Teh Megablog: Ashand to Mineral, Mineral to Whitehall, Whitehall to Waynesboro

Heading out of Ashland

ScotchtownGotta love the sign

Clothesline outside the rescue squad

The past three days have been increasingly hilly (and increasingly beautiful). Two days ago, we left my mom and Ashland to head up to Mineral. Similar to past days, we had a mix of forest and field, with a cool morning and sun later in the day. I felt great; we did 45 miles (fully loaded for the first time since Yorktown) and averaged 11.5mph. Early in the day, we passed Scotchtown, Patrick Henry's home - twas pretty cool, and the old ladies there were sweet. They also had rams. We did get to go through Bumpass, and as you can see from the post office pic, that really isn't made up. We cycled in over Lake Anna, which is the site of the most recently built nuclear plant - I think. In Mineral, the joined rescue squad and fire department offer bicyclists a place to rest, and since there was a group using the banquet hall the next day, we set up our camping gear out back. The folks were great and the area was nice.

Wild roses by the road - a common occurance

The solar home - nicknamed the trojan goatDad finishing the 80 mile day
Storm clouds rolling in - still gorgeousI almost sat on this dude

Yesterday was probably my toughest day thus far. I hadn't slept that well in Mineral, and my abdomen was pretty much failing. So I got up in a bad mood, biked over pretty hilly terrain in humid, mostly sunny weather, and though we got good distance, it was taking a lot to keep going. From Mineral, we went through Palmyra and Charlottesville (where we got lost and ended up on a super busy road with graduation traffic) to Whitehall. It was pretty, but oh so tiring. We came into town pretty late and had the offer of camping behind their Ruritan building (with no bathrooms or water or anything). A massive storm was kicking up over the Blue Ridges, headed straight our way, and we ran into our first bit of trail magic. :) This wonderful, wonderful man in a minivan rolled down his window as we passed and offered his spare solar home, which had just been completed and which is completely kick-ass. Bamboo flooring, new everything, a cool deck, smallish (and efficient) space... the works. 2 miles away from his place, we got caught in the storm (complete with lightning), and we poured the last ounces of energy into sprinting through the rain. (My panniers withheld the massive quantities of water - yay!!) We stayed on the road as instructed, but Tom (the amazing guy) had been expecting us to miss one of the turns and go straight onto a different road. At some point, we were soaked through on this gravel/dirt road in the middle of nowhere, and Tom drives up, tells us to get in, and drives us back out to where we were supposed to be going. He dropped us off with towels, changed vehicles, and went back for our bikes and remaining gear. Once he delivers that to us, he goes to his house, grabs wine, apple cider, chips, salsa, grapes, ice cream, and honey-roasted peanuts, and feeds us. I love Tom. Having shelter was amazing, and he even gave us breakfast and energy bars this morning before we left. Many thanks to him, his wife Sue, and their awesome kids. Total mileage was around 80, with average speeds just under 11mph. My spedometer is now unresponsive, so I'm using my dad's cyclocomputer.

Woke up this morning, still pretty beat, but in a much better mindset, and headed out of Whitehall. We went over some more rolling hills, climbed a ways on backroads (up through Afton), got over the Blue Ridges at Rockfish Gap and came down to a hotel in Waynesboro. My dad was not looking so great on the hills today, but he has been dealing with some super not-good leg cramps. He's not so used to these hills, nor, for that matter, is he used to the country. We did about 30 miles today, and dad's average was about 8.3mph. (For the record, I expect my avg would have been a bit higher, since I was riding a little more than my dad on some of the hills). In Afton, we caught up with one of the long-standing legends of the trail, the cookie lady. This awesome lady, June Curry, is 88 years old and provides food, water, and shelter to any cyclists that care to take it. We had some cookies and some conversation with her, and she is definitely one of the more loving people I've met. Bikers are her family, and she has rooms filled with things that transam folk have sent her. Tonight at dinner, I felt like I'd been biking - three giant plates chock full of food = nom. Gotta love all-you-can-eat buffets and steak houses.
Tomorrow, we re-climb the Blue Ridge on a more popular and more easily-graded road to get back on the trail, and we'll be following the Blue Ridge for a while (probably beyond where the trail goes down - Vesuvias - to some road that goes down into Buchannan. One of the great things about the decent today was that we took US250, which is not as scary of a descent as the transam likely is. Since the Buchannan trip would be about 80+ miles, we'll take two days to get there.

