Pothole, One, Bike Zero
So having decided the previous evening to go for a weekend ride as the weather promised to be fabulous for the weekend and it was my alternate Friday off, I threw a change of clothes together, grabbed the camera and headed out about 9 AM Friday morning with the intent of heading in a generally west by southwest direction to explore some more roads in WV.
Got into the town of New Market around an hour later after crossing over the Blue Ridge.
The color is really popping along the roads now, at least in the lower elevations…
A thousand feet up though the trees are still mostly bare of leaves or any color…
Rolling into New Market, Va…some "dummy" (literally, though I couldn't tell at first!) enjoying the morning on her front porch.
Headed into and past Broadway and Timbertown to Rt. 613 south..
A plea for help (they obviously need help! Damn, what a mess!) or an employment opportunity posting, you decide…
Some farm land and home pics… Many of the houses look like they have gone thru a metamorphous over the years.. growing and burgeoning as various residents add more and more rooms
green everywhere as new growth takes hold and the smells of newly plowed and manured fields assaults the senses…
A little while later I decided to head up along Rt 257 across the next range to the town of Sugar Grove, and that’s where things got interesting…
the map showed it going thru and the GPS said it did as well…both showing it as a state route with nothing to indicate it was other than a two-lane paved road,,,, Hmmmm
As I started to climb, and climb and climb, the road got narrower, then more so.. then the lane marking disappeared…
but there were some nice views and road was still in pretty decent shape
nice little lake at around 3000 feet..
and some nice views thru the trees
but the road kept getting narrower and narrower, now it was just one lane and a sign informed (warned) that up ahead it became a narrow, steep, one lane road with "occasional" turn outs
I knew I was getting some serious elevation as I started to see snow, several inches deep in places still hanging around on the northern slopes!
And Still it kept going UP…..
Then just as I rounded a bend, it happened…
A huge mother of a pot hole slid across the road from the other side and positioned itself right in my path, WHAM! ( I swear it moved and wantonly positioned itself RIGHT in MY way!! really!) Coming out the other side of the grand canyon some 15 minutes later (No Really!!) I thought for sure both wheels were damaged beyond repair and at any moment both tires would go flat and the front end would fall off! YIKES! (sorry no pothole pics) and here I am, gods know where, with NO traffic, NO cell..and No idea where I really was, even if I could call out. This sure wasn’t any State Route, regardless of what the map and GPS claimed…..then moments later I hear a banging/dragging sound….
Then I realized the center-stand had gotten “deployed” by the hit, Whew! And lo and behold, the tires held, the wheels where still true, Damn What Luck, (or so I thought then) no apparent damage..(although some 500 miles later I learned that was not Quite the case!).
Finally I got to a fork in the road and could either go to the right and stay on the semi-paved road or go left along a dirt road labeled with a wood post as simply “85”. Decided to try the paved road, though it was still headed UP, while the other one looked more level with the potential of maybe, at some point going Down, but it also looked really rocky and pitted; a great GS road perhaps but not really a “road bike” kind of affair. So I continued my upward climb (this Had to eventually start down again, right?) headed Up to the right and the road got steeper and after several rather sharp turns ended at a parking lot. Damn! Only well.. perhaps not so much……
as I looked around I realized I was at the very, very top of a mountain ,a rather tall mountain; in fact it was the tallest of all the surrounding ones and the view extended 360 degrees. From my current location I was looking Down on everything else, Wow! What A View!!! I’ll have to go back sometime and a try a 360 pano shoot from there, it would be spectacular! But for now you’ll have to settle for just a few random shots
Turns out (as I later found out) I had found my way to the top of the tallest peak in the Northern Va area right on the boarder of Va and Wv called Reddish Knob sitting at 4397 feet in the Geo Wash national Forest! Used to be an old lookout tower there but it had been torn down and parking area leveled out in its place. And the “85” sign stood for Forest Service Road 85.
So then I had to decide; either back track 20 some miles the way I had come, then a detour of 50 or more to get to the nearest mountain crossing and then south again for another 30 just get to Sugar Grove, OR; head down the dirt forest road which would (should, Could) get me down the western side in maybe 15 miles. I choose that option in the hopes I would not lose to much more time as I had planned on 300 plus miles to Beckley WV to visit a coal mining museum and I was no where near as far along as I should be by now. So off I headed along FSR 85…On the way down, yes it finally started to go down, having no other choice being at the top where it began, I passed a group camped in the middle of the road, not Resting, Camped right in the roadway, tents, fire pit and all, that alone should tell you how much traffic there is along there. I stopped to ask them if the road went thru, they said they “thought” it “might” but had come up the mountain side themselves.. so… on I went…
Well that was some of the roughest dirt road I’ve ridden to date on the airhead (and I’ve found some pretty rough stuff before though not normally by intension), luckily it was dry, cause there were some pretty steep grades and sharp corners waiting at the bottom of each incline! And me with a rear tire that I probably shouldn’t have set out on, but the weather and my writing the previous night had pretty much conspired to force me to travel that weekend, although dirt roads with sharp pointy rocks sticking out had NOT been on the itinerary! Still I Could have been on the K1200 LT, now That would have been fun along here (Yeah, right!)
Onward and downward, with me pleading to the sky and trees, “PLEASE let there be civilization at the end of this, not just a wall of trees and dead-end mocking me for come so far”….
Finally after giving up all hope that the road really Did go thru, while buzzards circled above me in anticipation of my demise…. I found pavement again on State Rt. 30 which lead to 32 which took me right to Sugar Grove and Rt 21 south. Only about 2 hours past the time when I planned on getting there! So it did go thru, well sort of….
The rest of the day was just more of this even though I as I headed in a mostly southern direction along 21 till I got to Rt. 25 to 250, to 220 to 63 into Lewisburg…
and this as I got closer to Beckley (which I never quite made it to that day)
crossing down into the New River and Greenbrier Valleys
Finally around 5 I was getting close to Greenbrier and Lewisburg and decided to pack it in for the day, that crossing had really worn me out and all the mountains after that having taken its toll.
In Lewisburg I saw an Inn up on a hill on the main road that looked inviting. It appeared to be an old historic building (as it turned out it was indeed, part of the building and where my room was, having been build in 1839)
It was one of those “finds” that So hits the spot
I pulled up the drive and parked, walked inside and WOW! Wonderful!! The place was filled with period furnishings, they served dinner and breakfast, it had a wonderful front porch with a view of the main drag, they had cold beer you take out on the porch… nice comfy rockers to sit in, some quiet music being played live by a couple off to one side…
The General Lewis Inn
And they Had A Room! Yeah!!!!
Let me tell you, that cold beer while sitting in the rocker till dinner was served sure tasted sweet, for dinner I had roast duck in orange sauce with home made breads, Fresh butter and home cooked sides (not canned crap).
Last Pic
My bed for the night..
By nine that evening I was crashed out with a full belly and slept til 6 just as fresh coffee was being served downstairs…
Sweet dreams…
End of part two… next up pics taken around the General Lewis Inn and start of day two…
RM
