Along the Appalachian Trail
Wednesday I was up and ready to go before 6am under the pavilion at the Mt. Carmel church in Meadowview. Usually if I’m ready early I’ll wait until the sun starts to rise, but this time I headed out. It was a nice change riding in the dark with the headlight on and no traffic. But I didn’t have to ride far before I crossed under the interstate highway, of course with a McDonalds at the exit ramp. After a dinner of a banana and trail mix the night before, I was ready for breakfast.
I wanted to ride 75 miles to Wytheville, which for me would be two very good days in a row of progress through the mountains. When I looked at the map on the computer though, I saw that the distance between the two towns taking the interstate highway was only 42 miles. In this case, taking the scenic route with less traffic makes for a much longer day.
It turned out to be another perfect day for a ride, with temperatures that would reach the mid 70s, or around 24C. There would be two long climbs, but the good news was that there would also be a lot of downhill during the second half of the day.
A little over ten miles in was the town of Damascus. A very small place, but here they had a couple of bike shops where the rental of bikes was big. There’s a trail called the Virginia Creeper that many cyclists ride on and it was listed as an alternate route to the main one on my map. It looked like it would only add a couple miles to the day so I decided to take it.
The trail is made of crushed cinder and gravel and was pretty smooth to ride on, but every now and then I’d hit a few rough parts and wonder if I was risking a flat. These tires have held up well, but I think the end of the trip will be all they can possibly handle.
It was a good decision to take the trail as it was so scenic. One of the best stretches of the trip. I saw a lot of people on rental bikes and some hikers along the way but nobody loaded up for touring. I was getting questions from some about my ride. Back in August when you told people you were going to the Virginia coast they seemed amazed. Now when you tell them that there’s not much of a reaction since you’re almost there. However, when they follow it up with asking where you started then it becomes a topic of conversation.
As I was riding along the trail I was looking for a road that would take me back to a paved road which would take me back to the route. It wasn’t well marked and I ended up riding further on the gravel than I needed. In the end this added another eight miles to the day and a fair amount of extra climbing. Not exactly what I wanted. So the 75 mile day ended up being 83. But well worth it in the end to have taken the trail.
As I was on pavement again a young girl with a backpack was coming out of some brush and getting ready to cross the road. She was hiking the 2,000 plus mile Appalachian Trail with her 32 pounds of gear and had been going since August 1st. An injury to her ankle had set her back and now she can’t do the whole route. She introduced herself as Kindling, but her real name was Emily. I guess it’s a custom for AT hikers to use a trail name along the way. It was nice talking with her, but I still had 50 miles to go and needed to move on.
While stopping for a drink in the small town of Konnarock, a woman there said that rain is expected for Friday. After going through the whole trip with virtually no rain, this was surprising news. I’m so close to the end that I thought I’d avoid it, but we’ll see what happens then. I was thinking about taking one last rest day, so that might be it.
The rest of the day involved the two big climbs, which I got through okay. The afternoon looked to be a lot of downhill according to the map, which it was, but it also included numerous short, steep uphills and you wondered if it would ever end. But aside from the hills, the scenery made it an excellent day. After the night of sleep on the picnic table the night before, I got a cheap hotel room in Wytheville. This may become common heading into the final week on the road.