Below Mechanicsville to Ashland

TRAIN!!!!

We made it to Ashland tonight (think Randolph-Macon). Short ride, humid day, rolling hills, and a bunch of gusty wind. It was about 40miles, and we went unloaded to get some recovery time. We're now repacking all our stuff (aka moving some things from my dad's bags to mine) so we can ride fully loaded again tomorrow. We stopped at a pretty awesome bike shop in Mechanicsville and had their main guy check out our bikes (for the cost of a postcard sometime during our trip - awesome). We started out on this awesome cool, forrested road and got to something similar a little past halfway. There were a lot of asinine drivers out today, and we did go through some heavier traffic (complete with people who decided to pass us on a blind curve with incoming traffic). Twas annoying.
There were some quotes earlier in the week that I forgot to post. The first, from a guy in colonial Williamsburg: "May all your hills be down." I have a feeling that isn't exactly gonna be happen, but he was pretty cool for saying it. The second, from my mom looking at swim goggles in the REI: "Do you think that any of these would keep bugs out of your eyes?" I have shades for just that reason, and I'm pretty sure that even though she is a swim mom, she didn't recognize the fact that they were goggles.
Tomorrow we'll be passing Patrick Henry's home, but right now we're on track to hit Charlottesville for UVA's graduation.
Things I wish we didn't have: 3 bottles of Halt (a dog repellent that scares me), a heavy stove, a ton of things that will be useful occasionally. Time to continue packing.
Also, there was ice cream... which was amazing.

WAHOOOOOOO!!!!!!

Oy! So we finally made it somewhere, and that somewhere is about 15 miles away from Mechanicsville, VA. We went unloaded to make some distance, and that means that we made it 60 miles today with an average speed around 13.5mph. Top speeds were around 26mph, and we caught back up with Fabian, Ted, and Lisa at the hotel tonight. Found out a little more about their life stories, though it certainly isn't to the ecohouse level. The roads were mostly flat, and we travelled through a mixture of hardwood forests and midwest-esque sceneries. (The flat farms were the only thing we got pictures of.) We stopped once to get food at this kinda cute sub shop, and since my dad has forgotten a lot of important things (i.e. snacks), we got my mom to bring us gatorade and snickers at one turn in the road around 50 miles in to the ride. Traffic was increasingly heavy and will probably continue getting worse tomorrow (when we go thru Mechanicsville and Ashland).


If we get some good distance tomorrow, we'll be getting off the road at a place named Bumpass, which was apparently named for the Bumpass family. In case you were wondering, Bumpass is pronounced "bump-us."
My dad and I are both reasonably worn out, so planning 40-50miles for tomorrow. Anyhoo, I'm gonna sleep soon. Life is good.

good grief

Day one sorta postponed again.
We got to Yorktown and took the obligatory ocean + monument shot, but about 8 miles in, my dad's front hub got messed up, and we started hearing a clicking noise (not a good one, either). 13 miles in, we realized that the clicking noise was coming not from the hub, but from a break in my dad's frame (right next to the drivetrain). Luckily (?), the REI folk had a newer model of the Randonee that fit my dad up in DC, so we've switched bikes out (which took all day).


On the awesome side of things, we did meet several other people starting the trail, including Fabian from Portland and Lisa and Ted from Hawaii. They were super nice, offering tools and conversation as far as we could make it.



