May 30, 2002
6 min. read
This post is part of the Trans-Am series.
Adam and I both woke up a few times and went back to sleep. We finally started getting up around 8:45. We grabbed our things and got out of the motel room at check-out time (11 AM). As the trash can indicates, we might have over done it a little, staying right next to a Wal-Mart.
We carried out our bikes empty, then loaded everything on to them in the parking lot before starting back into town. We made it to the Post Office and began packaging our less needed things. As time goes on, you find that the weight up the hills doesn’t pay for the convenience of some items. Adam shipped a package back home to Omaha and I sent one to Jeffersonville.
Around 1 PM, we left the Post Office on our way out of town.
We decided to take Hwy 11 to Natural Bridge, so we didn’t have to back track to see it. We had assumed that there would be a free exhibit, being that it is touted as a national marvel. We stopped at a fruit stand/store to take a break. The owner warned us that Natural Bridge was a tourist trap.
It was a tough ride to the Visitor’s Center, where we found that we could see the Natural Bridge for $10. We both thought that we could just swing by and see it. That will be one thing that we will miss on our trip. We saw another black snake, dead by the side of the road. According to the locals, black snakes are great. They eat copper heads and keep that population in check.
The climb out of Natural Bridge was tough. You have to take Hwy 11 out of town and we had thought about taking it all the way to Troutville, our destination for the night. After the 2 miles, we decided to climb the extra hills, that traffic was just bad.
We were both glad with this decision after the beautiful scenery started. We were climbing, but it was a nice slow uphill for the most part. Of course, these were be punctuated with the occasional serious uphill. We took a break at a gas station with a little picnic area. I purchased $0.16 worth of gas purchase to fill up my camp stove. The smallest gas station purchase of my life.
After a fast, but tough ride with a few hard hills, we made it into Buchanan for dinner at the Main Street Diner. Located not surprisingly on Main Street.
Today’s ride contained many tough climbs. The route turned into some serious rolling hills, which you could climb with momentum, if you worked at it. This meant riding fast and pushing a little. It was interesting to follow the stream and rail road tracks, but it was the first time that we rode along a stream of any distance with the water flowing opposite of our direction of travel. Breaking the law of gravity takes energy.
The first picture below shows the after effect of my first heart stopping scare on the trip. I was riding along and suddenly something was chasing me behind making a terrible noise. I had no idea what it was. I saw nothing in my mirror and glanced back. Then I started laughing loudly. Adam stopped to see what was up as I was unhooking a huge branch from the side pocket of my panniers. The little piece of wood made a tremendous sound along the road. Heart back in chest, we continued on.
Troutville was a satisfying end to the day. We rode over 45 miles and a over 2000 feet vertical. From leaving town at 1 PM. It was a hard day. This heat is a killer. Since we talked about stopping in Troutville, I hoped that the park had a picnic shelter. This allows you to roll out our sleeping pads and bags on the picnic tables and break camp fast in the morning. It turned out that we were able to do just that. The city park was really amazing, for a city that small. There is tennis, basketball, horse shoes, a running/walking track, and some seriously cool playground equipment (says the small child in me).
We arrived just after 7, so we went to the local store before it closed at 8. We picked up some heartburn medicine, as that has been a problem with both of us a few days so far. We are starting to figure out what to eat, but still learning. Drinking Gatorade or similar sugary energy drink without some fat or protein makes me digest it too fast and causes bad heartburn. Going to Wal-Mart yesterday was like a kid in the candy store. We both had bad gas all day for all the dairy products we decided to get. One of us would drop back to, umm, get rid of some up it, and then catch up using the added propulsion. It is really good that we are riding bicycles all day, and not working in close quarters.
At the store, we purchased some watermelon, Fig Newtons and bananas. I didn’t eat that much, as it seems like my body is working a little more efficiently. I haven’t been as hungry as the first few days.
Since the shelter had power, I was able to use my laptop quite a bit. My automatic email system had stopped deleting messages I sent it after processing. This caused emails to go out every couple hours. I deleted all the extra entries in the archive and typed up and sent Day 10, then turned off the email functionality. All this automatic stuff is cool, when it works. I had to update static web pages, instead of the automatic system for the rest of the tour. I don’t have time to deal with it right now and writing code and testing it over a slow analog cellular modem on an old Toshiba Libretto would be painful.
We got setup for bed and packed up everything for leaving early tomorrow. A finally got in the sleeping bag after 10:30. I must have slept only 30 minutes when the volunteer fire department alarm went off. The best I can figure is that this signal calls the people to the fire department. The reason I think this is that a few minutes later, just as I was falling back asleep, the sirens from the truck and ambulance started up as the vehicles went out. I almost got back to sleep when the train came through, 200 feet behind the park, with it’s whistle and rumbling diesel. The last time I looked at the clock was almost 1 AM. I finally got to sleep then.
Troutville, VA
Tent Site: 37 deg 24.976 min N, 79 deg 52.537 min W, elev 1373 ft.
Part 16 of 48 in the Trans-Am series.
Series Start | The Conversation | Day 12 - Troutville, VA to Christiansburg, VA