North Carolina – Page 2 – Exploring by bicycle

Day 2 — 68.9 miles from Smithfield to Fayetteville, plus a long car ride

This was our longest day. It’s also the day we found out that the ride will end early because of Hurricane Matthew.

This is about all I saw of Myrtle Beach. — This is about all I will see of Myrtle Beach on this trip.

Today was our longest day on the East Coast Greenway. But today was more than the bike. The forecast for Hurricane Matthew is turning grimmer, and we’ve been told that the ride will end after 3 1/2 days. So we’ll be back in Raleigh on Thursday night instead of Saturday night.

That’s fine for all of us who’ve come from the north. But Chris, who I met on the Maine ride, had left a car at our end point in Myrtle Beach. So he needed to get that car out — today. So he rented a car after we spent seven hours on the bike with no proper lunch break, and we drove two hours to Myrtle Beach, moved it to Elizabethtown, where we will be tomorrow night, and then got back to Fayetteville.

Today’s route was heavily on roads, but we still had a taste of trails. We started with a repeat of Monday’s trail in Smithfield, then enjoyed the Cape Fear River Trail before the unpleasant ride through Fayetteville. We did miscalculate at one point, getting off the trail at the rocky parking lot instead of continuing on to the nature center and beyond. We thought we would have to climb a hill to get back on track — or backtrack. Neither was that appealing. The maps on our phones gave conflicting information about the neighborhood streets — did they dead end, or could we find a path to the other side?

Fortunately, we found a way to squeeze through. Note the barbed wire protecting the no-cursing neighborhood we escaped! (Oops, I almost cursed going through it.)

Here are some of the day’s other sights:

The lower price is what farmers will be paid. The higher price is for dried kernels of corn (no longer on the cob) that can be fed to pigs and other animals. Even deer, if you’re crazy enough to do that.

Lesson learned about venturing into the fields: beware of fire ants. My ankles are still swollen. How did the slaves tolerate it? And yes, the cotton does feel as soft as a cotton ball.

Pie and an odd food discovery

Spotted along the East Coast Greenway: Chess pie and pig picking cake.

I know — bike rides are really all about the food (or for some, the beer).

And when we topped that hill into Clayton and reached Main Street, it was too early for lunch. But is it ever too early for something sweet?

I peered into the pie case at Nancy Jo’s Homemade and settled on a lemon chess pie. Chess pie is a southern classic; I discovered it in Occoquan two years ago. Amazingly, I couldn’t take more than a few bites. Into the rear bike bag it went, to be eaten further along the route and polished off once we got to the hotel.

But this is what really caught my attention. It’s not something we have in New Jersey:

Why the crazy name? The key ingredients seem to be a cake mix, canned mandarin oranges and canned pineapple. There’s no pig in it. But it does seem to be served at barbecues, and people there pick at the pig, I guess like we pick at the turkey leftovers after Thanksgiving.

There wasn’t exactly a stampede of riders with me into the bakery, so I couldn’t suggest that we share this half a cake. But you can bet I will be looking for a single-serving size further along the East Coast Greenway. Or riders to share something bigger.

I’m guessing I haven’t seen the last of boiled peanuts either.

What I learned about Ava Gardner at her museum in Smithfield, North Carolina

Today’s offbeat stop on the East Coast Greenway: the Ava Gardner Museum.

This Hollywood star is Smithfield’s claim to fame. She actually was born a few miles away and this was the “big city” back then, reached on dirt roads. But she’s buried here and the town is claiming her. And there was no way I was missing the Ava Gardner Museum — just because where else would I find something like this? It’s the sort of thing I stop for on bike rides. Continue reading “What I learned about Ava Gardner at her museum in Smithfield, North Carolina”

Day 1 — 49.1 miles from Raleigh from Smithfield

I’m back in love with the trails in the Raleigh area.

Wow, what trails!

I can’t rave enough about the first 20 miles of our ride today. We were outside of downtown Raleigh within a matter of blocks and on a trail in just over a mile. And then we stayed on them for 20 or so meandering miles, at times along a river, at other times along fields (apparently full of sunflowers at the height of summer). Sometimes we saw neighborhoods with a connector to the trail. Lots of boardwalk (so lots of money spent), many short bridges and then some serious ones. It’s all part of the Capital Area Greenway Trail System. We rode parts of the Little Rock Trail, the Walnut Creek Trail and Neuse River Trail into the next county.

This fuzzy photo of a map gives a sense of what Raleigh has to offer — and remember that we rode from Durham to Raleigh via Cary last year primarily on trails too, and I fell in love then. So those red lines capture only part of what the area has to offer, and obviously it’s more than just the East Coast Greenway. But like the East Coast Greenway, it shows the power of connecting trails.

