Milepost 469

I am home. That is the bottom line. But the title of this entry is the end of the trip, which actually occurred on Monday, June 9 at about 5:30 pm.

Between Asheville, NC and MP 469 was the most intense riding of the trip and some of the most spectacular scenery. Jim and I got a good night's rest at the Best Western Biltmore East in Oteen, NC outside of Asheville. The thunderstorms had rolled through as we arrived but did not leave behind nice dry air as sometimes will happen and the morning was heavy with fog as we rolled out after our continental breakfast. It was like pea soup and we had all of our blinky lights on. We had a 2 mile ride over a couple of hills to get back to the parkway. My legs felt dead and I was not looking forward to the climbs ahead.

As we got on the parkway the fog persisted until we got out of the river valleys of Asheville. At one point, in the fog, on a curve, across two solid yellow lines oncoming comes a car passing another and headed right for us. Some people are just made stupid and I think that one must have been in that category. The car whizzed by us as we scanned the roadside for a spot to bail out. Luckily he left us enough room but that was not a way I wanted to start a Sunday.

We rode along and the ride for the first 10 miles or so was just great. My legs started to loosen up and feel much better. We were riding through the Biltmore Forest and the roads were rolling to flat, there was little traffic and there were many other groups of cyclists out for the Sunday ride. There was one group of women who were riding with their Carmichael Training Systems coach. They passed us on the flat section and then were gathered across the French Broad River where the climb to Mt. Pisgah began. We slogged on by at our blazing 5-6 mph as the climb began and they shouted encouragement. Soon they were passing us again and exclaiming at their amazement seeing us climb with all that gear on our bikes. Jim had a conversation with some of them and with Tracy the coach at an overlook a few miles up and then they turned around, their climbing for the day done. We had a way to go yet.

There were several miles of climbing before the last 3 miles or so which were the steepest and were the ones we were told will "kick your butt". Oh ya! But we did it. We got to Pisgah, asked the attendant at the campstore where the campground was and the response, I kid you not, was "I don't know, I have never been there." The Park Service apparently does not hire concessionaires based on motivation or knowledge. Not only that but their signage sucks. Have I mentioned that before?

We had planned the day to Pisgah to be a short one and it was. We were there shortly after noon and found the campground and a real nice campsite, made some lunch (mac and cheese) in camp, cleaned up a little and chilled out for some time. Then we headed up to the lodge, gift shop and restaurant. Jim plugged in his laptop and did his journal in the lobby of the lodge. I looked around the gift shop and then went in to the restaurant at 5 when they opened for dinner. The food facilities along the parkway vary greatly. The map and brochure from the Park Service has a handy table that has a category "Food". The problem is that in some cases that means a tiny snack bar which has BBQ pork, hotdogs, chili and soup and closes at 5 pm and in other cases, as at Mt. Pisgah, a full service restaurant with a wine list, local microbrews, waiters in black aprons, a chef , entrees that run to $25 and open for breakfast, lunch and dinner. So now we know. I wish they would add "drinking water" to that table. More on that later.

Dinner was great with some corn fritter appetizers and a big bowl of pasta with chicken. Could not even finish it. Then it was off to bed, rest up for the last day, a ride of just over 60 miles with some very major looking climbs.

Everyone had talked most about the climb to Mt. Pisgah in North Carolina or the climb up from the James River in Virginia as the big, long, difficult climbs. No one really said anything about the last 60 miles. Wow, is there a lot of climbing in the last 60 miles! Miles and miles of climbing. Eight miles in one long steady chunk of 2450 ft of up. That comes after climbing to the highest point of the parkway, 6047 ft and milepost 431.4. Then you go down and long way so you can come up again. While there is a lot of climbing, guess what there is precious little of? WATER!! There is a visitor center at MP 450 called Waterrock. Every other visitor center on the parkway has running water. Most have Coke machines. Guess what Waterrock visitor center does not have. (Hint: they do have rocks) They did, luckily, at least have bottled water for sale for a mere $2 for a 16oz bottle. I was steamed. There is a 3 mile climb to the turn to the center, then you need to climb another 1/2 mile just to get there and then there is no running water!! The park ranger called it "ironic". I called it something else.

We were tired and hungry at Waterrock. We drank our designer water, ate some snacks and knew that we had only 19 miles and one 800 ft climb to go. We were now going to spend most of our time screaming downhill from around 5900 ft to 2020 ft at the Oconaluftee River where the Blue Ridge Parkway ends.

The last day gave us our only real on-the-road mechanical problem: a broken spoke on my rear wheel. I have no idea why it happened but it is one of those things that can happen when a wheel is under so much stress with weight and climbing. I heard the tell-tale tinkling sound as the wheel turned. I found the culprit. Problem was, Jim was quite a way up the road. Luckily a motorcyclist saw that I was walking my bike and looking at my rear wheel. He stopped and asked Jim if he was riding with me and that I may have a problem. Jim came back and we got the spoke replaced and the wheel trued, thanks to Jim's good mechanical skills. And we were back on the road.

The other feature of the last day in particular was a series of tunnels. There were several going to Pisgah and there were many in the last 60 miles. They all had names. They each had a yellow sign which said "Tunnel" and under that was a little yellow sign with a picture of a bicycle on it. We have no idea what the bicycle sign is supposed to indicate. Of note, these were the only signs indicating the presence of bicycles on the parkway. There were no "Share the Road" signs or any other acknowledgement that bicycles use the parkway. While riding on the parkway was great and some of the best riding conditions over such an extended distance I have ever seen, it would be nice to have some reminders for those with big motors propelling them along the road.

The last five miles of the parkway, going south, are a great fun downhill with curvey roads, tunnels and the knowledge that soon you will be able to say you rode the length of this road with all of its 48,000+ ft of climbing, and descending. As we rolled down to the end Denny was standing on the bridge over the Oconaluftee snapping pictures. We shook hands, hugged and congratulated each other. Then we got the bikes in the van as fast as we could and Jim and I jumped in the river. It was an area of rapids and we sat in the cool water and let it massage our tired legs. It felt great. Soon we were in the van and beginning our return to Connecticut. We were in CT the next evening about 8 pm after an uneventful road trip. The contrast between riding a bike everyday and then sitting in a car for 15 hours was measured by the stiffness of our leg muscles.

This was an amazing and challenging bike trip, 1505 miles of riding through CT, NY, NJ and in to PA and Amish country, and on to the trip to Front Royal to start the Skyline Drive and then the Blue Ridge Parkway. More final thoughts in an epilogue to come later.