Do I get a stamp in my passport for this?

The time had come for a very literal descent into the Deep South. "Literal" because, unbeknownst to me,  I would be saying goodbye to the last elevation I would be seeing for a long time...

I have a theory that by either technological evolution,  alien intervention or demonic possession,  my motorcycle is at least partially a sentient being. Its behavior is statistically divergent from the predictability of a mechanical device. It tends to decide how and when to cooperate based on what is best for our team of two. Leaving Asheville,  the objections from The Monster took the form of a gritty clunking from my chain and rear sprocket.  In my ignorance, I took this only to mean that replacement or break down was imminent. The intended urging to reflect on and appreciate the topographical glory I had been basking in went shamefully unheeded. Sorry, old friend. I'll listen more closely in the future. 

I left Asheville with only rough plans about where I was headed and little to no plan about how I would be getting there. It only took me 31 years to learn certain critical facts of life, but if I had learned nothing else from the prior year, it was that life had exactly zero fucks to give about your plans. Better to make yourself as adaptable and capable as possible, and play the hand you're dealt. That, You can control.

Headed south. Florida at some point. By way of... Savannah? Why not, sounds decidedly Southern. It was early July, and my journey was taking me through South Carolina and Georgia,  but I put a lot of faith in the fact that I am a rugged New Englander. Soft-hearted as we may be, our will is hewn from the same granite that makes up the bedrock of our homeland. There was a job to be done, and I decided I didn't give a shit about the heat. I drank in my new surroundings eagerly. Palm trees started to replace the deciduous trees I had grown accustomed to in the upper elevations. Cicadas began to sound off, and tiny lizards studied me whenever I would stop for a cigarette. My aversion to major interstates allowed me to see some local color,  such as a small-town main street with a giant banner proclaiming it the "Coondog Festival". I went around the outskirts of Spartanburg,  and with the sun diving hard on me, I ripped around Greenwood, SC on a truck-only bypass that carved through a forest of towing pines that were a little too geometrically arranged to be natural. Later research revealed this to be a tree farm. I was time to find a hideout for the night. 

When camping in a location that is not entirely legal, the priority is concealment. Stay away from anything that would draw the eye of a passerby; a break in the trees, a stream, a boulder. Sick to a regular expanse of the same old scenery and blend into it. You can be visible to the eye and invisible to the mind at the same time if you do it right. I saw my spot and doubled back for it, crossing my fingers that I'd get a minute or two with no bored or nosy truckers to report an Italian race bike suddenly jumping the roadside berm and disappearing into the trees. A precarious 50 foot off-roading session took me over, around and through branches, rocks and ruts in the forest floor, all the while wrestling my bike to stay rubber-side-down slipping and skidding on deep pine needles and leaves. I got myself in position to jump off to scout a bit deeper for a campsite. I lucked out. The area had no side roads or houses, but was not short on old logging roads. Seeing the overgrowth on the tracks long-since abandoned by heavy machinery, I knew I was home.

Many things to consider when you've got your entire life strapped to a pasta-rocket; it's gotta fit, it's gotta stay on,  and it had better be everything you're going to need. Another important consideration is that you should be able to carry all of it, preferably with a free hand. After much forethought, trial and error,  I can unload my bike in ten minutes and carry all of my earthly possessions with BOTH hands free.  All bags, clothing, electronics, camping and survival equipment, if properly arranged, can be carried to the campsite in one trip. It's a hell of a good way to keep yourself from owning (being owned by) too much shit, and it's enough to make any Zen Buddhist smile contentedly.

A quick inspection of the forest floor assured me I want setting my gear down on any ant hills, a precaution that I would fail to take three days later, much to my detriment, but we'll get there... The Monster was 50 or so feet into the woods but since it would be there overnight, I went back to see to it that no stray headlights would catch a reflector and betray my position. I threw my rain cover over it and hacked down some branches to break up the clean lines of the blue nylon. Another twenty minutes, and my tent was pitched, all my gear was safe inside and all of my sweaty clothes were hanging on a paracord line across the old, forgotten trail. I had logged about ten hours of saddle time that day and won a Judo match with a 350 pound opponent made of red hot steel and slippery carbon fiber, but it still took until well after dark for the thrill to give way to exhaustion. The frogs and cicadas finally won out, and I drifted off.

