First day of Riding!

So today's ride was awesome!  I met John at his house in Canal Winchester and we left around 9:30 AM.   We took Rt. 33 southeast all the way to Athens, home of Conor's school, the Ohio University Bobcats.  Traffic was heavy because school is letting out for the summer break.   Conor finished up and came home yesterday.  He's almost ready to graduate and we are very proud of him.  

In Athens we hopped on Rt. 50 and basically rode it all day.  There's John leading the way.  

We stopped and had lunch at Shemps in Cairo, WV.  What a cool town and lunch was very tasty.

When we parked across from Shemps, Curt the owner came out and greeted us.  He remembered me when I stopped in 1.5 years ago.  The place is very busy and him and his wife Katie have expanded the business and food.  If you are ever in Cairo, stop and check out Shemps.  

John made a new friend.  Buy 10 pizzas and get one free!

We checked out an old hardware store across the street.  There is a Lambretta scooter in the front window so we knew it had to be cool. I asked if the had any pliers as I needed to adjust a peg on Red Velvet.  The guy behind the counter said sure and showed us his workshop, and he used to work for Vespa.  What a cool shop and I got Red Velvet back up to spec.  

A little blurry but there is a nice Suzuki 185 the with all the other 2 strokes, but it has a snake skin seat. My dad would like that bike!

Back on the road again, we eventually passed through Clarksburg, WV.   Cathy grew up there and this is a picture of the church we were married in, back in 1989.  

Once we got through Bridgeport, WV, the riding got fun and the road turned from 4 to 2 lanes. 

Cool road sign.  I want to live on Dragstrip Rd.  

The road got really fun and I was having a blast and John was keeping up!  Our pace was just right...wow the roads are curvey and climbing up or going down a mountain for hours and hours.  

We stopped here for a few minutes.  The cow on the roof caught my attention. 

That's John back there.  

Lots of bikes were out today. Me and John both thought we saw more riders today than any other time. 

So we road hard and made it to Winchester, VA and lucky us, the Apple Blosom festival was in full swing.  Wow it was packed.  So we headed down Rt. 522 towards Front Royale, VA.  We had every intent to camp out but the campgrounds were full...dang it.  So we got a room at Super 8 and had dinner at a lovely restaurant, called Mill on Main st.  Our view at dinner was this...a neat location in Front Royal.  Tomorrow, we start the Skyline Drive south via the Blue Ridge Mountains!