Dual-Sporting the North Carolina Appalachians

So—we’re supposed to meet 8 AM Monday, corner of 291 and 276? Damn! Sometimes I forget about rush hour! I caught every traffic light in western South Carolina, but with a bit of liberal throttle application in between, I arrived almost on time. But what’s this? I’m a bit late, but though there’re supposed to be eight of us on this ride, I come upon a lone BMW X-Challenge waiting in the parking lot. Joey is the parts guy from the local shop, getting in his first ride on the demo bike. How’s that for perks?

We stood around and admired our bikes (I’m on an LC4 640), and after a while Norm showed up on his DR650. Mike M. soon rolled in on his DRZ400, and then three young guys (Mike, John and Austin), who left Columbia two hours earlier just to make this ride, show up on… well, umm, it’s hard to say exactly what they were riding, actually. They were all Honda XR’s of the 600/650 variety, but, if you’ll permit a little exaggeration, they’re kinda transformer bikes—cobbled and patched together, and, in some cases, street legal. Since he had no side stand, Austin found a lamppost to lean his (definitely not street legal) 600R up against. Well, I suppose he’s got a side stand, but it’s a serious amputee. This park-against-a-lamppost/tree/rock scene would replay itself throughout the day. His tail light (which won’t survive the ride) was tentatively held on by duct tape, and none of the lights worked. Norm pointed out a pretty slack chain, and Austin whipped out his tool kit and set to work adjusting it. Mike carried his kick start lever strapped to his seat—never got around to asking why.

Finally John, our last participant, showed up on his DR650. The clock’s been ticking, so it’s announced that we’ll fuel up and reconnoiter in Rosman, just a little ways across the border into North Carolina. We’d take the scenic route there, of course—Pumpkintown Hwy west. We swooped through rural countryside, past the gas station on Highway 11 (Cherokee Scenic Byway) where the mostly street bike crew congregates on weekends at the start or the stop of their banzai runs up and down the mountain, and then began said carom—up Hwy 178. It’s a lovely strip of tarmac that twists its way with wanton abandon up into the Appalachians, and I got to test how well the IRC GP-1 'trials' tires can keep me planted. Pretty well, actually, though I did feel the semi-knobby rear end tend to squiggle and squirm from time to time.

Soul-stirring seems an apt phrase for our booming octet of big thumpers. I’m not sure if there was a stock pipe amongst us, and though none were obnoxiously loud, we were not going to sneak by unnoticed. So hence we plunged, engine braking for the sweepers, braking hard for the hairpins, rolling the throttles on gleefully while listening to the raspy bark ahead and behind and watching the scenery blur past. There must have been scenery involved, I’m certain of that—though I’m afraid my attention was a bit more narrowly focused.

We stopped in Rosman and Mike M pulls out his trusty map (he’s also got a GPS unit on his crossbar). A really nice map; a semi-laminated Pisgah National Park issue, I believe (I need one). Mike’s been doing these routes for several years—a good man to have along. He pointed out some alternatives, and off we went, jagging onto Hwy 215 to resume our careening climb into the higher mountains.

Just past a lonely mountain church we turned left and immediately right onto newly surfaced gravel. Past a couple of minor splits in the road we’re on Tanasee Gap Road, playing it somewhat careful on the loose surface. I sometimes tried my foot-out, throttle-steering flat-track style, and the best I can say about that is that I survived it. Tanasee Gap does a convoluted loop (I’m guessing around 15 miles) back around to Hwy 215, where we readjusted to the pavement headed back to the south. Just before closing the loop that started with Tanasee, and shortly before the wide spot known as the community of Balsam Grove, we took a left, once again heading northeast on a forest road with the official-sounding name of ‘Government’. I believe it was here that we pulled off at an overlook and parked the bikes on a spreading semi-flat stone expanse to walk across the massive boulder and look out across the valley and the adjacent mountains. Very cool, but not a place where you would want to seriously lose your footing. Mike M. pointed out the trail snaking up the opposite mountainside to the clear-cut up top, wishing he could remember how to get there, and Norm suggested that we try to avoid private property.