Here’s a view from the trail:

That may look like a harmless stream or creek but clearly it had recently flooded:

A view from a bridge:

The value of trails couldn’t have been made clearer than when we reached the Clayton River Walk’s trailhead at Covered Bridge Road and had to leave the trail. We had a long, steep-ish hill on a somewhat curvy road with the tiniest of shoulders. One motorist patiently held back behind a few riders slightly ahead of me, and traffic started backing up. The third in line became impatient at one point, pulled out and zipped past the two cars in front. Another thought about doing the same. I was equal with him at that point and the passenger window was open. I could see a car in the oncoming lane and quickly said there’s a car coming. So one mess averted. But I do wish there had been a trail to take us to downtown Clayton.

We hit another lovely (much shorter) trail toward the end of the day — the Buffalo Creek Greenway/Smithfield Neuse Riverwalk. Unfortunately, the local hotels are a few miles away at the other end of town, by the interstate.

Why is today’s distance longer than advertised? A bit of backtracking to reach that last trail — and more backtracking from the hotel to visit the Ava Gardner Museum that tacked on about four miles.

Carolinas, here I come

I’m getting ready for my second big bike ride of the year along the East Coast Greenway.

This is the second big East Coast Greenway ride of the year. It’s 325 miles — similar to the fall rides of the past two years — but crammed into six days instead of seven. That’s what happens when hotels dictate where you can stop.

So I’ve got three days over 50 miles and one that is just under that. On the flip side, it’s mostly flat, unlike Maine, the hilliest section of the 3,000-mile route. I figure it will be cooler too — yay. There are 40 of us riding (plus staff and support), and I’m looking forward to seeing many people I know from previous rides. It’s going to be fun! Just hope we don’t have any big storms.

Here’s the itinerary:

Sunday, Oct. 2: We gather in Raleigh, NC, where we ended last year’s ride.

Oct. 3: 44 miles to Smithfield, NC.

Oct. 4: 69 miles to Fayetteville, NC

Oct. 5: 40 miles to Elizabethtown, NC

Oct. 6: 58 miles to Wilmington, NC

Oct 7: 66 miles to Ocean Isle, NC — after an early-morning boat cruise on the Cape Fear River.

Oct. 8: 48 miles to Myrtle Beach, SC and a celebration to mark a trail opening. Then we get shuttled back to Raleigh.

Any suggestions for sights I should see out? Places to eat? If Maine was about lobster, this ride may be about barbecue…

After this, I can say I’ve ridden from Philadelphia (really just outside, in Conshocken) to Myrtle Beach — about 1,000 miles. Plus, of course, there’s the Maine ride earlier this year as well as training segments in Connecticut, New York and New Jersey.

I’ll be blogging every day of the ride, so check back for tales from the road.

Finally, this is a fundraising ride for the East Coast Greenway. If you’d like to support the cause, you can donate here. All the money goes to the cause; I’m paying for food and hotels.

TWO bike rides this year!

I’m riding twice for the East Coast Greenway this year — from the Canadian border to Portland, Maine, and from Raleigh, North Carolina, to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

The East Coast Greenway’s Week-A-Year ride continues to roll down the coast — and another effort is starting from the top.

So I’ll be going from Raleigh to Myrtle Beach in October AND I’ll be going from the Canadian border to Portland, Maine from July 30 to Aug. 6. Each ride will top 300 miles — the Maine ride is closer to 350 miles.

I’m looking forward to being part of the 2016 version of this photo:

Since we’ll be shuttled from Portland to the border that Saturday late afternoon, you know I’ll be crossing into Canada for a stamp in my passport to mark the ride.

Better yet, I’ll be riding with three of my best friends!

The Carolinas ride is Oct. 2-8. And when that’s over, I will have ridden my bike from Philadelphia to Myrtle Beach on the East Coast Greenway. The plan remains to hit Key West in 2019.

This route is 100% mapped, but as I’ve seen on previous ride, there are many gaps between off-road trails. Some are quiet roads — almost as good as a trail! But in other spots, a trail is desperately needed, both for local residents and for long-distance riders.

Please help close the gaps by supporting my rides. The fundraising page (and pitch) is here.

As for me, I will still have gaps in my personal East Coast Greenway after 2016. My training goals this year include closing some of them. I want to ride several of the East Coast Greenway trails in Connecticut and go from Newark’s Ironbound section (Portugal!) to Metro Park’s Oak Tree Road (India!) and on to New Brunswick. Any interest in joining me? Or on another training ride?

Trail angels in the Triangle

Pickles are a thing on North Carolina bike rides. Really.

More kindness in North Carolina:

The “stuff lady” — Stephanie Loyka of GoTriangle (sorry, I had mistakenly credited Triangle Bikeworks previously) — came with a bag of front, back and spoke lights. We got to pick one. I’m trying out the spoke light. Thank you!

Two local rest stops. Who knew that pickles are a thing on bike rides? Apparently they (or at least the pickle juice) is good for fighting cramps. So are a couple packets of yellow mustard. (I have yet to test this last idea, but I did try a pickle.) Mount Olive, NC, east of Fayetteville, is a big pickle area, but it looks like it might be too far east of the East Coast Greenway route we’ll be biking next year (to Fayetteville, Wilmington and along the coast).

And then these homemade cookies! I admit I can’t resist a chocolate chip cookie or three, but if there’s oatmeal in them, then they are healthy, right?