Breakdown/loadup was as smooth as it should have been on such a beautiful, peaceful morning. The maneuvering to make it back to the road would have had a range of effects if viewed by the staff at the Ducati factory. The mechanics would have cringed over their espressos, but the engineers would have stood up and cheered. I took less care with my escape, and a distant semi driver undoubtedly saw me spring from the undergrowth, drop a gear and dissappear.

The day greeted me with a glorious sunrise and scant traffic. I envisioned Savannah as my next stop, but my chain had me worried enough that I actually got in touch with a friend from up north who now lives in Myrtle Beach. A Biker herself, she was all ears when I told her I might need a place to crash and wait for a part to ship. In the end I went through two cans of chain oil and a small mountain of gas pump grade paper towels to keep my chain from breaking and slashing through my leg, though two teeth did break off of my sprocket. The Monster and I shared a smirk about that as I remembered toying with the idea a couple years ago of switching to a smaller front sprocket with two less teeth. It's a mod referred to as "dropping teeth" that changes the gear ratio and increases torque, but dropping them mid-ride is not the way to do it. Afterwards the chain synched up with my new "custom" sprocket. This just meant that the next break down would surely strand and injure me, but I decided to roll the dice. 

I had done precisely zero homework on what to do in Savannah, but I knew I would want to make the most of my one night there. Rolling a lot of miles in one day means extra fuel, but more gas money was offset by spending nothing on food or water all day. It's not that I had none, it's just that there are other ways to get it than paying for it. Since my budget looked good for the past few days, I sprung for the cheapest motel I could find, Motel 6 Midtown. This afforded me luxuries like a roof, a shower and a locked door to stash all my shit behind so I could travel into town unencumbered. In my excitement,  I actually left my good camera in my room, which I regretted, but this was before my "adventure-proof" phone started to give up the ghost, so I managed to get some passable shots with it. I took a third and final shower and started the engine to the sensations of what I would consider my first night in The Deep South.

How to describe Savannah... Having only one (Tuesday) night in town, I am by no means an authority, but I can paint a picture of what jumped out at me. The most poignant and poetic way I can describe how Savannah struck me is to say that rolling through town made it seem very much like The South had won the Civil War,  and I was in the capitol of the Confederate States of America. Cobblestone streets led me past churches and buildings made of stone and brick. I was heading north through town and right through a historic district where on every other block, I was paraded around a small grassy area. In the center of most of these was a resplendent carved likeness of historical figures that were integral to the history of the city. Mostly statues, sometimes monuments or plaques, I felt as though a Traveller could not gain admittance to town without this history lesson. It felt incredible to be in a truly OLD town again. I felt hundreds of years of history, strife, triumph and culture all with a genuinely foreign feel. Any place is foreign or exotic to someone, and this was different enough for me to feel that way. This was the feeling I knew I had to chase once life chewed up my plans and shit me out onto the road. I was starting to see the world.

I knew I'd only have one night in town,  so I got some recommendations from locals about what there was that I shouldn't miss. I'd done a couple of days with very little food, and certainly nothing that qualified as "unique local fare", so I decided food and drink would be part of tonight's budget. I kept hearing about places that were "right in City Market", which was evidently a thing. "Vinnie Van Go-go's Pizza" was one of the more common recommendations,  so I used that to get myself heading in the right direction. I had parked The Monster (for free no less! ) near the waterfront which was all brick and cobblestone buildings, the oldest of which was directly down on the water and connected to the main thoroughfare by warves and ramps made of still more cobblestones.  The Northerner in me wondered what in the world the snowplows did to deal with that in the winter... oh yeah... never mind that I guess. The ramps were spanned by elegant foot bridges made from wrought iron that added nicely to the aesthetic. The heat was getting to me, and I couldn't help but stop in at an alleged Irish pub,  undoubtedly named "O'-something's" for a Sam Adams. This is not a food blog (Food Network execs, I could totally do one, just sayin'), and can't even begin to fake it as a beer snob, so let it suffice to say, my beer was cold. What was interesting though was that there sitting at the end of that bar was the first time I noticed an interesting phenomenon.

