Got up and got a shower around 7.  Willville has a great bathhouse, clean, with good water pressure, big showers and plenty of hot water.  Will started the campground from scratch just a few years ago, so everything is new.  It is also wonderfully located, only about a mile from the Parkway, and 2 miles from Mabry Mill.  Will brings in chicken and sausage biscuits every morning around 7, and puts on a big pot of coffee.  That day, Will, Butch, Nelson, and I sat around munching on our breakfasts and talking roads.  I had asked Will last night to suggest some places to ride, so he began outlining some of his ideas as we ate.  Everything sounded wonderful.  Then, almost as an afterthought, he mentioned a place called Burke’s Garden.  “What’s that”?  “Well, it’s a crater about 9 miles wide that the locals call God’s thumbprint.  When the Vanderbilts first came south to build the estate that became Biltmore, their first choice was Burke’s Garden, but the locals wouldn’t sell.   It’s still kind of undiscovered.  There are only two roads in, one paved, one gravel.”  Well, that did it for me.  I had to go there.  Will gave me directions, and I was on the road by 9. 

I remembered 58 from a previous trip here with Eric, and it got really good west of Independence, tight and twisty and very fun.  In some places the hawthorn had grown so thick that I felt like I was in a canyon.

I got to Damascus, a funky little hiker town, at about 11:30 , a tad hungry.  “A good time to beat the lunch rush” I thought, and a cool little town like this would certainly have a place for me to check my email.  I looked for a place that advertised Wi-Fi.  I rode the whole town and found nothing.  I finally pulled into a parking lot and checked my cellular reception, thinking I could log in to the net with the phone.  The signal was very weak, so decided to press on.  I backtracked on 58 to 603 to 16, and took 16 all the way to Tazewell.  Heading through, and north of, Hungry Mother State Park, 16 rocked.  This is a first rate motorcycle road, with long runs of steep switchbacks and hairpins. 

Lunch finally came in Tazwell at a Subway where I checked email and returned calls.  From there went I went to Burkes Garden, which was as beautiful as I had been told.  It reminded me a bit of Cades Cove.  Great road going in (from the north), and dirt going out. 

From there, I  set a route back to Willville, which took me past the Mt. Walker lookout.  Got gas and a bottle of scotch in Wytheville, then decided to take 21 south, which was indirect, but I still had some daylight left.  Ended up in Sparta, 18 back to the parkway (very little traffic), and to Thunder Ridge Road.  By this time, I didn't feel like stopping anywhere to sit down and eat dinner, so I hit at a little store just as they were closing at 6:50.  I bought some canned ravioli and a bar of dark chocolate, and went back to the campground.  Butch and Nelson were gone, I would have the campground all to myself tonight.  I heated the ravioli on my camp stove.

Temps today were 50-80, mostly overcast but had some blue sky at Burkes Garden.  310 miles today.

As I was leaving the bathhouse after my shower, Will called out “Have you seen that movie, Wild Hogs”?  “Nope”.  “I’ve got it on DVD, you want to watch it tonight?”  Turns out it was a pirated copy that someone had made with a video camera in a theater.  We could hear the audience laughing and see people getting up to go to the bathroom, but still enjoyed the movie. 
 

We talked motorcycles and the campground business and ate popcorn, and I hit the sack around 11.

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