Heaven and Hell - part of the adventure

June 11.

Total trip mileage is 4296.

Let’s start at 3:15AM back at the “resort”. I mean the Punkin Motorcycle Campground and Resort. It’s 3:15 in the morning and one of the 6 or 8 dogs that are resident here decided to come to my cabin and start a bark fest. I shooed him away and he meandered to the other end of the compound and is barking over there. Then, he comes back. Ok, I break out the earplugs and sleep off and on until after 8 in the morning. I pack up, anxious to hit the “Tail of the Dragon”.

The roads around here are built for motorcycling. Beautiful surfaces, perfect cambers and lots of twists and turns make these very desirable for riding. I pass the Punkin store that I stopped at last night knowing that in just a few miles from here, I’ll be in the Gap (Deal’s Gap) and am excited at this prospect. I do stop a couple of times to snap some photos of the lake and dam on my right side.

Then all of a sudden, I realize I have arrived. I yell to myself, “I’m on the Tail, I’m in the Gap!!” I take my time as the road becomes more technical with sharper and more frequent twists and turns. It starts getting really tight but there is a large mower somewhere ahead of me and has churned all sorts of grass and other debris onto the roadway. I am grinning and anxious to find some clear roadway. Some of the curves are hairpins and others are less severe but all of them are challenging. I finally pass the mower and get a clean road. I add a bit of throttle through the turns but am wary because of not being familiar with the road. The camber is perfect and the 20MPH hairpins dip and angle as I power through each of them. Then, it’s over. I see the Welcome to North Carolina and realize that I just finished “The Dragon”. I pull over and snap some pics. I wait for a few minutes and remount, turn around and start my second run.
This time, I press it harder, but safely :). There is no debris on this side of the road so it is easier to push harder through the turns. I am sweating profusely due to the heat and my nerves. I concentrate and fall back on my track training; brake hard, downshift and throttle through the turn. It works well and I am having a blast. I finally reach the turnaround point and stop for a breather. There are a dozen or more bikes at the overlook and I start a conversation with a local couple who ride Kawasaki’s; she a 750 and he a Z1000, orange of course. After I snap some pics I mount up, turn around and start my 3rd run on the Dragon.

Same debris on the roadway and more cars now as I reach the end of my run and this time keep going until I run into Deal’s Gap Motorcycle Resort. I stop, buy coffee, a hat and a Tshirt. I am now complete.

After awhile, I ride onto Bryson City about 40 miles to the southeast. I stop for lunch and have a nice blackened tuna and rice meal with more coffee. I want to ride through The Great Smoky Mountain National Park. I ride through the town of Cherokee where I see Native Americans with full headdress banging drums and chanting while tourists watch. There are many Indians with headdresses hawking something for sale. I finally enter the park and get in line with all the cars going from one end to the other. I am patient and am enjoying the scenery. Beautiful forest, streams and smoky mountains in the distance. I summit the road at 5,000 feet and start down. This is another tight, twisty and technical road with a steep decline. I am finally down and arrive in Gatlinburg, TN. This town is exactly the type of place I try to avoid at all times. Think of a Country Western Themed Levenworth (WA), on Steroids! It is busy, crowded and filled with all sorts of shops and restaurants. It goes on and on…

I am on Highway 321 and I see storm clouds, lightning and hear thunder off in the distance. It starts to rain. I pull off at a gas station and wait awhile. I put on my rain suit even though this storm cell seems to have passed. I continue on and have picked up 4 other bikers in line behinde me. After a short while I turn onto Foothills Parkway East and it is pouring rain. I reach the end of the Parkway, I turn onto my nemesis, Highway 40, again. I press on leading the other bikers into what becomes a struggle for survival in keeping the bike on the road. The storm unleashes everything it has on me. I cannot see as my visor has fogged up, rain is running inside my helmet wetting my face and head. The lightning and thunder is right on top of me. The roadway is flooded and the rain falls harder and heavier further obscuring my vision. It’s getting worse and I cannot see well enough to continue. I find an off ramp and pull off and to the side of the ramp. The other bikes go past me and turn left to get under the underpass and I follow. There is a tow truck towing a wrecked Hummer waiting underneath. There are cars there also because they know that soon giant hail will fall and damage the paint of their vehicles. We squish the bikes together to keep them out of the rain. The thunder is loud as are the wheels of the trucks passing over us on the highway above. It does not let up. Wind is blowing rain through the underpass and I do what I can to stay out of the wet. More lightning, more rain, more thunder. A state trooper shows up then leaves within a few minutes. There are other cars on either side of the underpass waiting out the storm.

After about 30-40 minutes, it looks like it is diminishing and the 5 bikes decide to make a break and get to Maggie Valley, 13 miles to the south. I take the tail position in the line of bikes this time and let them lead because that is where the group of 4 are staying and they will know when to exit. As soon as we get fully onto the highway, it starts all over again. Lightning right on top of me with accompanying thunder, torrential rain, flooded highway and I can’t see a thing. Same as before but somehow, we make the 13 miles and exit the freeway. It is dry here. Just like that. Like what I just went through never happened. Nobody in this town will appreciate what just happened to me because it hasn’t even rained here all day long.

I fall off my bike and kiss the driest, sweetest ground of the day. Ok, I didn’t really do that but I felt like it. I ride through town and back again before selecting my motel for the night. I check in and start to dry out all of the wet stuff from today’s adventure.
And that’s what it is, an adventure and today’s trials will make for a good story…

Take care,

Dave