Inevitably the question comes up, "Where are you from?" Now that don't really live anywhere, that takes on new meaning. Anyplace I've ever lived is equally not my home, but one thing that is concrete is where I was born. The best way for me to express this to someone who doesn't know where the Melrose - Wakefield Hospital is would be to say, "I'm from just outside of Boston, originally." Fifty percent of people immediately interject,  "OH! You mean BAHH-STEN?" ("A" sound found in "pasta") and proceed to laugh at themselves in all their worldliness. If you have had sufficient exposure to a proper Boston accent, you can already see the flaw here. If not, consider this a public service or cultural education. I lost my accent when I went to school in New Hampshire, where Masshole are burned at the stake, but I have maintained my fluency. The following is a response that I've developed to both confound the Joker and educate them on the subtleties they are falling to grasp, complete with Trainspotting-esque phonetic spelling:

"No, no, no, lookit, it's BAWSTIN. With a dubbayoo. What you said woula stahted with 'B - A - AHH', like 'Meet me at the bahh fer a beeuh.' You cahn't staht BAWSTIN with 'B-A-AHH.' Ya geddit?! I already cahn't undahstand you people, and ya just makin' it hahdah!"

Usually, my new friend and I are both cracking up the time I get to the end.

I stepped back out onto the street, my appetite awakened by the icy beer, and headed toward "Vinnie's". It was time to see what all the fuss was about. On my way, I really began to believe that it was getting hotter, despite the sun setting, but when I rounded the next corner, I suddenly realized you didn't have to be a masochist to live this far south.

In front of me was a wide-open square the size of a city block. My attention was immediately commanded by a graceful and brilliantly lit fountain, jets of water arcing rhythmically into the hot summer twilight. A cooling most hung in the air all around, and affected from me a deep, peaceful breath. Laughter, conversation, music. There was a buzz of humanity washing over me. It pushed back the haze in my mind as the cool mist pushed back the heat-haze around my body. I had found the beating heart of Savannah, and I was just as much a part of it as every person there. I felt that satisfaction carry me through the square and into "City Market".

Essentially two adjacent city blocks of downtown Savannah are not there. In thier place, there are benches, tables, booths, small stages and dance floors. Around the perimeter, are store fronts that seemed to be mostly restaurants, but there were also art galleries and souvenir shops. There was even a horse and carriage parked in the center taking people on jaunts around town. After sitting for a few minutes to take it all in, I spotted "Vinnie's" in the corner. Five minutes later, I was confronted by something I can only express as the biggest motherfucking slice of pizza on earth. It was as long as my arm from elbow to finger tip, and it was great.

I stopped of at a half dozen other places in City Market, including a gallery featuring an artist with a number of surrealist interpretations of scenes from The Big Lebowski (obviously a genius). There was a candy factory/shop that smelled like heaven and just a half block away a club called Jinx. There was a vacant stage upfront with a violently vandalized amplifier, an eight-foot portrait of "Fu Manchu" on the wall and the air conditioning ducts painted like the black-and-white worms from Beetle Juice, complete with paper maché heads full of teeth. Definitely my kind of place, but tragically dead on a Tuesday night. Satisfied with my evening, I strolled back toward the Monster when the sound of a blues harmonica blasting through an amp made me turn on a dime and step right into a doorway. I have never been so magnetically drawn by music in my life.

I discovered the Blues at the very same point in my life when I realized I needed it. It had been a very long, hard winter trapped inside the husk of my old life. Nothing but ashes left of my marriage. Falling flat on your ass when the rug is pulled out sucks, but that split second where you're hanging in the air is actually worse. When I started listening to the Blues, it helped me know what rock bottom was. The beauty of it is that once you do, you have something to push off against. My push started when I hit the road, but I made sure to get a good firm grip and know damn well which way was up. Sitting in that club and knowing that I was hearing something so real and raw right on stage in front of me was a real turning point for me. It was a perfect way to wrap up a night that told me,  "You're heading the right way. Just ride hard and smash off those rear view mirrors, because there's no need to look back."

====

Next time, I reach Florida and am greeted by fire ants, giant goldfish crackers and 80's dance night. Don't miss it! 

I found "The Weird"

I hesitate when it comes to paying for a campsite. All I really need is a patch of dirt and some expectation that I won't be picked up for trespassing. Settling in just south of Asheville however, my Fellow Traveler had reserved a site in Pisgah National Forest. It was my intention from the beginning to do as much Ninja-hobo camping as possible, tenting out someplace without being seen and leaving no trace. I had done plenty of it during test runs in NH, and it sure as hell fits the budget. Since I wasn't footing the bill, why not enjoy a campground with fire pits, showers and good company?

