yoothgeye
I build stuff.
Last week I took my family on vacation to the mountains of North Carolina tucked right into the corner between Virginia and Tennessee. On the agenda was hiking, tubing, relaxing, but most exciting to me, riding the Virginia Creeper Trail.
The Virginia Creeper is a Rails to Trails, the railroad use to be called the Virginia Creeper trail for the way it creeped up and down the mountain. I am no expert on the history, but you can get a lot online. Nowadays the city of Damascus, VA is only being kept alive because of this trail. In town there are 7 outfitters that run multiple shuttles up to White Top to drop off riders and let them enjoy the easy 17 mile downhill. There are 2 more shuttle services outside of town.
Having the whole family and just 1 vehicle, we had to shuttle, but if you had someone willing to drop you off and pick you up, it would be real easy, wait till you see a van pulling a trailer full of bikes and follow them up to the drop off area, it won't take long, they were EVERYWHERE!
We went on a Tuesday, so there were a lot less people on the trail than on weekends. I was told that on weekends they even have park rangers on bikes helping people on the trail.
I rode my single speed rigid 29er, my wife her 7 speed cruiser with pedals removed for the 3 year old, my 9 year old daughter on her Giant 20" cruiser, and my 6 year old son on his 16" Dyno VFR.
If you don't have your own bike, all the shuttle services rent bikes, single speeds, tandems, tag-alongs, trailers, comfort bikes, mountain bikes, etc...
I was a bit skeptical of 17 miles of downhill. The furthest my kids have ridden with me is 5-6 miles, so whiny kids on short uphills haunted me. Turns out... it really is 17 miles of downhill. I don't remember pedaling with any real resistance the entire trail, there are flats, but if you kept up your momentum from the downhill, you could possibly coast the entire trail. I'd even like to try it on a scooter.
The trail is beautiful, too many bridges to count (though the are numbered), clear water creeks, awesome views, wildlife, etc... the trail is very very well maintained, very smooth covered in crushed gravel (like sand, but packs down hard).
Sometimes you are in National Park, other times private property, but it is marked. You can fish (trout stocked river), climb rocks, swim, and I even saw some people primitive camping.
We were told that it normally takes 2.5-3 hours, but you can really make a day of it if you stop and check out all the cool different spots, heck, you could make a weekend out of it.
There are also cafes, and other little stores along the trail selling bike parts and ice cream and souvenirs.
My kids did great, but for my 6 year old, it was the hardest, he is the lightest, on the lightest bike, with the smallest wheels, so keeping up with us coasting, he had to pedal quite a lot. At the end of the day, I hadn't broken a sweat.
I suspect the crowds of the weekend would be a little bit of a hassle since some parts of the trail are just wide enough for passing, but this could just be me since I'm so use to trail riding and seeing nobody the entire ride.
Would I do it again? In a minute. Now that I've seen it, I want to try to see how fast I can get down the mountain, have my wife drop me off with my geared mountain bike and see how much under 1 hour I can do it in.
I'm pretty sure everyone charged the same for shuttle, $15 per bike, of course rental would be more. So it cost me just over $60 to take my family, but it was worth it. I used the first outfitter I saw as we came into the city which was J.C. Outdoors, a Christian company. The guy who shuttled us up had been born and raised in Damascus and remembered the last day the train went up the mountain and was able to tell us a lot of local history.
I didn't take many photos, I was just taking it all in. If you get a chance, ride the Virginia Creeper Trail.
The Virginia Creeper is a Rails to Trails, the railroad use to be called the Virginia Creeper trail for the way it creeped up and down the mountain. I am no expert on the history, but you can get a lot online. Nowadays the city of Damascus, VA is only being kept alive because of this trail. In town there are 7 outfitters that run multiple shuttles up to White Top to drop off riders and let them enjoy the easy 17 mile downhill. There are 2 more shuttle services outside of town.
Having the whole family and just 1 vehicle, we had to shuttle, but if you had someone willing to drop you off and pick you up, it would be real easy, wait till you see a van pulling a trailer full of bikes and follow them up to the drop off area, it won't take long, they were EVERYWHERE!
We went on a Tuesday, so there were a lot less people on the trail than on weekends. I was told that on weekends they even have park rangers on bikes helping people on the trail.
I rode my single speed rigid 29er, my wife her 7 speed cruiser with pedals removed for the 3 year old, my 9 year old daughter on her Giant 20" cruiser, and my 6 year old son on his 16" Dyno VFR.
If you don't have your own bike, all the shuttle services rent bikes, single speeds, tandems, tag-alongs, trailers, comfort bikes, mountain bikes, etc...
I was a bit skeptical of 17 miles of downhill. The furthest my kids have ridden with me is 5-6 miles, so whiny kids on short uphills haunted me. Turns out... it really is 17 miles of downhill. I don't remember pedaling with any real resistance the entire trail, there are flats, but if you kept up your momentum from the downhill, you could possibly coast the entire trail. I'd even like to try it on a scooter.
The trail is beautiful, too many bridges to count (though the are numbered), clear water creeks, awesome views, wildlife, etc... the trail is very very well maintained, very smooth covered in crushed gravel (like sand, but packs down hard).
Sometimes you are in National Park, other times private property, but it is marked. You can fish (trout stocked river), climb rocks, swim, and I even saw some people primitive camping.
We were told that it normally takes 2.5-3 hours, but you can really make a day of it if you stop and check out all the cool different spots, heck, you could make a weekend out of it.
There are also cafes, and other little stores along the trail selling bike parts and ice cream and souvenirs.
My kids did great, but for my 6 year old, it was the hardest, he is the lightest, on the lightest bike, with the smallest wheels, so keeping up with us coasting, he had to pedal quite a lot. At the end of the day, I hadn't broken a sweat.
I suspect the crowds of the weekend would be a little bit of a hassle since some parts of the trail are just wide enough for passing, but this could just be me since I'm so use to trail riding and seeing nobody the entire ride.
Would I do it again? In a minute. Now that I've seen it, I want to try to see how fast I can get down the mountain, have my wife drop me off with my geared mountain bike and see how much under 1 hour I can do it in.
I'm pretty sure everyone charged the same for shuttle, $15 per bike, of course rental would be more. So it cost me just over $60 to take my family, but it was worth it. I used the first outfitter I saw as we came into the city which was J.C. Outdoors, a Christian company. The guy who shuttled us up had been born and raised in Damascus and remembered the last day the train went up the mountain and was able to tell us a lot of local history.
I didn't take many photos, I was just taking it all in. If you get a chance, ride the Virginia Creeper Trail.
