Saturday, May 15, 2010
The adventure has begun! We left Yorktown, VA on 4/29 and are now in Berea, KY. Before leaving Yorktown we dipped our rear tires into the Atlantic Ocean, as is the custom, and, upon the completion of our trip, will dip our front tires in the Pacific Ocean. We then rode off on the start of what we called “Bruce and Steve’s Excellent Adventure.”
Our third night out we stayed in a fire station, in Mineral, VA. The fire station is listed on our Adventure Cycling TransAmerica Bicycle Trail map as a place that offers cyclists doing the trail overnight accommodations. They let us use their upstairs meeting room for the night and we slept relatively well despite the large air conditioning unit that started up every half-hour or so and made slightly less noise than a locomotive. Not that I’m complaining—the price was right.
From there we rode to Charlottesville and then made an hour-long, steep climb to the top of the Blue Ridge Parkway. We rode the parkway for most of the day and ended with a very steep and windy “plunge” down Vesuvius Hill, a descent that tired out our arms (from braking) as much as the ascent had tired out our legs. We spent a rest day in Lexington, VA, then continued our trip through Virginia, spending a good share of one day riding through the beautiful Shenandoah Valley. We rode past many beautiful farms and horse ranches, some with miles of pristine white fences surrounding them.
We finally arrived at the Kentucky border almost two weeks after starting out after what seemed like a very long ride through Virginia. We had ridden the long way through the state, riding first north, then back south, then west (that’s where the route took us) and I was happy to get to the end of the first state on our trip. The Virginia drivers were really nice and patient. Many of the roads on which we rode were busy, narrow, and had no shoulders. This meant that many times there would be a line of vehicles behind us waiting for a spot to pass. None of them honked, shouted, made any hand gestures, or otherwise showed impatience.
Our last night in Virginia we stayed in a hilltop lodge at the beautiful Breaks State Park with a deck overlooking “The Gorge,” a deep chasm in the hillside.
We have now ridden three days in Kentucky and I think the state motto should be, “No dog on a leash and no pick-up with a muffler.” We have had three dogs chasing us almost constantly (not the same three dogs) since we entered this state. It seems every household has at least three unleashed dogs that don’t like bicycles. Steve has become very adept at throwing rocks from his moving bike but I have opted for the “Shout loudly at them” method. Both methods are moderately effective. We are told that it will be this way (dogs chasing us) until we cross into Illinois. And there seems to be an inordinate amount of “good ol’ boys” in pick-ups with very loud mufflers. At least we can hear them coming (from miles away).
The weather has been good, sunny and warm, although we did have to stop after 35 miles one day as 50 mph wind gusts were blowing us around the road.
Somewhere along the way we realized we had ridden 800 miles without seeing a liquor store. As Steve and I like to end a long, hot day of riding with a refreshment a bit stronger than lemonade, this was wearing on us. Kentucky has many “dry” counties and few liquor stores. In Berea, KY we had the good fortune to befriend Nick, the proprietor of a bike store, who told us he was making a “liquor run” to the next county that very afternoon. He offered to bring us back two small bottles of good Kentucky whiskey. Good old Nick!
The adventure continues!