The camp ground was a great place cook, relax and sleep peacefully. The real value to me was in its proximity the BlueRidge Parkway and to the Weirdness Capitol of Western North Carolina: Asheville.

I wanted nothing more than to rip some loops on the BRP and the surrounding highways, but that back tire was hurting bad. I begrudgingly made the call to a local shop for them to order my new Pirrelli Angel GT, and scheduled the service. The Monster sulked and kept watch over the campsite, hobbled and anxious, while we went out on the town!

My early impression of Asheville was established by the first person I saw in town, and it turned out to be a pretty fair judgment. I dropped my Fellow Traveler off at the first of several yoga training seminars. They were the reason she was in the area in the first place, and with no bike, being able to borrow the car was pretty handy. It was actually a total downpour when I got into town, so I parked underneath an overpass to step out a bit. Before I had even fully parked the car, I was scrambling for my camera. Walking through the sheltered area of the overpass was the character who served as Ashville's ambassador... And his dog.

The dog was an oldish border collie, damp from the rain, but stepping sure-footed and confidently. He wore a backpack, at least the canine analog to a backpack. It probably contained at least one first aid kit, a flare gun, and various medals of bravery awarded to dogs that save cities. If you were some wussy pomeranian that had ever been carried inside a purse, you could never make eye contact with this dog. If you were a puppy, you would have a poster of this badass border collie on your wall which you would stare at and think,  "Someday, I'll be just like him..." His tail did not wag. His tongue did not hang from a panting mouth. His eyes did not dart from car, to squirrel, to bird, back to car as so many dogs' would. He looked at precisely what required inspection, and nothing more. He was the Champion Badass of all dogs, and he knew it. He stood stoically next to a man that could not fairly be called his owner, as a dog of his status can be "owned" by no man.

The man assessed the rain with a keen eye as they both dried off. It seemed not to be the first rainstorm he had been caught in. "...And it won't be the last," he seemed to be thinking, not giving a shit. In his position, the average person may worry about stepping in puddles or ruining their fancy hairdo. The rain only made his dreadlocks look more feral. The grimy puddles only made his bare feet tougher. Like his furry traveling companion, he had a backpack as well. It looked like it had been looted off of a German shock trooper in a trench during WWI. Unlike the dog's backpack, I did not have to guess at its contents.

Protruding from the bag was an assortment of wooden flutes. I imagined that one of two of them had been carved by an Amazonian shaman. Perhaps some were entrusted to him by a monk in a Himalayan mountain temple. Another was surely smudged ceremoniously by an Aboriginal tribal elder. They were all slung together over his shoulder in a way that facilitated a quick draw should the need arise.

Together they stood; the Uncrowned King of Dogs and Flute Ninja. In any other place in the world, they would strike you as utterly absurd. Well, it turns out, Asheville isn't like anyplace else in the world. They were right at home.

I could go on and on about this city. The culture, the architecture, the food... I've got too much for a blog post, so your choices are to wait until my book is published (filthy-rich investors wanted!) or to go there yourself. That being said, if I had to pick one feature of what makes Asheville the town that it is, it's a no-brainer: the music!

Genuinely "Weird" towns like this tend to attract younger people... Or maybe a youthful crowd just weirds-up the place, but either way, the demographic of the city in comparison to the musical landscape caught me by surprise. Why would all these hip young people be walking around in Olde-tyme clothes rocking banjos and washboards? It wasn't until I factored geography into the equation that things started to make sense to me. Bluegrass music was never something I never had much exposure to in the northeast, but it is still embraced whole-heartedly in Appalachia. In fact, I only continue to show my ignorance when I say they "still" love Bluegrass around here. It is, and has always been, the music of these mountains.

During my time in the region, I developed a real respect for it. The nature of a melting-pot nation that is only 238 years old means that much of what we think of as iconically American is an amalgamation of immigrant cultures. If I were a pretentious music aficionado, I would remind you that it does supposedly have roots in British music, but fuck that. I have ears. The voice of Bluegrass seemed to speak only of the mountains all around me and the people that lived there.

On every streetcorner, at any hour, there was music. Sometimes it was a five or six-piece band with washboard, fiddles (often more than one), and banjo, with any or all of them accompanying a lead vocalist with rich harmonies, hoots and hollers. Around the corner would be a young kid with a drum set, giving a 10 minute, Neil Peart style solo. Across the street, in front of a bookstore and Cafe was a very serene man bewitching passers-by with some sort of convex steel drum that I had never seen before. When I heard the bagpipes, I had an isolated moment of weakness. Hearing the sound of my people so unexpectedly, my heart ached briefly for Boston. I dropped two bucks in his tip jar knowing that my soft heart had just cost me a cup of coffee.