Thank you to everyone who helped with these two stops.

Seems like someone else couldn’t resist either:

A glimpse of Durham

We made it to Durham, North Carolina.

Cool — our hotel is right next to the Durham Bulls baseball stadium. Just too bad there’s no game.

We found another bull, though:

This was the time for usual last-night group dinner. With one day left in the fifth Week-a-Year ride, those that have done them all are more than halfway to Key West (that’s the 2019 goal). We also heard how the development of the American Tobacco Trail, which we will ride on Friday, was instrumental in revitalizing Durham. Tobacco is gone, but the old buildings have been converted into multi-use spaces. DPAC, the big performing arts center, is next to our hotel. And our hotel has eight u-shaped bike racks out front!

A short walk way was our barbecue place for the evening and another hopping restaurant across the street.

And we’re still a few miles from Duke, so I feel we’ve barely scratched the surface of this city. I’m curious to see more.

A month to go!

Come Saturday, Oct. 3, I’ll be heading down to Fredericksburg, Va. and the start of the East Coast Greenway’s 2015 Week-a-Year ride.

Come Saturday, Oct. 3, I’ll be heading down to Fredericksburg, Va. and the start of the East Coast Greenway’s 2015 Week-a-Year ride. It’s all part of an effort to ride one week of this 2,900-mile route each year and make it to Key West in 2019. (I missed this first three years — from the Canadian border in Calais, Maine, to Philadelphia, so I have a lot of catching up if I’m going to claim I’ve ridden down the east coast.)

We got more information about the week on Friday, and I am excited that our final group dinner, on the next-to-last day, features Carolina barbecue. We will be eating at The Pit in Durham. This is “eastern Carolina” style barbecue — roasting the whole hog and using a vinegar-based, not tomato-based, sauce — and I suspect I will be getting a barbecue education on this trip. Anything I should know before I start eating?

I’ve already got one other food spot I want to try on the route — the Peter Chang Chinese Restaurant in Fredericksburg. No, it has nothing to do with P.F. Chang’s. It’s been on my list for this ride since I read a New York Times article more than a year ago.

We’ll be staying in downtown Richmond, in Petersburg, South Hill and Clarksville, if anyone has recommendations for those places.

There’s already a bit of advocacy on the calendar — we’ll be having lunch on the Thursday with the mayor of Oxford, North Carolina, a town of about 8,500.

And on the final day, our ride will join with a one-day ride from Durham to Raleigh. I’m excited that a friend who has moved back to Raleigh will be riding, and I’m looking forward to catching up over the 50 miles.

I’ve said it before and I know I’ll say it again, but thank you everyone who has supported the East Coast Greenway through my ride. Creating an off-road trail down the coast and through major cities is an amazing vision that I want to see turned into reality

A North Carolina bike ride

We spent a long weekend in North Carolina, tasting out way through its famous barbecue and the Brit sampling many of Asheville’s craft beers. Of course I couldn’t resist trying out Charlotte’s bike-share system. That included a ride on the Little Sugar Creek Greenway, a waterway that until recently was a polluted mess and partially concreted over. Now it’s a welcoming linear park with fountains, benches and restrooms, a cleaned-up stream and some mixed-use development that seems to have been attracted by the still-uncompleted project.

The goal is a 20-mile trail to the South Carolina line that fits into a broader two-state network of trails near 2.3 million people (but not part of the East Coast Greenway, which goes through Raleigh quite a bit to the east). Yes, the power of connecting trails! We only rode a few miles, until B-cycle ran out, so this really isn’t much of a training ride. I hope B-cycle will keep following the trail past Freedom Park, and include directional signage to docking stations, particularly that one in the medical center that took us too long to find.

As for the bikes: 3 speeds, like Citi Bike, but lighter. Easier to dock — definitely no temptation to slam it in just to make sure it locks. In fact locking and unlocking was far easier than in NYC. I like that you hear three beeps when it locks and you can get a confirmation text. Citi Bike, I’d be happy with just the text. The bike also has a proper basket (guess B-cycle cities don’t worry that their residents will treat them like trash cans) and a cable lock attached to the basket for running an errand where there is no docking station (something else Citi Bike doesn’t have.)

B-cycle is a different company than the one behind bike-share programs in big cities like New York and Chicago. There’s a Trek connection, and it has about two dozen second-tier cities signed up in the U.S. But there’s the same 30-minute limit for each ride when you have a day pass. We used seven bikes apiece in our explorations, and the coverage area was pretty limited.

And Charlotte? Pretty bike-friendly. There’s a nice, busy multi-use trail along much of its lone light-rail line (and lots of new condos too that seem dominated by Millennials, in case you needed visual proof that they prefer more of a city lifestyle to that of the suburbs). We biked quite a bit of it, until B-cycle ran out there too. On the whole, traffic wasn’t bad, especially when you’re used to New York City. And motorists are far more polite!

Maybe next year the East Coast Greenway ride will end in Raleigh and I can discover another part of North Carolina.

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