hubcap's other hillbilly ride pictures...

[hubcapsc]

I got invited on a ride this weekend back before Reb announced
the Hillbilly ride... I ended up riding all weekend with these hillbillies: Britman,
Ian, Mark, Steve and Duffy...



I headed out to meet them at Cashiers NC, and stopped along the way
at Smokin' Joe's "lake that looks like a Christmas tree"...



We stayed at this house:



On this lake:





                                                                  

Britman sent us explicit directions for the ride and told us all to commit them
to memory, so we all knew every detail of the ride route...



Crabtree Mountain Road out of Canton North Carolina is a good start to any ride...







Duffy got a little squirrely going over the top, but he kept it out of the ditch... the
debris in the road was only partially responsible for the close call 



I have other pictures going down this hill, any ride that goes down this hill
is a good ride 



Crabtree Mountain Road dumps out right above The Rattler:







There's a Rattler Loop, where you peel off onto 63 at Trust...





We bounced off the side of Asheville but never got into any tourist traffic,
even though it is Memorial Day weekend, Britman had all kinds of little
roads planned out that took us under I-26 and past Asheville...









A cow leaped out into the road among us, crossed all the way to the right and back
again, but it all happened so fast my "picture every five seconds" camera only
caught the retreat to the left...



After "snaking" us past Asheville, Britman took us on 19w up through a
little bit of Tennessee... 19w is one of several great roads I got introduced to
on this ride... here's a Wiki picture by some guy named Mark Clifton, not my
picture:



19w's too curvy for trucks, but not curvy enough for Britman, so we took Piney Hill
Road for a while. I was hoping for some good pictures there with maybe the other
motorcycles coming back at me on some of the tight switchbacks, but the
camera battery pooped out somewhere along the way... not before we came
to this tree in the road, though...







You know you're on the real back roads when you have to clear the trees out
of the way yourself 

We got back to the house on the lake after about 275 miles or so... very few
stops, a nice big loop and numerous new-to-me roads, a great ride!

Duffy discovered that he'd worn his tire down to the threads when we got back
It was raining this morning (Sunday). We all left out to find a phone and or
some Internet service - I hoped I'd remembered correctly that Schroader's Honda
in Hendersonville (40 miles away) was open on Sunday. We found their number
and HOORAY they were open and could fix his tire. I split off from the group
at that point and headed back home down the hill to South Carolina. I hope
Duffy made the 40 miles OK and that they're all headed back to Georgia
on good tires as I type this...



-Mike

[3fan4life]

Britman sent us explicit directions for the ride and told us all to commit them
to memory, so we all knew every detail of the ride route...

  It doesn't look like anyone actually read them. 


Great Ride Report Mike. 

[Jess from VA]

Thanks for the story and the pics.  

Looks like a great ride.  

Last time I followed this guy, I got to dodge a flying, floating, killer mattress. 

[Oss]

Thank goodness

A terrific ride report where fun roads and good times ruled the day

Really enjoyed the pics as well

Thanks Mike !

[Hook#3287]

Great report

[The emperor has no clothes]

Awesome ! 

[Whooray]

Thanks for sharing the ride.... I really enjoyed the pictures . Great road report!!

[Valkorado]

 

[f6john]

How do you get this quality of pictures while your riding?

[msb]

Great ride report. I really have to get a Go Pro...love the pics from the rider's perspective. Thanks for posting this Your back country roads in that area look fantastic... I keep saying "one of these days..."

[flsix]

Fantastic ride report. Thanks for the pics.

[henry 008]

thanks for taking us along, Mike!

[hubcapsc]

How do you get this quality of pictures while your riding?

Thanks for the comments everyone...

I have a gummy old GoPro, I don't remember how many megapixels it has, maybe
around 5 or so...

I stuck one of its clips onto my windshield, and set it to "take a picture every 5 seconds".

A fun part of rides for me is clicking through pictures after the ride while sitting in the
easy chair with a glass of tea, there were about 2,800 pictures for this ride... my 16
gig SD card didn't fill up, the battery ran out... I don't think it lasts as long anymore,
the GoPro has seen a lot of use.

I don't "study" each picture, there's probably any number of gems that get away. I just
clickity-click-click through them, stopping to look closer at ones with good color, and I look
more carefully for times I remember with interest, like the tree in the road, or Duffy
with his foot down, or the cow in the road. I resize and/or crop the pictures I like, to focus
and center on whatever is interesting in the picture, but never more than 25 or 30 get
that kind of attention. I like to pick ones with barns and old houses and other bikes and
signs about where we are and stuff like that.

Taking lots of pictures and looking through them for a few good ones works out like
that thing you learn in statistics: get a million monkeys blasting away on a million
typewriters and one of them will eventually type out a line from Shakespeare.

-Mike "I have thirty miles to ride yet ere dinner time "

[..]

Duffy was taken care of at Schroeders Hendersonville the moment he arrived with his credit card.

It was good they were open but it cost a tad over $400 for the cost of the Avon and fitting.  

As I wrote it was good they were open Memorial Day weekend on a Sunday.  

It also gave us an opportunity to buy $1 raffle tickers for a blue loaded Goldwing.

Where we were staying there was no internet and no available landline without a calling card.  Mike's notion that the dealer would be open on a Sunday had to be verified after riding 20 miles to where my bargain cost Totalwireless.com service worked. ATT, T Mobile and Verizon didn't work.

Schroeders phone number is 828-693-4101 and has been saved in my phone contacts.

[..]

Britman sent us explicit directions for the ride and told us all to commit them
to memory, so we all knew every detail of the ride route...

  It doesn't look like anyone actually read them. 


Great Ride Report Mike. 

I dunno what happened there. I was waiting down the road a way.

[pocket aces]

Looked like some great riding! Thanks for sharing. 

[RDAbull]

Thanks Mike.

Looks like the OTHER great weekend ride.

[hubcapsc]

Thanks Mike.

Looks like the OTHER great weekend ride.

I missed seeing all you guys... I guess Gordon was there and Wimp
and Hal... we all had fun and there will be many more rides 

-Mike

[phideux]

Thanks for the story and the pics.  

Looks like a great ride.  

Last time I followed this guy, I got to dodge a flying, floating, killer mattress. 

Why are you on the wrong side of the road???? This ain't England.
Looks like some nice riding, here everything is flat, no hills. Where in SC are you??? I'm at the coast.

[hubcapsc]

Why are you on the wrong side of the road????

What? Gordon told me that was the right side! ? !  That fink!



Looks like some nice riding, here everything is flat, no hills. Where in SC are you??? I'm at the coast.

I'm near Clemson... the Blue Ridge reaches to Oconee, Pickens and Greenville counties... where are you?
Toogoodoo Road over near Hollywood has a few curves... I like the Salkahatchie River road too, and the road
down to Bennett's Point is nice... you're right, its all flat...

-Mike

[phideux]

I'm south of Dirty Myrtle. I used to go up near Walhalla years back to hunt. Stayed at a place called Whetstone Horse Camp in the National Forest. Beautiful up there, have to take the bike up there one day.