The divisions between music, art and dance are not important in Asheville. This was embodied succinctly in bronze statutes just a block over from my favorite bookshop. A dancing couple, a little girl whirling and laughing and a trio of musicians all frozen in time.  The statues were planted on the brick sidewalk, forcing you to walk directly through them. When you are approach the figures, you realize their scale is a perfect one-to-one. Music, art and dance. Standing among them, those all just seem to be different words for the same thing.

I haunted Asheville day after day, every time discovering a new wonder to behold, among them, the strongest and therfore best iced coffee in the world. One morning I received a call from the motorcycle shop; my tire was in. In no time, I got the Monster outfitted with some new rubber. My thoughts and my motorcycle turned toward the Blue Ridge Parkway. That tire wasn't going to burn itself. It was during one of the many trips up into the mountains that ensued over the next several days, I met someone who I will always know as Yosemite Sam.

I was on my way back to camp, but I had not yet descended from the ridge. I was enjoying one last view East from a scenic overlook before I bowed out for the day. There seemed to be storm brewing, and I had left my rain gear back at camp. My eyes traced the horizon to South, when I heard what sounded like a high performance engine coming in hot. I heard him downshift just before he rounded the corner and pulled into the lookout point. His car was a black Mercedes, later model, maybe a C63. If you're not familiar, it's pretty slick. I'm not a big car guy, so it takes a bit more than that for me to gawk. I sat on the edge of the retaining wall and went back to my inspection of the mountains. I was born with one of those faces that looks like I am brooding even though in my head I may be reciting the Holy Hand Grenade bit from Monty Python, so what happened next took my be surprise.

"Golly! Hell of a view, ain't it!" It was him, of course. He had gotten out of his car, and as he walked my way, I got to appreciate his style fully. He wore a filthy, brown cowboy hat with two white feathers tucked into a braided, leather hat band. He had a reddish-grey beard and matching ponytail. Teeshirt and jeans, both loose and dirty. He topped off his ensemble with a $300 pair of Oakley sunglasses and he clip-clopped bowleggedly toward me in a pair of cowboy boots that probably cost double that.

"You goan hit some rain, boy! I just come up through Black Mountain and I tell you what, it weren't pretty!" I responded only with one of my patented slow-blinks. Usually I use them to express condescending boredom, but this was delivered slack jawed; genuine dumbstruck moment for me. "Yeah, boy! I just heered em on the radio talkin quarter-sized hail! Quarter-sized hail?! That's like... THIS BIG!" He held up his thumb and forefinger, describing the size of a quarter.

Slow-blink.

"You see all that down'ere?" he pointed down the wall I was sitting on at a large bramble of bushes and vines. "They had me comin up here three weeks in a row tryna get rid of her! They said to me, 'Thatch'ere's poison oak, you better be careful,' and I told em 'I... don't... GIT poison oak,' but they din believe me! But I come up'ere, cut 'er back, she keep a-climbin. Cut 'er back, she keep a-climbin. Finally, I went down'ere with a bottle 'o bleach and that got 'er!" He laughed hysterically. By this point, I had regained control of my tongue and realizing how much entertainment there was to be had, I coaxed him into regaling me with stories, one after another, of everything from his car breaking down, to local politicians, to the funny weather in the mountains. It was glorious. I've met nobody JUST like Yosemite Sam, but I have met a few people cut from the same cloth. They all just want to talk, to be heard and on some level I think they want to be remembered. Days later, down in Asheville, I happened upon an open drum circle. I watched strangers playing together with big grins while others descended into the square just to dance. I watched the surging crowd when I saw a filthy, feathered cowboy hat bouncing up and down. It was Yosemite Sam. He stomped and whirled. He hooted and clapped his hands. As I watched him, I thought of one of the last things he had said up on the mountain.

"Yep, you goan hit that rain, for sure. But the weather up'ere can be funny. Might be pourin down,  but don'tchu worry. Ten minutes later, it'll come a-shinin."

At the time, I thought he was talking about the weather...

