TransVirginia Valley route to Clifton Forge

2021-08-02

After my last ride on the TransVA ended with me having to stop early, I wanted to give it a 2nd try. This time I was more prepared. I had replaced my chain and cassette since the last time, since they were broken/needed to be replaced.

Day 1

I left my apartment around 9am. It was sunny and hot! Not too much traffic on the W&OD trail. It was a Wednesday, compared to last time I started on a Saturday. I drank a lot from the various water fountains along the way on the w&od. Last time, I was here in April and all the water was turned off. It was nice that more stuff was "in season" on this trip in August.

I finished the W&OD and reached Purceville around 3pm-ish and took a break at the benches right at the trail head. A woman came up to me and asked me if I was going on a trip (I clearly was with all the gear on my bike). We chatted a bit and I mentioned that I was going to stay at the Bears Den Hostel that night. She told me how she had biked there before from Alexandria and enjoyed it. She also recommended staying at hostels - she had stayed in them all over the world and met a lot of cool people.

The next part of route is not as nice as the rail trail W&OD. It goes through some busier roads. Eventually I got to the quieter gravel roads, but then it started raining around 5pm.

Eventually I got the the dreaded Route 7 segment. This time I turned left onto the shoulder of the oncoming traffic, because I knew I had to turn left again. I didn't want to have to cross 4 lanes of traffic to get on the correct shoulder and then cross four lanes of traffic again to turn left.

So I cautiously walked on the left shoulder facing oncoming traffic until I finally got the road that the hostel was on. Then it was a huge uphill that I was too tired to ride. So I pushed my bike up the hill until I got the hostel drive way.

Bears Den Hostel is really nice. If you ever want a short adventure from DC, I recommend biking there and staying the night, then biking back the next day. I paid $21 to lawn camp and have a frozen pizza for dinner. It also included pancakes for breakfast the next day.

At the hostel I had a nice shower and a chat with a ~55 year old man who was through hiking the AT. He told me about some of the cycle tours he had done.

Day 2

After a nice pancake breakfast I took off. I left fairly late. Last time, I stealth camped in some woods next to the highway and left at like 6am or something but this time I left around 8am. I knew it was going to be a long day to Van Buren Furnace, so I mentally prepared myself for the suck.

This time I decided to take better advantage of the stores along the way. So I bought a pulled park sandwich around 11am. I had to poop really badly around 1pm so I stealth pooped in some overgrown field that didn't look like any body used. yeah I do feel kinda bad about it, but hopefully its fine and no one uses that field (of course i dug a proper cat hole etc.)

It was a long long day. I got to try out my new water filter on some stream. It was really nice and much better than the crappy lifestraw thing I had before.

I got a slice of peach pie and Richards Fruit market. Then I got to garden market around 4pm and this time got a big salami and cheese sandwich to have when I got to camp. Finally I arrived around 7pm.

This trip I was using a Garmin Etrex20, which I got off ebay, as navigation. So my phone was away and turned off, and since I didn't have it on hand I didn't take many pictures.

Day 3

Same as my last trip I spent the 2nd night at the Van Buren Furnace primitive camp site area. It was pretty nice. Once again I had the whole place to myself.

Same as last time, the trail became quickly unrideable. I don't have perfect memory, but it was worse this time. See back in April before the hike a bike section there was just rough rocky double track. But this time that double track was completely covered with big overgrown plants. In places the grass/plants came up to my hips. So I was pushing my back through that before I even got to the trail section. Luckily it seems like I didn't get bit by any ticks. There were a lot of flies about. I had some Picaradin, but I'm not sure how helpful it was. I had some long pants on the trip, but I did this section in shorts, maybe that was dumb.

I got to the hike-a-bike trail section. Last time there was basically a stream running through the entire trail, but this time it was drier with more plant growth. Not much to say it kinda sucked. Finally I made it out to a huge downhill section which was really nice.

Around this part of the trip I switched from the TransVA normal route to the TransVA Valley route. The Valley route is an alternative that has less climbing and less off road sections. I realized that I still wasn't cut out for the real TransVA. My bicycle was still too small for me and climbing was tough. I was enjoying the quiet state gravel roads the most. The forest-y double track was full of flies this time around and not enjoyable.

