Virginia Creeper Trail.

On Sunday 7/26, my daughters and I headed up to Damascus, Va. We hit several rain showers along the way so we were hoping the rain would hold off for our ride along ride the Virginia Creeper Trail. It turns out that the weather was awesome in Damascus.

Damascus, VA is just under a 3 hour drive from Charlotte if you are making the trip up through Blowing Rock and Boone. Something that I didn’t realize, by driving up through Boone we would actually drive through Tennessee before going back in Virginia.

The drive is pretty interesting but then, any drive through the mountains is pretty interesting for me.

We rented 4 mountain bikes from one the local bike shops in Damascus, and then shuttled us to White Mt. Station. This is where most of the rides began. From White Mt. Station to Damascus is roughly a 17 mile ride.

The ride is pretty easy. There is a nice net elevation drop between White Mt. and Damascus. We did a lot more coasting then actual pedaling. The trail has a speed limit of 15 mph, but there seemed to be a lot people rocketing down the mountain.

The temperature on top was a little over 70 degrees. I didn't feel cold just standing around but once we headed down the trail and went under the canopy of the trees, the chill really started to settle in. I could probably have used a coat. This lasted for about 7 or 8 miles and then the temperature started to even out and by the time that we were in Damascus, it was easily in the mid 80s.

There were a lot places along the way to stop and look around. We stopped once for a snack and then later for a late lunch. We also stopped several places along the trail to take pictures.

The trail is combination of gravel and dirt. Most of the trail is at least car width wide, but there are some tight places. Some of the bridges are quite narrow.

There a few places where ride crosses private land and through at least one person’s front yard.

Now that I have ridden it, I really want to run it. Actually, I would like to do an end to end run of the trail which is about 34 miles starting from White Mt. Station and running all the way to Abington, Va.

I don’t think it will be this fall but there is a good likelihood that it will be next year.

I think we can should it the Virginia Creeper Ultra. 
 

Sharing one thought at time,

The Cool Down Runner