and rode down the mountains and on the flat sections. I wasn't getting very far at all, maybe 4 or so miles per hour and I was losing steam fast. I felt like I had traveled so far on the parkway, the road to Boone must have just been past the next bend. Alas, this was not the case, and after another hour more, I stopped, stood, not knowing where I was, not seeing any signs for anything familiar, I decided that this was the end of my journey today. I would not make it to Boone on this final day. The Blue Ridge Parkway had beaten me once again. So I walked to the next overlook, conveniently just a few miles down the road and I parked the bike by the only picnic table. Too tired to even set up the hammock and knowing that I was in for a frigid night, I wrapped myself in it, and covered myself from head to toe in my shelter blanket. I would have even put on my other sets of clothes had they not been still wet from the torrent earlier, and I slept on top of that picnic table.
Shivering while the tenseness and heat from 18 hours of physical activity was escaping my muscles, my back sore from sleeping on a hard tabletop, the sun peeking on the treeless overlook kissed what little was exposed of my face early in the morning. It had to have only been maybe 2, maybe 3 hours. But I couldn't bring myself to get up just yet. I knew I was so close to my destination, but my body was too ravaged from the night before. The wind was just strong enough to whisk away the heat and so I continued to shiver. I wrapped up tightly in the hammock/blanket and the sun gradually warmed my body as it slowly rose in the sky,
Around 8, a guy in a hatchback drove up to my quaint little overlook. I'm sure I looked part explorer and part bum, laying there atop that picnic table, but I was apathetic. He must have noticed me stirring, because he asked me from afar if I needed a ride. I told him that I didn't think there would be room for me and the bicycle. HE asked where I was going, and I said Boone, astounded at this point, he asked how in the world did I end up here. I assumed at this point that I really must be in the middle of nowhere, and quite a ways from Boone. I thanked him for his generosity, and after a time of enjoying this pristine overlook he drove off, headed the way from which I came.
At around 10, I was finally starting to feel a bit uncomfortable from the heat, and rested enough to embark on whatever distance was left ahead of me. The loud exhaust blasting the air from group of bikers that came to the overlook was the motivation I needed to get up. So I folded everything neatly back up onto the bike and walked the bike to the road. I don't remember who spoke first, but I ended up talking to the bikers, asking them how far Boone was, they had come from Asheville and they said the dreaded words I feared....that Boone was still quite some distance away. They offered me a pack of cookies, yes,bikers with cookies, as a condolence. Running out of food. I hesitantly took it and thanked them as they went on their way. So I got to the bike, and realized that I had left my sunglasses on the picnic table, and I'm glad I had to go retrieve them, because when I got back to the bike, the largest freaking spider I have ever seen was sitting atop my bicycle seat and he looked pissed! Like, "I was snatched from my web last night and taken for a sadistic joy ride for 20 miles" pissed. And, ya know, he actually looked like he was ready for a bare knuckle fight. Being 100 times bigger than him, I wasn't too terribly scared. I picked that bike up, lifted my leg up over the center bar and sat right on that little sucker. "Blast me with web and then commandeer my bicycle will ya?" I thought...
Naw, just kidding, I took my water bottle, put the bike in the overlook, and scooped him up onto a nice thick green patch of grass. He still looked pretty upset though. Spider free, I got on the bike and embarked on what I hoped would be short, enjoyable half day trip.
The road still looked familiar, and I never saw any signs for West Jefferson and the like, but after 10 miles, I eventually came up upon a country store on the Blue Ridge Parkway. It was open, so I walked in. Alas, no plugs to charge the phone, but they did have a map. What luck! I was less than 15 miles from the Cascades! A group of three steep waterfalls that swiftly surge down a mountainous embankment, abutted by a set of castle-like rock terraces - and a place that I'd been before. I finally knew where I was!
Knowing how far something is can be a boon and a curse. Now that I know how far I was from the cascades, I could taste victory, however, those last few miles also go sooooo slooooow that it's mentally painful. It felt like hours before I finally made it, and come to think of it now, it probably was hours. "Just over the next hill" I thought over and over and over again. It got to the point where I just stopped thinking about it, and then, there it was! There was a fountain there, and lots of people enjoying their day. I hovered over that water fountain for minutes. The water was so cold, so crisp...it was the most delicious water I've ever consumed. After a long stint at the water fountain, I took off for the next goal - Jefferson mountain overlook.
It wasn't too far before I reached my next destination, surprisingly much faster than I expected - just up one mountain. There were some bikers there, and I felt accomplished, so I asked them to take my picture, the same type of picture I had taken a few years before. Atop the overlook sign, on the edge of the slope, and with nothing but mountains and air in the background. I couldn't help but give it the "I'm a freaking warrior" pose. They were glad to help and took some more from their camera, they said one of the pictures were going to be shown during their performance at the local motorcycle festival they were playing in that night. Felt good, man.
We exchanged goodbyes and I got on the road for one last trek. I remembered from my previous trips to this overlook that the road up to it from the other side is long and steep. I was going to get to go down this epic mountain at full speed. I sailed, I mean, really flew. It took up until about halfway down the hill before the band of motorcyclists finally passed me. It felt dangerous, but thrilling at the same time to see them slowly pass me on their motorized vehicles with much thicker tires. I got to the parkway/421 bridge. The parkway section was over! Now, just 10 miles down the busy 421 highway, lay my destination.
I got the phone out, which had just enough battery left, and tracked my last 10 miles, my speed, the height, everything. I was so excited that I tried to keep a speedy pace on this very last leg up. I wanted to get there in less than an hour. The shoulder on 421 was so wide that I had no worries of cars getting too close, so I didn't even look back, I just went. Then the sign for Boone, 5 miles. Then the Old 421 light. Then the dealerships. Then Bamboo Rd. Then I was there! Boone! I had made it, I was done! I stopped by one of my favorite coffee shops, turned off the mytracks - just under an hour of riding. And I celebrated with the sweetest, most caramel and chocolate filled "would you like some coffee with that" drink I have ever drank. And it was good.
But I had 2 more miles to overcome before I was back to the June house. Hills that used to cause me trouble were effortless, nothing like how I had remembered them before. I was at the house in a blink. No one was home, so I sat in the armchair, patiently awaiting the return of my friends. They got home shortly thereafter and were absolutely surprised to see my beaming face looking up at them as they entered the house. That night, we all celebrated over at the Russians' house. We took the car.
Here are some stats from the trip:
Days of the trip: 36
Days traveling via bicycle: 19
Distance traveled: 1200 miles
Average distance per day: appx 60 miles
Longest day: 9/2 - nearly 18 hours of riding ; nearly 150 miles
Weight lost ~ 20lbs
GPS coordinates map - Here
Summary/Rough map of route taken (easier to read) - Here
Well that's it! It's done! It's over.
I feel like I have accomplished something. I've met some amaing new people and reocnnected with some great old friends. I've learned more about myself,and what I'm capable of. I've found something new to do that I love doing, and I've learned the power in setting small little stepping stone goals that end up turning into one extraordinary achievement. Lastly, I've reaffirmed my belief that most people you meet are inherently good, just living their lives one day at a time. Just like you and me.
I had an adventure.
And I can't wait for my next one.
No comments:
Post a Comment