I have been thinking of going to March Moto Madness for a few years but never made it. This year looked like it would be the year. Since several members of MA were going and staying at CMTC that was the plan. Since I was on vacation this week I could go up Thursday, beat the rush and get a good campsite.
That was the plan. Then something came up and I couldn't leave on Thursday. :(
So I left early Friday morning. I was on the road before 6 and got to CMTC at around 10:30. My buddy Steve got there on Thursday, did some riding and was waiting for me when I got there. So I set up my tent and it was time to go riding.
Steve had found some nice roads on Thursday that I wasn't sure I had ridden so he led off to show me those roads. We went by the MMM site which Steve desciribed as: "Woodstock with Motorcycles". This picture only shows a small part of the site.
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Then we wandered around on a bunch of really fun roads. I'm talking twisty, hilly but often rough paved roads.
A little Waterfalls beside the road:
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Typical road. Keep in mind that I don't normally take pics when in the twisty stuff, especially at the pace Steve was setting.
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It didn't take us long to get lost. Well, since we had gas in our tanks we weren't actually lost ;D
We stopped at a three way intersection when a local in a car pulled up and talked to us. He told us about a really scenic set of waterfalls so we set off to see them. after a few miles of paved then gravel roads we came to a tree across the road. At the very left of the road the tree was on the ground and it looked like we could get over it. I joked that real riders would just wheelie over it.
The problem was we are old men, not "real riders" :D
We decided to turn around. Good thing because we had gone the wrong way and missed the falls anyway. So we went down the road to the falls.
We parked the bikes and headed for the falls.
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Good thing it's not a long hike because we weren't dressed for it.
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I took a bunch of pics. Here's a few.
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When we left the falls our plan was to go back out the way we came. We thought that's what we did but found ourselves on different roads:(https://advrider.com/f/styles/advrider_smilies/headscratch.gif) How'd we do dat:(https://advrider.com/f/styles/advrider_smilies/ne_nau.gif)
No problem. There are no bad roads around there.
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Eventually Steve figured out where we were and we ended up in Reliance. We took a break there and ended up talking to a local rider.
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Just before we left he asked if I was on ADV. It turns out he knew who I was and had read some of my ride reports.
I guess I have become an internet star: :D
We rode some more great roads and ended up in Tellico Plains where we had an early dinner at the Telicafe. We both had the country fried steak. If you are looking for a place to eat in Tellico Plains I highly recommend the Tellicafe.
Then it was back to the campground where we hung out, talked to some other campers and sat by the fire. There where a bunch of people there from Alabama but only ThumperKTM from the MA forum. The campground was reasonably busy but nowhere near as crowded as I had expected.
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It was a beautiful Saturday morning.
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I had to take another pic as the sunrise lighting was changing every minute.
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We had breakfast at CMTC then headed out for another ride. We were going to do Farr Gap, the gravohala, Tatum Gap and Porterfield Gap but changed our plans. With nasty weather on the way we decided that we would ride, eat dinner then pack up and head home before the weather came in. So we decided to do some local exploring. We started off the same way as on Friday.
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Then deviated from that route and did some great roads.
Did I mention there were some curves?
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I had been on a ride to this area many years ago while attending a KLR Rally. Cherokee Chuck led us to some really cool places that i hadn't been back to since that ride and really don't know where we went on that ride. I had an idea where to find a really scenic spot so we went looking for it. After some great twisties went found that spot. Looking down on the Hiwassee river from at least a couple of hundred feet up.
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Then we continued on. Beautiful scenery on a picture perfect day!
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Did I mention this was a fun road to ride?
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We did some more exploring. We checked out a dead end road just to see where it went. It got pretty nasty with big mudholes so we turned around before we saw where it went.
Coming back out:
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More exploring and another dead end.
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We took the dirt route up the backside of the mountain to the Chilhowee overlooks. I had only done that once and in the reverse direction. We had to just guess at a few forks in the road but we guessed correctly.
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Next up was trying to find the powerhouse on the opposite side of the Hiwasseee river that we had seen earlier in the day. After a long ride on some fun gravel roads we found it.
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On the right side of the picture was where we were earlier on the other side of the river.
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Heading back from the powerhouse I went ahead and set up to get some pics.
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We were cruising along on gravel roads when Steve noticed something down the mountain so we went and checked it out. I had seen pics of this old stuff before but this was my first time here in person.
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It's a dual sport ride so I had to get a water crossing shot.
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So what's this?
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I think maybe an old abandoned UFO/flying saucer landing site?
Yeah there's probably a more mundane explanation but I like the UFO landing site story better.
Another angle.
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GREAT ride report Winn....I hate I couldn't make it.
Yep, as usual a very great report!
I have been to that "UFO Landing" site thingy many years ago. Who ever lead the ride had a story of what it was built for but I'll be danged if I can remember what it is.
I DO remember the motorcycle I was on...my old H-D Springer. I was told that "If you get stuck we will leave you". :D
After hanging out a bit and not seeing any UFOs we continued our ride.
Lotsa gravel:
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Followed by some fun pavement.
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We were heading up 68 towards Tellico Plains when Steve decided to ride up to Buck Bald. We never made it there but rode down trail 82 to 68 instead.
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Then we had an early dinner at the Tellicafe again. That was three nights in a row for Steve.
After dinner we headed back to the campground and packed up our stuff. I'm glad we left a night early because later that night the weather turned to crap and the next morning was cold, gloomy and windy.
I only rode 225 miles for the weekend but they were all really fantastic miles, no droning on boring roads to get to the good stuff. It's all good stuff around there.
Quote from: springer on April 01, 2019, 08:15:03 AM
Yep, as usual a very great report!
I have been to that "UFO Landing" site thingy many years ago. Who ever lead the ride had a story of what it was built for but I'll be danged if I can remember what it is.
I DO remember the motorcycle I was on...my old H-D Springer. I was told that "If you get stuck we will leave you". :D
The gravel roads to get there weren't hard but it's still a long way for a street bike!
Just to prove I was actually there, a couple of pics Steve took with me in them.
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Always enjoy your reports, pics, and sense of adventure!
Great report as always. I got to get back up there to explore.
Thanks for sharing.