So partly up the mountain that I remember climbing back in April, the Valley route diverged and took some gravel road downhill.

Later that day, I ended up biking up some super steap section to the top of mountain/hill. So it wasn't all valley. There were some beautiful fancy homes up on that mountain though. Some nice fancy cabins with big wraparound porches hanging over the elevation drop of the side of the mountain.

Coming down from the mountain, the landscape opened up to a bunch of fields. I passed by a house and a dog came running out of the yard, barking at me. I can admit now that it wasn't a big dog. it was pretty small but it was running really fast at me and I got scared because of the last dog encounter I had where it bit me. In my startled state, I biked off the road onto a field. There was a ditch in the field where it met part of the road and my front wheel sunk into it and I fell off my back scraping my elbow on the asphalt. The dog reached me and just barked at me a bit until the owner came out and yelled for it. I picked up my bike and starting walking down the road. My elbow was dripping blood pretty badly, but I had some band aids.

The rest of the day was uneventful, until I reached a highway section with no shoulder. It was pretty sketchy, but I only had to go on it a little bit until I got to where I was spending the night: benny's beach campground. It was a weird situation, but eventually I explained to this guy that I wanted to stay there one night and I only had a bike. He was really confused about me biking from DC. He thought I was doing it to raise awareness or money for some cause, but eventually I was able to explain that it was just for fun.

It was pretty expensive, but they had a shower there so it was worth it.

Day 4

Day 4 was when things got tough. I wanted to make it to Todd Lake by the end of day, but that didn't end up happening. Somehow was super tired. Probably because I didn't sleep well previous night. It was cold, windy, and rainy and I woke up at 4 am.

I was moving pretty slowly. And then it started raining pretty hard 4pm. I waited it out under the awning of country store before Stokesville. I got pretty lucky since the rain pretty much stopped after an hour. I hung out an watched the people who came into the store, I got some strange looks haha. The rain stopped, but I gave up on trying to make it to Todd Lake. I stayed at stokesville lodge for the night. They had a discount: only $5 for bike camping. They also asked if I was doing the TransVA which was pretty cool.

I felt really bad that evening, like I was going to throw up.

Day 5

I gave myself a slow morning and late start, since I felt bad the previous day. I decided to make it a light day, and only try to do 28 miles. It ended up still being pretty hard. It was all up hill at the beginning. I saw some mountain bikers coming down from where I was headed. I eventually made it to Brailey Pond, and took an hour break. I saw a lot of fishers and had nice chat with man and his family. He was amazed that I came from DC, wanted to make sure I was okay. I explained what I was doing, and he asked if I was doing it because I had to. I said no, for fun, he said you have to check, sometimes its all people have gestured to my bike.

After the break, I began the big uphill on Route 250. In the middle of this, Garmin ran out of battery. It gave a low battery warning then died like 30 minutes later. I didn't expect it to go through 2 AAs that fast, so I wasn't carrying any extra batteries with me. I switched using my phone's GPS as navigation.

This really uphill section took a lot out of me. People pass me could tell it was tough I guess. A pickup trucks with bikes in the back gave me a honk honk. And later, two motorcyclists coming down gave me thumbs up.

Finally I made it to the top, and had a nice view waiting for me at the Confederate Breastworks.

From there, it was still a bit hilly, but over all going down hill, so it was manageable. I made it to Shaws Fork around 6. It was a nice campground I had the whole place to myself. I set up camp, and I think I feel asleep before the sun had set.

Day 6

I made really good mileage early in the day, on mostly gravel roads. There were a lot of washboards, and the road was a long a river. I took an hour long break at a community center before route 39. Then I began the slow uphill to Douthat state park. I bought a twix ice cream bar. I made the decision to end the trip. I was just too tired and might not have had fun anymore. I biked 9 miles downhill to clifton forge, which is actually a pretty nice town. I got picked up at Clifton Forge Amtrak "station".

Conclusion

Overall, I had a pretty good time. I think the trip was around 300 miles.. Now I know a better strategy to deal with dogs: just stop riding, get off, and put the bike between myself and the dog. Don't try to out run them. I still want a better bike. I still did this trip on my >10 year old 14" Kona Lana'i which is too small for me. Maybe the COVID bike scarcity will die down, and I can buy a nice bike. I want one with a lower gear ratio for those big mountain climbs