Back in the saddle, this completely unsurfaced off-road stretch was more fun than the previous gravel run. It’s a fairly steep, rocky, rutted course, and it’s a blast. I grew up on dirt bikes, and even though we're talking flat, sandy south Florida, I was fairly decent at it. But that, you see, was quite a while back. Since recently adding dual-sporting to my two-wheeled endeavors it has started to come back to me (the fun, not the youth).

There was no shortage of ups and downs and lefts and rights and roots and rocks, and sometimes a semblance of a berm to bank up against. We caromed along at a fair pace and I had to spend a good bit of time standing up, sometimes lofting the front wheel to clear a rock, or just for the heck of it. The tires would slide and I'd stick out a boot as an outrigger and I’d crowd up against the tank to get my weight where I wanted it to round that next fast-coming turn. Damn, I felt young! Maybe I should let the hair grow out again? (One of the few vestiges of youth I’ve retained)

We flashed past a park ranger on the trailside who had just enough time to wave his hand down, and we slowed for a bit until certain he wasn’t in pursuit in his jeep.

At one point I found myself coming into a sharp bend too fast, and I lost the rear end trying to slow. Into the curve I caught it, lost it, and then caught it and lost it again. There was a fall-off frightfully close on my right, but I wasn't looking at it because I really didn’t want to fixate there. Finally I pulled it together and blasted on to the next curve and the next. Just before that episode one of the young guys had waved me past, and he later told me ‘I saw the left side of your bike, and then the right, and then the left’. Note to Self: Tire pressure suitable for the street should be reduced for off-road duty.

After some time we turned more due north (I’m not sure if this was still Government or National Forest Road), then picked up northbound Hwy 276 for about a mile before angling back into the forest on Yellow Gap. Another lengthy run, in some spots quite steep and sometimes so heavily wooded that the GPS in my jacket pocket would lose signal for a while, and finally we came upon a spot where the road split and the fork to the left went under a narrow tunnel. The fork to the right proceeded a short distance to a paved road, and Hallelujah!, we’d taken off-road routes almost all the way up to the Blue Ridge Parkway, a bit west of Asheville!

Next we took a leisurely ride east on the Parkway, several of our members standing up on the pegs to, um… unkink their legs, and we got off on U.S. 25 heading south. It was about one in the afternoon by then, and so a good Mexican lunch was in order. A couple of enchiladas and one Negra Modelo later (I know, I know, but it was an hour before we resumed the ride), we continued on 25 and then picked up I-26 southbound. I thought for sure that the State Trooper that slotted in behind us for a while was going to tag the light-less XR600R, but it was a good day and he didn’t.

We couldn’t finish the ride without one more stretch of the dirtly, and so near the little burg named Zirconia we picked up Pinnacle Mountain Road westbound. We tooled sedately past some housing, and when all that faded behind we wicked it up. This roadway was newly regraveled and DUSTY, so I dropped further behind so that I might actually see where I was going (and breathe). After a time this ceased to be a regular dirt road and became more of a rutty mountain dual track, and not nearly so dusty. We regrouped, and with Norm leading and Joey on the X-Challenge sticking with him, I fell off a bit and was trying to keep up without being dumb about it. There were big gnarly rocks and roots sticking out here and there, and sometimes deep two-track ruts and puddles who knows how deep, and I’m banging and blatting along trying to make out the surface through the dappled sunlight and shadows filtering through the foliage overhead. Second Note to Self: Get more body armor.

We stopped at Reasonover, at what might be called an intersection if one was in a charitable frame of mind, and waited for the group to catch up. One of the young guys was pretty new to riding and was wisely not letting himself get caught up in the frenzy. To the right would be a paved route out to Hwy 276 north of Caesar’s Head, and a grand asphalt run down the mountain back into South Carolina. But we turned left and descended the narrow, lumpy dirt road (Green River) back out to pavement on Bob’s Creek Road, crossing Hwy 25 to descend the mountains through the very scenic, very twisty, barely trafficked route down through the watershed and past the North Saluda Reservoir. The group turned west on old Route 25 and split off on their own routes home, while I continued down Callahan Mountain Road and home on rustic Hwy 101.

Got home around five PM, and yes, I was tired and sore. But I sure couldn’t lose that big grin.