=======

My time in Asheville had come to an end. The Monster was chomping at the bit to tear up some new roads. My Fellow Traveler and I would be diverging, and I would be back to being John Solo. Next up was South Carolina and Savannah Georgia, a campsite ten feet from a Florida swamp and the Fourth of July in Jacksonville,  all leading up to my first major milestone, Florida's Gulf coast! Keep an eye out for my next entry and if you enjoyed reading, share it!

A ride through Hell

I've already said my piece about riding in the rain. I'll take any day on a bike over any day in a car. That being said... My ride from Boone to Asheville was a bit of an ordeal.

The first leg of the trip was pretty tame. After a great time in a cozy town like Boone, I was feeling down-right warm and fuzzy. As we proceeded to make our way through the mountains, I felt the storm brewing, and knew it was time to face the music. I switched over to my rain gear and expected to get a little wet. "Maybe it'll be like my trip through Connecticut. Ooh, won't that be exciting!" I thought, naive head up optimistic ass. Turned out I was off by orders of magnitude.

How to describe this storm... I'm coming up with a bunch of cliche shit like, deluge of biblical proportion,  or sheets/buckets/fuckloads of rain, but you get it, it was bad. Roaring, surging waves of cold, evil sky-hate assailed me. It made me wonder how there could be a single desert on this entire planet when rain like that can happen. Cars were pulling off the road. Yes, cars. Pulling over because they feared for their safety.

I splashed through puddles that reached my brake rotors. I hydroplaned across rivers of run-off that crisscrossed the road. The speed I had to hold was fast enough to not get bullied off the road by the inevitable asshole that would wind up right behind me, but not fast enough to sweep the rain off of my face shield. The only way I could see anything was to actually keep my shield open and get peppered on the bare eyeballs. The utter absurdity of my situation was too much for me to bear with a straight face. Every blinding splash from an oncoming semi made me laugh harder at myself. I amused myself by playing the "what part of me is wettest?" game until it was a tie across the board. After that came "what part of me is coldest?" I didn't find it difficult to keep my spirits up. I thought ahead to the deep South, when I would be broiling hot. I thought of the open desert of the southwest, where sun and heat would surely conspire to burn me to a crisp and explode the air-cooled heart of my trusty steed. I shared a moment with The Monster.  "We're gonna remember this one!" Contentment comes easy when you leave sanity behind.

My Fellow Traveller and I descended from the mountains and circled the city toward our campsite amid crackling lightning. I think you can still see the finger marks on her steering wheel to this day. 

All told, it took five days for my boots to dry out completely. They still squeak when I walk, which I don't even understand. I think they are still wet on a sub-atomic level. The Monster needed a new chain and a front sprocket, but we survived it. Turns out, it will take more than that to stop us.

Coming in my next posts, Asheville, day trips up to the sky and back, and I finally introduce you to my hands-down favorite person of my trip thusfar: Yosemite Sam. 

A ride through Heaven

"Where I come from, the roads around here are famous."

That's what I usually say to the people I meet in Appalachia about rides like the Blueridge Parkway, Skyline Drive,  etc.  It's no lie. These are the roads I've been hearing legends about for as long as I've been a Biker. I had heard about the twisty roads, the views and the combination of it all that made it all worth talking about a thousand miles away.  It was time to drop it into gear and lay a patch toward the highcountry!

Skyline Drive was first on the list, and it would take us through Virginia to our a campsite I found in Waynesboro. With my Fellow Traveler behind me and my gear stowed in her car, we turned into Skyline. I was immediately treated to a healthy climb in elevation on a winding ribbon of pristine asphalt through a corridor of green. The first thing that struck me was the condition of the road. Scenic byways like this are closed to commercial traffic and parts are shut down seasonally. They are spared the rigors of heavy trucks and plow blades. The result is an absence of the split road surface and Biker-launching potholes that are so common in New England. The grueling highway miles loaded down with gear had done a number on my tire. It was time to give the middle of my tire a rest, and keep it on the edges. The Monster was devouring the turns, and my face was starting to ache from the ear-to-ear grin.

All along the road are scenic overlooks that are so gorgeous, you could just lean out your window and get a postcard quality picture. Since you ride along the ridge, you get views of the overlapping peaks and valleys of West Virginia and Kentucky on one side and the expansive hollows (pronounced "hollers" apparently) to the east. The weather at some points on the Appalachians moves East to West, so as I watched fog rolling over the top, the feeling of heading north one moment and South the next added to my euphoria. Even in the middle of the day, turkeys and deer made appearances occasionally, but not often enough to make me lay off the throttle. It was what I can confidently call the ride of my life so far.

