As we slogged back along the dirt/gravel "road", retracing our path from the nonexistent bridge, I reflected that what at the outset had seemed a simple enough proposition- a three-day tandem tour of the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia- had turned into a near-obsession and test of will. Having blithely ignored the signs reading "ROAD ENDS 14.0 MILES", we had stubbornly pressed forward from the safety of the asphalt onto an unpaved, hilly country lane that led to the spot where the map promised a bridge across the rain-swollen Shenandoah River, several hundred vertical feet below our point of departure. Now we were paying the price, and had plenty of time to contemplate our sins.
The Prelude
Way back in February, my friends Jeff and Alice had decided to abandon their usual Mother’s Day weekend junket to central Ohio for the Tour of the Scioto River Valley (TOSRV), in favor of something more local. I had (jokingly) suggested that we do a trip that covered Skyline Drive, at the northern end of the Blue Ridge, and then tack on the return leg through the valley immediately to the west. I had done such a ride several years ago, and thoroughly enjoyed it. They thought that sounded like a capital idea, and the planning began. Our intent was to spend three days; on the first we would be riding from Front Royal to Skyland, covering the northern 41 miles of Skyline Drive. Skyland is a lodge located at the highest point on the Drive, and would be our overnight spot Friday evening. Saturday was to see us continue southward, finishing off the remaining 64 or so miles of the Drive, and ending up in the city of Waynesboro, VA. The final day we would return to Front Royal via the Valley, where the hills were much shorter and gentler, and there would be some shelter from the weather. I purchased a Virginia gazetteer, and Jeff and I spent an evening poring over it to find likely routes between Waynesboro and Front Royal, the towns at the southern and northern ends of Skyline Drive, respectively. We laid out a route that seemed to promise a minimum of time spent on busy, two-lane U.S. 340 and offered many miles right along next to the river, crossing it some three or four times. I transferred it into spreadsheet format, and generated electronic copies of the map using an electronic street atlas. (It also definitely showed a bridge at the critical point, and failed to indicate that the road in question was gravel.) The total northbound leg measured out at just over 91 miles according to the map.
It being an El Ni�o year, our early-season training weekends were often cool and rainy. Alice had been battling a mysterious ailment, made worse by wet, chilly conditions. As her mood goes, so goes Jeff’s, so they had not done a great deal of training beforehand, except for regular Spinning classes. I had also not done much riding, also except for Spinning, but felt confident that I could pull through without undue distress. The last time I had done the trip I’d put in less than 250 miles of training, and had similar totals for the previous year or two. In contrast, I’d logged well over 2,500 miles in each of the last four years, and had been Spinning twice a week for several months. I was also counting on Terri, my stoker (this was a tandem trip after all), who had ridden a fair amount this year, and who is a bundle of power and energy at most times anyhow.
Chaos at the Outset
Time wore on, and we never seemed to manage to find a day to drive the 60 or so miles out to the Valley and then field check the 91-mile route that was to be our northbound leg. So, we arrived in Front Royal Thursday evening completely innocent of what we were really about to experience. The whole week had been cloudy and rainy, and Thursday was exceptionally bad. In addition to deadly slow rush hour traffic (I’ve seen glaciers move faster), Jeff had had to get over to a local bike shop to pick up their bike. Two weeks previously the springs in their integrated shift/brake levers had failed, leaving them unable to change gears. The shop had promised to get on it right away, but the bike wasn’t ready when he went to get it. Seems that the derailleur cable had frayed beyond the point where it could be reinstalled, and the shop didn’t have another tandem-length cable in stock. Jeff made a quick trip back home to get his spare, which he then had to install by himself while the service staff was otherwise occupied. In the meantime, I was mired in traffic, fretting and fuming as the minutes flew past and I crawled along. Finally I got home and began to make the final preparations for departure. While I was doing this, Alice called to give me a final chance to bail out, but since it was now after the time when we could cancel the first night’s motel rooms, I decided to press on. I also knew how eager Terri was to get out and ride. We had only tandemmed together once in the past, but that had been a very fun century so we knew we could ride together successfully.
Having pre-packed, all I had to do was collect the cue sheets, maps, etc. and get everything out to the car. As I loaded all the stuff, I had the nagging feeling that I was leaving something important behind. Sure enough, as I was loading the bike it hit me- Terri uses traditional toe clips, and I had left them inside, still mounted on one of my half bikes. They also didn’t have the toe clips in place, so it was going to be more pain to get them and put them together than to swipe hers when I arrived to pick her up. With the tandem secured to the rack, I jumped in and headed down the road, already 45 minutes behind schedule. Twenty minutes later, about five minutes before I reached Terri’s, it dawned on me that I’d forgotten my helmet. Not to worry- I could borrow one from her and not lose any more time. We fiddled around her place for a bit, collecting her stuff and stripping pedals from one of her bikes. With all of here things in the car, we headed west, finally well and truly on our way.
We stopped for a little dinner on the way, and as I was getting back in the car, my final omission became evident- I had no water bottles with me, and had also failed to bring my hydration bladder! By this time it was after 9:00 p.m., and there was nothing to do but keep going. We figured that we could stop somewhere in Front Royal and get three or four bottles of sports drink at a gas station or convenience store, and just re-use the bottles after they were emptied. At long last we arrived at the motel and met up with our traveling companions, who had only arrived a few minutes previously. We socialized for a while, as I changed the toe clips on Terri’s pedals and made other minor adjustments to the bike, then retired for the evening.
