June 21, 2016
Farewell to North Carolina
This was our last day to enjoy the peaceful well paved roads of North Carolina. The fact that we were awakened at 6 in the morning by trucks rumbling by in front of our Gatesville house did not portend an increase in traffic. After leisurely strolling through the cemetery across the road from our house the traffic had cleared out. We made a late departure sometime after 9:00.
The NC roads were almost empty, the sky was blue and the trees offered cool shade. Even though we passed a sawmill we did not see logging trucks on the road. We went flying down a hill, crossed a small stream and climbed up the other side. That's when disaster struck in the form of blackberries. It was our first time to see ripe berries on the side of the road and Viktoriya ordered an immediate stop and U-turn to go back and pick some berries.
A U-turn on a tandem is not a trivial maneuver. Think of an 18 wheeler making a 3 point turn or a couple of tug boats trying to turn a giant freighter. The road was just not wide enough to make the turn without putting a foot down. Somewhere during the turn, when Kerry had one leg unclipped, the bike tipped toward the other side.
A dog which had been barking at us from his yard was so astonished by this unexpected maneuver that he ceased barking. Thus we were able to asses our damage in peace and quiet. Any fall, even a very low speed fall, can lead to painful injuries or extensive damage to the bike. We were lucky in that no one was seriously hurt and the bike did not sustain significant damage.
After Jeanna and Kerry had picked themselves up and dusted themselves off Viktoriya went and picked some blackberries. They looked delicious. Just as she was about to eat them Kerry told a story about getting worms from eating wild blackberries. Was this a true story or just a form of revenge for the berry U-turn causing an accident? Viktoriya wasn't taking any chances and discarded the berries.
Continuing on after the horrific crash we noticed some bean fields with suspiciously wide rows - at least twice as wide as the beans we had been passing during the last few days. Some left over cotton debris seemed to indicate that these were perhaps young cotton plants rather than beans. The agronomy literature indicates that cotton is typically planted in 38 to 40 inch rows. Beans which were traditionally planted in 30 inch rows are now often planed in 15 inch rows. So we decided that we were looking at cotton fields - a new crop.
The ideal spacing of frog cotton is not specified in the literature.
After we crossed into Virginia we noticed more wheat and less corn. Our Virginia route took us past the Great Dismal Swamp. For reasons that are obscure Kerry seemed somewhat disappointed that the route was not sufficiently swampy and dismal.
We have observed that it is difficult in many of the small towns we have passed through to buy fruits, vegetables or other healthy foods. Many towns are too small to support a grocery store and only have a gas station/convenience store or perhaps a dollar store. Perhaps this explains why one of the convenience stores we stopped in features T-shirts in sizes XL, 2XL, 3XL, 4XL, 5XL and 6XL.
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Suffolk Virginia is probably the largest town we have been in since we left Jacksonville Florida. Our hotel was next to a Ruby Tuesday that featured a salad bar. We did our best to make up for the lack of veggies in the small towns we had been visiting for the last couple of weeks. To ensure a balanced diet we followed up the salad bar with chocolate chip cookies provided by the hotel.
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