We descended back to earth and jumped on the highway for a bit and camped out at a TA Travel Center. That's right, a tent site at a truck stop. I thought it was awesome and it fit the budget nicely at 15 bucks. Despite a passing 18 Wheeler blowing a tire a hundred feet away early the next morning, it was pretty relaxing.

The next day we made our way towards the next stop: Asheville, NC! My Fellow Traveler once lived in a great town by the name of Boone, and with high recommendations of a thai restaurant located there, I was happy to get to Asheville via Boone.

Boone is a big magic trick... A commercialized college town somehow hiding behind a tiny, tight knit village. Everyone there seems to know everyone else, and I couldn't help but feel like I was in Vermont. Artisan bakeries, craft beer brewpubs, locally sourced restaurants, art galleries, you name it. All the awesome food and art snobbery you could imagine, and not so much as a whiff of the college hooliganism you'd expect with the school right there in town. And I say that as a UMass Amherst alumni, so I know my shit. How do they do it? Whether by design, or good fortune, the malls, the department stores and all that commercial garbage are all a mile away from the village, with a buffer zone of residential neighborhoods in between, dorms included. The swanky thai restaurants and Moroccan tea room don't fit the college budget, so they all steer clear. We met with some old friends of my guide, and I had an unforgettable dinner with all of them. Great food, warm people and a cozy town. We found ourselves going back to Boone often during our time in NC, and we always got the best of their hospitality.

Departing Boone was where things got a little dicey... And by dicey, I mean soggy. And by soggy I mean absolutely fucking soaked. Find out in my next post when I take you on A Ride Through Hell. 

Finally, some pictures: DC

A few good ones from Washington.  More to follow.

The geek-o-meter is over 9000!

I arrived in Washington with spirits high at the prospect of some opportunities I wanted to make the most of: WASHINGTON DC, A chance to meet up with a friend from back home also doing some traveling of her own promising a guided tour of Appalachia, and a car to stash my gear in for a couple of states! How could I pass that up? I met up with my hosts on a hot and sticky night in DC after my marathon run from Boston. I'm told the Satan's-butthole level of humidity is to be expected this time of year in a city built on a swamp. Who knew? Anyway, the Monster and I both needed some maintenance, his in the form of a wash and a copious grease job on the chain, mine in the form of wine, air conditioned rest, Game of Thrones and getting my ass handed to me at Monopoly Deal.

Humidity and roaches, that's it for the negatives. Other than that, the residential parts of town I saw were gorgeous; Brownstones dripping with wrought iron, all with little "yards" out front. You can tell the people that didn't give a shit about maintaining them. I saw one that was a ten by ten square of meticulously groomed lilies and Japanese maples with a meandering slate walkway winding through the mulch. The yard right next to that? Not a word of a lie, a square of astroturf.

The people are youngish. A slightly older, more professional demographic than the iconic urban collegetown in Cambridge I had just left. Dressed for business and a bit brusque, but not in a razzing New England "Good to see you, ya sonovabitch" way, but still no detectable malice. I didn't mind it one bit, but being immersed in that for too long doesn't sound like my kind of thing.

The touristy stuff is awesome. The Air and Space Museum is basically Mecca for me. I started to geek out before I even got through security, and when I walked out into the lobby, I turned it up to eleven. I buzzed from one exhibit to the next. 30 minutes in the lobby alone, for godsake. The Apollo 11 capsule and lunar lander, Gemini and Mercury capsules, a one-to-one scale copy of The Twins in the Mars exploration exhibit, the fucking Saturn V engine!? ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? Just awesome. It always bothered me that I had never seen a shuttle launch, but my time at the museum made me resolute in my goal to see the Space X launch this fall from Cape Canaveral. Somewhere between John Glen's flight suit and rounding the corner past Skylab to the shuttles main engine, I had one of the moments I've been seeking. I was starting to feel like the planet I've been living in for 31 years, the one I've heard so much about, is a real place. All the most heroic people and exotic places you've ever heard of, all the most beautiful poems and songs ever written, all the good deeds ever done, they all happened on this planet. And you live there! Do you not feel lucky for that?

