Cycling in the middle of nowhere

I had to make a quick trip down to North Carolina, to a town just about 20 miles south of the Virginia border for some meetings yesterday.  Given I had my usual bike workout planned for Tuesday I figured it would be a cool opportunity to do a ride some place other than my usual stomping grounds/routes.

The meetings ended by noon, so I basically had all afternoon to drive back the 3.5 hours to DC.  I decided I would just pick a random place, pull off the highway and then start riding.  I’m all about adhoc. I saw some roads crisscrossing the farm lands near the highway that looked pretty quiet so I jumped off the highway and then began to look for a parking lot.  Of course, it didn’t occur to me that there wouldn’t be a parking lot in the middle of nowhere.  There were to gas stations, schools or parks – it was just instant farms.

And then it hit me!  I’m in an area where it appears everyone just leaves their cars strewn about all over the place (lawns, front yard, side of road, neighbors yard, upside down, sideways, etc…) – so I just did the same.  I picked a random place on the side of the road and called it my parking spot.

And then I rode.  I rode past barns, corn fields, active working tractors, died antique tractors, random crops I’ve never seen – and even cotton fields.  The cotton ones were kinda cool, it almost looks like it snowed.

Despite the nasty winds sweeping across the fields, it was a fun ride.  Just aimlessly going nowhere in particular for about 75 minutes on quiet country roads.  Nobody honked, nobody cut me off, everyone just moseyed along.  Although I was briefly concerned as a oversize house came rumbling down the road (ya know, the ones that they drag on big trailers).  Other than that, it was just a nice way to break up an otherwise boring drive home.  The below satellite view of the route farmlands is about as scenic as the actual view from the handlebars.  Nice to see something different for a change.

Oh, and on a side note – a butter knife can still hurt like heck once impaled into your finger.  One should consider avoiding that in the future.  Not that I would know anything about that or anything…

FOUND THIS POST USEFUL? SUPPORT THE SITE!

Hopefully, you found this post useful. The website is really a labor of love, so please consider becoming a DC RAINMAKER Supporter. This gets you an ad-free experience, and access to our (mostly) bi-monthly behind-the-scenes video series of “Shed Talkin’”.

Support DCRainMaker - Shop on Amazon

Otherwise, perhaps consider using the below link if shopping on Amazon. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. It doesn’t cost you anything extra, but your purchases help support this website a lot. It could simply be buying toilet paper, or this pizza oven we use and love.