Fall in the North Carolina mountains

I went for a day ride with my friend Mark to Highlands, NC on 1 November, 2006. We left at 7:30AM and returned after 7:00PM, putting just about 400 miles on the bikes in the meantime. The weather was nice, a bit chilly in the morning, but warmed up in the afternoon. The leaves in the lower elevations were gorgeous, but higher up they had already fallen for the most part. We stopped in Highlands for a bowl of soup and a great sandwich, then rode a nice loop through the mountains before we had to head homeward. Here are a few pictures of our day. We only stopped once for pictures, though it was seriously beautiful country. I found the twisty roads a little difficult at first, but I soon got the hang of it. It was a very enjoyable day and I can't wait to go again! On a side note, this was the best test of our Chatterbox communicators to date and they worked great. Mark was able to go a bit quicker through the turns than I was, so he was out of sight for many sections of the ride through the twisties. But we were able to check up on each other every few minutes with just a click of a button. What a great invention.

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I had a couple of people ask me where we went so here is the basic route we took. We left Evans taking taking country roads to Washington, GA, then turned north on GA 17 to I-85. We turned right (east) on 85 for about 4 miles, then took GA 11 north to Walhalla where we turned left on 28, the Highlands Highway. That is where it got fun.