Dispatch from America: Observations and Happenstance

As we enter Virginia, I am back to the lighter side of our bike trip. Abby likened Eastern Kentucky to places in Peru she had seen, third world where sanitation and garbage are concerned. The past two days brought back a PSA that aired when I was in college(See the YouTube link below). Keep in mind that while the PSA was meant to be over the top, we have seen areas that are worse!

We have had ideal camps on the ridges of the Appalachians. Catching the waning daylight and waking to the intense orange dawn light that warms the tent. There are often turkeys calling and hound dogs baying in the early morning hours. As we ride up and over the steep hills of Appalachia you can not help but take in the immense poverty that has strangled this area since people fled the crowded East Coast more than a century ago.

Coal is King and everyone has "Friends in Low Places" as dictated by their truck decals that depict a miner crawling through a shaft. The shoulder is the white line; often with sharp pieces of gravel and coal strewn about near mountain top removal sites. The convenient aspect of loud or lacking exhaust on vehicles is that you can hear them coming and move over. People are mostly indifferent to the foreign bikers, occasionally a member from the "Greatest Generation" will wave and talk with you. There ought to be more of that spirit. You get the random, "dumb ass" or other incomprehensible mutterings of a passenger car as they fly by you at 60+ mph. None of those people say anything when you see them at the next gas station; with looks of," their here already?", lacking the stones to confront you.

I look forward to crossing the Appalachian Trail outside Damascus, VA where this time 3 years ago I walked these very mountains. Then we are onto Boone, NC where I went to college and have not visited for 5 years. Finally we ride out of the Appalachians and into the sand hills of NC and head for the ocean to finish our bike tour.