Blue Ridge Ramble

[ctankcycles]

[ctankcycles]

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[JimF22003]

Thanks, it was a great time with perfect weather. We passed through Goshen near the end of the third day (http://app.strava.com/activities/145159748) and continued west on Maury River Rd which becomes Mountain Valley Rd (route 42/39). The next day (http://app.strava.com/activities/145159746) we continued west on Mountain Valley and then made a right on McClung Rd (629) which turns into Deerfield Rd. We were only on Deerfield for 6 miles before picking up Indian Draft (678). Indian Draft follows the Bullpasture River much of the way and was a great road with lots of nice rollers and almost no traffic. There's also almost no water between Millboro and McDowell, about a 30 mile stretch. We ended up stopping into a Virginia State Fish Hatchery and the guy there was super nice and let us fill our bottles. In the future I'd take a small water filter for situations like this. Eventually Indian Draft turns into Bullpasture River Rd, which took us into McDowell where we hit the Stonewall Grocery (Stonewall Jackson is a local hero for winning a battle there), and then headed east on Highland Turnpike and eventually Hanky Mountain Hwy. This was probably one of the more challenging sections with two very steep, switchbacked climbs and a lot more traffic (including trucks) than we had for most of the trip.

Sounds wonderful. I'm just getting to know the roads up in that area, so that helps a bunch. You might be interested in the Mountain Mama century ride that starts in Monterey, over in that general area.

[ctankcycles]

63.2 miles, 5,063 ft elevation from Peaceful River Campground in Millboro, VA to Todd Lake Recreation Area, GWNF (near Stokesville, VA).

http://app.strava.com/activities/145159746

The first half of the day was full of rollers along the Cowpasture and Bullpasture Rivers as we ascended 770 ft from Millboro to McDowell over 37 miles. There was no cell reception (not unusual for the trip) and no stores/places to fill bottles between Millboro and McDowell. As it turned out we were able to fill up at the Coursey Springs State Fish Hatchery 30 miles in which was just as our bottles were drying up. The first half of the day was great but looming over us were two steep climbs at mile 37.5 (600 ft over 2.5 mi) and mile 43 (870 ft over 3 mi). After 35 miles of having the road pretty much to ourselves, the section along the Hanky Mountain Hwy heading east from McDowell was another story completely. Apparently there's somewhat of a rush hour in this area as all the construction trucks make their way back to Staunton at the end of the work day. I definitely don't recommend this section of road at the time of day we were on it but we made it and were rewarded with a nice 7 mi descent and eventually a smooth gravel road leading to the campground.

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[ctankcycles]

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