Friday, August 11, 2000

Today we managed to almost completely avoid the Adventure Cycling route. We started in Christiansburg, VA and ended the day at Natural Bridge, VA, a distance of 62 miles. We stayed at a motel that was two or three miles off the Adventure Cycling route in Christiansburg and on highway 11. Highway 11 went where we wanted to go, therefore, we spent most of the day traveling on highway 11. The only drawback to this route was that we had to go through Salem, VA and Roanoke, VA. We managed to accomplish this without a shouting match.

In Salem we stopped at a museum, spending a pleasant hour. We went on to Buchanan, where we planned to spend the night. The motel was supposed to have a restaurant nearby but when we arrived (the motel was at the very top of a high hill) the motel owner informed us that the restaurant was closed, and called ahead to find out if we could get a reservation for the night at the Natural Bridge which was 8 miles further on. They had room so we continued to the Natural Bridge. We checked into our room, then ate an expensive all you can eat fish buffet, explored the gift shop and returned to our room and collapsed with exhaustion.

The weather was ideal, sunny and not too hot. From Christiansburg to Buchanan we made excellent time. It seemed that all we were doing was going down hill. On one of those hills we did 48 miles per hour (a new record for us on this bike). After Buchanan, we again began climbing into the Appalachians. Instead of 10 to 30 miles per hour we were suddenly reduced to 10 miles per hour maximum.