Friday, October 18, 1996
Departure time: 8:30. Weather: heavy rain.
Like yesterday, because it was raining, I packed my microcassette recorder away in a One-Zip bag, so didn't record my notes for much of the day.
We started the day by backtracking a bit to the town of Sweetwater for breakfast at Davi's--excellent french toast despite the fact that it wasn't even on the menu. Because it was pouring rain, we nursed our coffees and donned our rain gear before departing, but it was clear that the rain was going to last, so we headed out. A man in the restaurant suggested that we head east on Tennessee 68 over to US-411 from Sweetwater, rather than heading down US-11 to Cleveland, then across US-64 to 411 at Ocoee. He said there were good shoulders on 68 and a lot of bicyclists travel on 411. TN 68 was indeed great. There were wide (8') shoulders all the way to Madisonville. Though 68 had some serious hills, the grades were good and we chugged along pretty fast despite the heavy rain.
When we got to Madisonville, however, the picture changed; the shoulders shrunk to 9-12" and the traffic seemed to increase in volume and speed. The stretch from Madisonville to Englewood was one of the worst stretches of highway I've ever ridden on--especially in the rain. Just outside Englewood, a travel trailer with Florida license plates came within 4" of my handlebars. Obviously, the driver had no idea how much wider his trailer was than the pickup truck he was driving. This was not a fun day. This sort of "white knuckle" bicycle riding is incredibly exhausting.
Fortunately, south of Englewood, there was highway construction and a better shoulder/highway situation to Etowah (about 7 miles south) and when we arrived in Etowah around 1:00 PM, the rain stopped.
We ate lunch at Kentucky Fried Chicken (good Senior Citizen Buffet for $3.99--I didn't ask for it--I must have looked that old today--I do need to cut this white beard off, lest I be considered an old foggie). I was soaked and chilled to the bone. I added another layer of clothing: Ultimax sox, North Face polypro long sleeve shirt and Pearl Izumi leg warmers under my rain suit. A couple of miles out of Etowah, the sun warmed me to the point that I stopped to remove my rain pants, then a couple of miles further south, I removed my rain jacket. While it had been in the 40's in the morning, it was now up to about 62°.
In a farm field on US-411, I saw a goal post-like structure strung with hornet-nest-like birds' nests (I really don't know what I was seeing) against the backdrop of some significant mountains.
We crossed the Hiwassie River, more of the TVA project.
 |
 |
The rain really slowed us down. It became apparent as early as Etowah that we were not going to make it to Chatsworth, GA as we had hoped. We stopped a couple of times to seek information on lodging choices south of Etowah. We didn't want to stop at Etowah. We wanted to get in at least 20 more miles, but nobody knew of any motels short of Chatsworth.
While stopped at a convenience store several miles north of
Benton, I met Dwight "Coonie" Dalton, one of the most outgoing
folks I've met so far on the trip, who told me he is in the riding stable
business, a farmer, deals in real estate, and does anything to make a living;
a self-proclaimed "old country redneck boy." Coonie showed me
a shortcut to the Ocoee Inn on Ocoee Lake (about 10 miles away), which we
decided to take.
Following Coonie's directions we turned east onto TN 314 at Benton.
Disaster struck as I was riding peacefully along highway 314. As I was coasting down on a shallow grade, a couple of dogs ran at me barking from a house on my right, one dog on each side of me. I yelled my usual "NO", and even shouted "go home God damnit" but they both persisted. The one on my right was growling and trying to bite my right heel. I wasn't focusing much on the one on my left because it was about a foot away, but I sped up to try to outrun them. That was a big mistake. As I was steaming along at around 20+ mph, a car came toward me in the other lane and the dog on the left decided to cross over to the right--directly in front of me. My front wheel hit him broadside and flipped him upside down. Then everything happened real fast. We both crashed real hard. At one point, Ritt (who was about 1/4 mile back) said he saw my feet fly up in the air. All of my weight went crashing onto my left elbow. I was forcibly ejected from the SPD pedal clips and rolled head-over-heels on the pavement, landing real quickly on my feet.
My left elbow, left shoulder (on which I received physical therapy all last winter because of a torn rotator cuff) and ribs all hurt quite a bit, but I think I handled it about like a good football player handles a hard tackle and I didn't break anything. The people in the car coming toward me stopped and helped me right my bike and recover my stuff from the road. The woman said these dogs were notorious for such behavior.
The dogs ran home squealing. I didn't feel any remorse for the injuries I managed to inflict on the one dog.
My handlebar bag was thrown several feet, my water bottles were rolling in the road, my front Vista light bracket was bent real bad, but amazingly enough all the electronic equipment seemed unharmed (computer, cellular phone, digital camera, film camera, microcassette recorder, MO disks--all were fine).
Just before the crash, I took a picture of the mountains along 314.
This area is incredible. The Ocoee (another TVA project) is gorgeous.
 |
 |
Upstream, just a few miles east of here, the Ocoee was the site of the 1996 Olympic whitewater events. Luckily, though it was Friday night, we got to the Ocoee soon enough to get the last room at the Ocoee Inn. The dinner (BBQ Ribs, corn, baked beans, fries and blackberry cobbler a la mode) was wonderful. I wanted a beer, but was shocked to discover that they didn't sell it there.
It was only about 40° out but I used an outdoor pay phone to call home. There was no telephone in our small room. I didn't get much web work done because Ritt complained about light and noise.
Total miles today: 49.
 Tennessee |
  |
 Tailwinds Home Page |
© Ed Noonan 1996, 1997