Unfortunately, when I was putting on sunscreen at the Yorktown visitors center, I forgot to put my bike gloves back on and ended up losing one. The REI trip did turn out to be an excellent way to get a replacement pair.

Stats:
13 miles for the day
11ish mph (slow) average
20ish mph high speed
3 annoying problems


It's probably a good thing that we did have to stop, though. Dad was not doing so hot. Apparently he hasn't biked in two weeks, hasn't biked at all fully loaded, and has been tired and antsy for the past two weeks as well. Granted, I've been stressed and nervous, but I still figured he'd be doing better than 7mph up small hills. I hope he gets into the swing of things soon, cause it was a little draining for me to balance my bike at the slower speeds. He also isn't doing very well at telling me how he is. We'll work on that. Anyhoo...

For the record, when my dad's frame broke, I talked in materials terms about it for the next 10 minutes. Thankfully, my dad is also a dork, so he completely understood.

Dad and I are determined to get closer to Mechanicsville tomorrow.

Day one has been postponed due to full-blown food poisoning. This is not fun. :(
Hopefully, we'll be on the road tomorrow.
V

Day Zero

WAHOOOO!!!!! I'm sitting in a hotel room in Williamsburg, VA, waiting for my start tomorrow (from Yorktown). Dad and I have gotten everything packed, the first week mapped out, and if we get a good ride in tomorrow, we should get 60ish miles into Mechanicsville. If we keep that pace, we'll be in Charlottesville within a few days. (Right after that will be our first major climb into the Blue Ridges - about 3000ft.) If we stick to the 1 map set per week thing, we'll be to Christiansburg at the end of the week.

Excited? Heck yeah.

Have I realized that I'm done with EHC? Not yet.
Hopefully, I'll see some Emory folk on my trip, because I didn't really get all the goodbyes done with.

EEK

Ok, so in one week, I shall have started my great adventure :) For those of you looking for the other perspective, my dad will be writing about his life on http://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/LambTransAm. We have something of a packing list put together, and since I'm sure you're interested in every minutiae of my trip, I'll add it below. I'm pretty nervous and incredibly pumped and am sure that my dad's in better shape than me right now. I'll catch up soon enough, though. If you have yet to check it out, I would suggest looking at the first post if you are wondering how, exactly, I managed to get myself into this completely amazing mess of a Trans-America bicycle trip.

So, for the packing list (if you have suggestions, I'd love to hear them)
Camping Supplies
paniers (4)
tent & fly (big agnes 3 person)
kelty bag (40deg synth) + compression sack
ridge rest
stove + fuel
pots (just a 1.5L? + handle)
sierra cup and spork
swiss army knife
2 water bottles + camelback bladder (small bleach thing for water treatment?)
Dr. Bronner's + pack towel(?)
toothbrush/paste
thin rope
first aid kit (pain/allergy meds, bandaids, neosporin, blister kit, larger bandage type things, alcohol/iodine prep pads, badger balm, duct tape, etc)

Food
drink mix
oatmeal (fruit variety pack)/rice, sugar, milk powder for breakfast
cliff bars
dried fruit/nuts/other munchies?
other food as needed (tuna/pbj/dried hummus mix + wraps, ramen, stuff fm grocery stores)
spice kit

Clothes
bandanna
tevas
wool camp/hiking socks
wool biking socks (2 pairs?)
sleeveless jersey
short sleeve jersey (gore windstopper for the first few weeks, then something cooler)
2 pair bike shorts
bike shoes
bike gloves
helmet
underwear
synthetic pants
soccer shorts
normal shirt
light wool long sleeved shirt
fleece shirt (aka pillow)
rain shell

Bike stuff
bike (novara randonee + fenders + front and rear racks)
saddle bag
cyclometer
frame pump
cable/lock + assorted bungees
tools (patch kit, tire irons, multi tool, spoke tools, lube, wrenches, spare parts - my dad is taking care of most of this)

This may get adjusted tomorrow, since I'm planning a trial ride with all my stuff. Hopefully things will go well!!