Next up was the Natural History Museum, which was better than I expected. Quite a bit bigger too. I could have spent the whole day there. The Early Origins and Human Genome exhibits were great, but no T-Rex! WTF! I could have looked at more  paleontology, but I to get back to meet my hosts for dinner and hanging out. And laundry! Thanks again guys.

The next morning I faced the next leg of my journey with my new traveling partner/Appalachian tour guide ("guides" actually if you count her four legged bodyguard). It was great to see them again and they are much more well-traveled than I, so I was happy to join up.

More to come, including the most jaw dropping beautiful views of my life, two epic rides; dubbed The Ride Through Heaven and The Ride Through Hell, AND a genuine recurring character like nobody I have ever met! I couldn't make this guy up!! Meet him next time. See you then.

Where to begin?

Hard to believe,  but I am almost a week on the road! Things have been nearly too exciting to keep up with mentally,  much less to keep up with blogging. In fact, I've barely talked to my family, so don't feel left out. I'm composing this entry just south of Asheville,  North Carolina! I know, I didn't expect to be this far already either, but I had some good opportunities, so I made a move, and I'm glad I did.

So this is what you've missed! I marked the beginning of the voyage in Montpelier, VT. With a warm send off from my sister and my niece, I continued through NH to bid farewell to some friends and family on my way to my first stop: Boston!

I arrived in Boston late Saturday afternoon to meet a long time partner in crime at his new apartment in Cambridge. He's only a few blocks from Harvard Square, and we spent a night out with a few of his friends and coworkers. Everywhere was a beautiful mix of ethnicities and languages that made me remember how trapped you can feel if you let your world get too small. Eventually we found ourselves at the Tavern on the Square ("in the Square"? I'm not sure) and I got a lesson on why Patron is so damned expensive from a Mexican guy. I forget every word. I spent the next day ripping around Boston on the Monster. About halfway through, I found myself making some genuine Masshole maneuvers, and decided I no longer blamed these people for the way they drive. That night I ate at pretty kickass korean place. Chilled noodle soup, which hit the spot on a hot night. We then rounded the corner for a few drinks at a bar where the waiters wore shirts that said "Will work for soju". Pretty awesome, but ironically I didn't drink any soju. The latest Korean pop videos played on huge flatscreens while we drank some kind of fermented rice wine served in a copper teapot. The drinks were great, the videos made me feel like all of the very worst influences from American popular culture are the ones that other cultures seem to pick up on. Just the same, I caught the green line back, the train driven by a man with the most gigantic gold Rolex I had ever seen. I could have spent weeks in Boston, and the new and old friends I spent time with would have made me feel welcome, but got word from some friends in Washington DC, and I couldn't pass up my chance for some time there! My last morning in Boston came too soon, but it was time to hit the road. I spit on John Harvard's statue, and was on my way.

As I pulled out onto Cambridge St from what's got to be the biggest loophole in the City of Boston's entire parking scheme (no, I'm not telling) I thought,  "Okay, Boston to DC, I'll be leaving during rush hour and arriving during rush hour, rain in the forecast, and I'm riding a motorcycle with my entire life strapped to it... Am I out of my mind?" Turns out, they're right about the "desperate times, desperate measures" thing. That day, I broke a vow I made long ago; I went through Connecticut.

My return to the state where I spent the worst year of my life was rewarded with a slap in the face in the form of a rain storm. Pretty light at first, but by the time I hit Waterbury, I had switched over to my rain gear, and kissed my ass goodbye. Everything held up fine and I made it through in one soggy piece. Something occurred to me about riding a motorcycle in the rain. I kept thinking,  "It could be worse, John. You could be stuck in a car." Maybe I had lost my mind, but I think some of you will understand what that means. The route I wanted to take kept me away from I95 and gave me a shot at some nice riding once I cleared NY. I went through Scranton and Gettysburg and who the hell knows where else. I was so determined to destroy my prior record for hours on a motorcycle in a single day that I didn't give a shit if I was riding through Somalia or Antarctica or the fucking Gobi Desert, I was going to make it. And make it, I did.

My neck was a ball of knots from the cold rain and the disregard for speed limits. My wrist was locked up like a rusty hinge. My legs were jello from clamping onto a rocket for 11 hours. I was spent, but let me tell you, the beltway into the city felt like a victory lap.

Lots more story to tell; Washington, Skyline Drive, Boone NC, and the torrential downpour of biblical proportions that was my ride from Boone to Asheville!! More to come soon, with pictures (I promise!) but I'm out of time for now.