A Wet Beginning
Friday morning broke gray and drizzly, but not especially cold. The weather didn’t dampen Terri’s enthusiasm any, and she convinced (bullied) me to at least get started. I agreed, and began to stash things into the panniers, "just in case". As it turned out, Terri is the Chief of the Gram Police, and every item had to be scrutinized and approved before I was allowed to bring it. In the meantime, Alice and Jeff had definitely decided that they were in no mood to ride, and would drive their mini-van to Skyland, acting as our emergency sag vehicle. This at least gave me the opportunity to get access to the thing left out of the panniers, as I could toss them into the van and retrieve them partway along if need be. The four of us agreed to meet at the Elk Wallow wayside, 24 miles or so down the Drive, and just past the end of the largest climb of the trip.
Most of the first 21 miles of Skyline Drive are uphill, climbing steadily from the entrance to Shenandoah National Park at 600 feet to the top of Hogback Overlook, elevation just over 3,600 feet. We soon settled into a steady climbing cadence, giving the granny gear a good workout but making steady, relatively easy progress. We stopped only once on the way up, at the Dickey Ridge Visitor’s Center (milepost 5), to shed a layer and catch a quick breather. Then it was back on the bike and off we went. The weather was actually just about perfect for such a climb- temperatures in the low to mid 60s (F), overcast, and a slight drizzle to keep us from overheating but not raining heavily enough to drain our body heat completely away and leave us hypothermic. Part of the way up it stopped altogether, and we really enjoyed ourselves.
Thrills and Chills, But No Spills
We reached the top in about two and a half hours, and paused so I could don my jacket, long-fingered waterproof gloves, and wind/rain pants for the three mile descent to Elk Wallow. As I was doing so, I noticed that one of Terri’s toe clips had come loose so we spent a minute fixing that. Then we hopped on the bike and began to descend. I was immediately glad of the extra gear, and was comfortably warm as we roared down the serpentine road. Knowing how wet the road was, and how likely it was that there would be loose debris to further reduce traction in the curves, I did my best to hold us to a clearly safe speed. The tandem does not have a drum brake, so all of the braking force had to come from the rim brakes and what I could generate by way of wind drag. I did my best not to ride the brakes continuously, pulsing them and alternating between front and rear. However, the gritty wet conditions soon took their toll on the rear brake pads, leaving me with only the front. I was also moderately aware that the front tire seemed to have a very slight bump or bubble in it, or at least wasn’t rolling as smoothly as I expected.
We had made it to within a thousand feet or so of the entrance to the wayside when it happened- the front tube exploded, blowing the tire completely off one side of the rim. The bike began to shimmy and shake, and steering control was immediately virtually non-existent. After the fraction of a second of initial shock had passed, I shouted back to Terri "Oh, SH*T!!! We’re going DOWN!" The best I could hope for was to get us slowed enough that we wouldn’t be entirely flayed by the pavement, and perhaps slightly pointed towards the grassy margin so that we could slide in the grass and further reduce the abrasions we were surely about to receive. By some miracle, we managed to get off the asphalt without crashing, and I thought to myself "Well, at least now we’ll only get wet and dirty but not seriously hurt." Just down from the place where the tire blew had been a patch of loose gravel, with a slight difference between the height of the road surface and the grassy shoulder. At the point where we actually hit the grass, though, there was no dropoff.
The grass had about the same effect on us that the arrestor wire has on a plane landing on an aircraft carrier, and we came to a very swift halt just a few feet after leaving the road, still upright and VERY happy about it. As often happens in such a swiftly unfolding chain of events, time seemed to have slowed and each step seemed almost to have occurred in isolation, yet definitely as a sequence. While I had definitely been completely engaged in descending prior to the blowout, from that moment until we came to a stop the demands of steering and braking had my F U L L A T T E N T I O N !!! Amazingly enough, I didn’t even really have the shakes- it all happened too quickly.
We changed the tube, remounted the tire, got ourselves back on the road, and pulled into the wayside for our scheduled meeting with the van. Our wet clothes now began to be a more serious liability, and Terri got slightly chilled waiting for our friends to arrive. When they did we were treated to carrots, delicious strawberries, freshly roasted peanuts, and other goodies that our thoughtful companions had picked up while we were riding. They also brought me two bottles of Gatorade to be used as water bottles later on, but I shipped them ahead as Jeff had kindly loaned me his hydration bladder when we set out.
Blast to the Top
Refreshed after our respite, Terri and I remounted and set off to complete the last 17 or so miles to Skyland, which lies at the highest point on the Drive. Terri was definitely feeling cold, so I pushed the pace and cadence with the result that we made great time for the first six or seven miles, which are flat to slightly downhill. After we crossed through Thornton Gap at mile 30, we began the final long climb of the day. That got us nicely warmed up again, and we even caught a few glimpses of our shadow as the sun tried to make an appearance. Jeff and Alice passed us on the climb, reminding us in passing that "anyone can ride ten miles", our standard joke when the end of a tough ride is beginning to become prominent in our thoughts. Neither Terri nor I was really uncomfortably weary, let alone ready to quit, although she was beginning to take more and more frequent breaks to relieve the pressure on her backside.
Soon we entered the home stretch, a two-mile segment where the grade is less than what precedes it, and we pulled into Skyland in fine style, about six hours total time out from our starting point. The last time I had done that leg it took me ten hours- who says tandems climb more slowly than singles?! As we made the turn, Terri confessed that she had expected me to quit at Elk Wallow, but was pleased that we had continued.
We checked into the lodge, and then headed to our room. It had a marvelous view of the western side of the mountains, across the valley. Our appreciation of the view, however, had to wait for us to finish appreciating the hot water in the bathtub! Our room adjoined Alice and Jeff’s, and they had thoughtfully unloaded all of our luggage before taking off for a hike of their own. They had also left the door between the rooms open, and invited us to use their tub so that neither of us would have to wait for the long-awaited and much-anticipated bliss of a long hot soak in the tub.
� 1998, Keith Adams
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