Southeast Tour 06/2010

Day 5, Monday 6/21/2010

Another sunny day and the Blueridge Parkway await... We were on the road by 9:00 local time.  The plan was to do approximately 120 miles of the Blueridge and then end in Johnson City TN for the right.

One of the things that surprised me was the speed limit on the Blueridge... 45 mph... Just a wee bit slow for the road in most places.  The road sure is a piece of work, it becomes obvious why it's called the Blueridge... as you look out what you see is various layers of bluish hills/mountains.  The further away they are the more blue they seem.  For the most part the camera just didn't capture the beauty.

At one point I pass a group of riders that were taking their time, and at the next stop they pulled in.  Turns out they were from various parts of the country and had met at the start of the Blueridge to ride the whole thing.

We chatted for a while and they were nice enough to take some photos of me and the daughter.

Here's a perfect example of the layers of blue...

 We were in no hurry, so made frequent stops... and of course there was more of the customary sitting on the ground...

The road really is beautiful; a must do for any motorcycle rider...

Rest assured, I was not actually riding the motorcycle with my daughter blocking my view.  We were stopped waiting for some construction traffic to go by, she was goofing around and I got this photo... 

This was the "Little Glade Mill Pond" stop... and it's hard to see, but she's sporting a smile...

Daughter felt the need to carve something into the picnic table and make her mark... 

Only thing about the Blueridge Parkway is that there really are no services directly along the way... It was getting close to 1:00 local time and we needed to get some food and gas... so I searched for the closest gas station and made a beeline for it.  Turned out they also had a deli with roast beef sandwiches, fruit, etc..  So, we filled up the bike and our bellies...

And there was plenty of time for more sitting on the side of the road...

Views from a roadside rest stop...

Well, somewhere around 5:30 local time we arrived at the Johnson City Red Roof Inn.  And they were nice enough to give me a discount on the room, for no apparent reason.  I wasn't complaining.

First order of business was to find a laundromat and get some laundry done.  The caretaker gave us directions and we were off.  My wife wanted to make sure we got some photos because me doing laundry is a rare occurrence. Not sure what her point was... Daughter thought it was really stupid taking pictures at the laundromat... I'm sure I embarrassed the heck out of her...

Course she didn't have any issues asking me for quarters to play the machines... and also do some goofing around...

As we're drying the clothes a really ugly cloud front started coming through... the clouds were really big and dark, the winds were gusting, and my daughter was trying to cut our dry cycle short so that we could get out of there...  She literally had tears in her eyes cause she was scared... couldn't really blame her, it was ugly.  We finished up and got out of there.  By the time we got back to the motel, the clouds had calmed down a bit, but it started raining shortly after that.

With it raining, and us not having eaten dinner yet, we tried to find someone that would deliver.  Pizza hut wanted a ridiculous amount for a medium pizza, but the rain started slowing down so we just put our rain jackets on and walked a block to the nearest restaurant and had some huge salads.

So, another great day.  Not only was the Blueridge Parkway fantastic but the other roads were just as good if not better... really, there is no such thing as a bad road in this part of the country... Anything off the beaten path is guaranteed to be twisty and challenging.  I'm not talking just mellow twisty roads like the Blueridge, what got me was the number of roads that were crazy twisty... I didn't have much tread on the rear tire when we left, but I wasn't too worried about it, because I spent most of my time leaning one way or another.  

I can't imagine what traveling without the GPS would be like.  At times I was changing roads as often as two to three miles.  My list of turns would be an arm long and trying to keep it all straight would be ridiculous.  There's a great freedom that comes from being able to pick a spot on the map and letting the GPS take you there.  Combine that with being able to program routes in, and it has completely changed the way I tour.