June 1, 2002
7 min. read
This post is part of the Trans-Am series.
We both woke up early, but slept in. It is hard to leave a cold, paid for motel room. We managed to get packed up and out by 10:30. The climb up into town was moderate, but much better than climbing Danger Hill. We were heading out of Christiansburg before noon.
We had thought that we left the 666 road back behind us, but that wasn’t so. We rode along 666 (Mud Pike Rd) for most of the way into Radford. About halfway into Radford, we stopped for lunch.
There was a little store with a grill. I had a hamburger “all the way” and some potato wedges. Adam had a cheese burger “all the way” and a hot dog (which came with chili.) If you are wondering about the “all the way”, we were too. I stifled my desire to say, “all the way to where” and just said “Ok.” So did Adam. I guess that is how you say “with everything” around here. I don’t think Adam realized that the hot dog came with chili, when he unwrapped it and said, “Well, here is one Pepcid AC gone.” (He had bought a pack of 6 to split in Troutville.)
Oh, I forgot to mention a big milestone. When we reached Christiansburg yesterday, we had fully completed section 12 of the route. Woo Hoo! We are now on section 11, map 138. 1 out of 12 sections and 11 out of 150 maps down.
We crossed the New River in Radford and then rode along with it for a few miles. Apparently the New River is the second-oldest river in the world and one of only a few that flows from south to north. How they know it is the second oldest, I have no clue. I’m guessing that those big satellite photographs from way back when only showed one river, then another showed up. They all said, “Wow, another river. This one is New, so lets call it New River.” Then they wrote down that this “New River” was the second river in the world. Otherwise, wouldn’t you call it “2nd Oldest River”? Calling it “New River” is really kind of mean, like calling the fat kid “slim”. I wish people would have more respect for the rivers.
Donna’s book has a few paragraphs about the New River Trail State Park. This is Virginia’s only linear park. Being from Indiana and visiting Ohio, both of which have rail-to-trails, I see nothing interesting about this. It would be a pleasant ride, but somehow I don’t understand her suggesting that you pedal this trail if you want a break. I can see suggesting that you go canoeing or something for a break, but pedaling as a break from a bicycle tour is a little strange.
After stopping for lunch, the sky had started to get overcast. I mentioned to Adam that this was probably the start of the line of storms we saw on the Weather Channel the night before. About half way to Newbern, the clouds started to get really bad looking behind us. I pulled over and told Adam that we needed to get things buttoned up. I put the rain cover over my rear “handlebar bag” and made sure my rain gear was ready. While he was finishing, I told him that I was going to ride ahead and look for a place to wait it out. I told him that we probably had 5 minutes before we started getting wet.
He caught up with me in 3 minutes and the first sprinkles had started. I saw a lady getting out of her car and asked if we could use her car port for a few minutes. She said that it would be fine and we moved under there. The rain started pretty light, but quickly built, as did the lightning and thunder. Adam told me that he was glad that I asked to use this and I agreed. I was planning on knocking on the door to ask, if I hadn’t seen the lady going inside. The winds stated picking up and we were still getting wet inside the car port, so we both put on our rain gear. I managed to get it on a little quicker and didn’t get as wet. After the gust front finished coming through, it rained pretty hard for over a half hour. I pulled off my rear buckets so we could sit down. There were some really close lightning strikes (less than 1⁄4 second sound delay) and many under 3 seconds.
Just as the rain finished and we were about to pull out on the road, another Trans-Am cyclist came up the road. He was traveling really light, probably mostly staying in hotels with only clothes and some emergency shelter. He had been doing 100 mile days, which is something even considering his light load. I asked if he had pulled over anywhere for the rain and he said that he had just rode through it and it was scary. Umm, yeah. It was bad weather under a car port. I guess he was trying to push towards a motel in Wytheville, originally our destination for today. We told him to enjoy his trip, as we wouldn’t be seeing him again (unless I bought a car).
I put away my rain pants and jacket, then we started towards Newbern. We gradually rode back into the back end of the storms and I had to get my jacket back on. In Newbern, I was riding along and making mental notes of the places I could turn back to if it got bad again. We were heading out of Newbern, when the weather started coming again. We rode on for a little bit and saw a picnic shelter at a local church. We pulled inside and another bit of decent rain came down. Since we were under a cell tower (being right next to I-81), I pulled out my computer and cell phone. I showed Adam the animated radar for our area and we looked at our options. Waiting out the heavy rains had cut down our travel time. The only know place to stay before Wytheville (which would be hard to make today) was Draper. That was a free camping location, behind a store. We thought that the 8 miles gained would be quickly lost by packing up the wet tents. We were going to catch the edge of this storm front for a few hours, so we decided to stay at the picnic shelter.
We have tried to find someone associated with the church to see if it is OK, but have been unsuccessful. Hopefully it will be fine and we will leave a little something for the lodging in the morning. Service starts a 9:45 AM and we should be on the road by 7 AM at the latest. We headed down the street a 1⁄2 mile and ate at Shoneys. I was planning on cooking, but the outside tap of the church is not on. I wouldn’t have a place to easily clean up the dishes, and we had a few hours to kill. It was a good choice Since this is probably the last night I’ll be riding with Adam, I treated him to dinner.
I should mention a little about that. Adam called home to find out when school started and it is mid-August. He had set his schedule around someone that pushed out the Trans-Am like our 100 mile guy. He is starting to realize that if he doesn’t push and average of 67 miles per day, he won’t get done. That is also without rest days. It will be really hard to make that happen, but more power too him if he can pull it off. I also showed him the Western Express route, which goes out to California from Pueblo, CO.
I cuts 500 miles off the trip, but you get some tough roads and long distances between services.
The sunset was great tonight. We are finally staying at a place that has some type of horizon. Hopefully we won’t run into any problems sleeping here for the night. If anything interesting happens, you’ll get to hear about it.
Newbern, VA
Tent Site: 37 deg 04.273 min N, 80 deg 41.811 min W, elev 2039 ft.
Part 18 of 48 in the Trans-Am series.
Series Start | Day 12 - Troutville, VA to Christiansburg, VA | Day 14 - Newbern to Wytheville