Copyright: Jurgen Brauer, Augusta, Georgia, USA
My oldest son, Jonathan, and I took a week-long motorcycle tour from Georgia through South Carolina to North Carolina to Virginia and West Virginia. We covered 1,750 miles in seven days of riding, five of them in driving rain and thunderstorms. Our rain gear got its workout, and the camera equipment stayed mostly unused.
Here we are starting from home. Jonathan, who just got his license, is on the left. He rides a 1991 Honda 750CB Nighthawk. I am on the right, riding a 1996 Honda ST1100. We drove from Augusta, GA, directly to Fancy Gap, VA (on I-77), and spent the night there. Next day we went on the Blue Ridge Parkway to Roanoke, VA and overnighted there. Next day, on we went to Waynesboro, VA, where the Blue Ridge Parkway becomes the Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park.
On one of the two sunny days, we set out to cover the Shenandoah valley and stopped by Luray Cave. The picture above is taken in the cave. It shows a lake inside the cave. The stalactites hanging from the ceiling are perfectly mirrowed in the lake water.
Some formations are alive, with water still building the stalactites and stalacmites.
An unusual sight. A fallen stalactite, several tens of thousands of years old.
The cave is awesome (but awfully commercialized and damaged by tourists and the company that "developed" it). Jonathan and I enjoyed the adjoining auto museum just as much. Here he is posing with a model lady, pushing a wicker baby stroller, aroud anno 1875.
A Daimler-Benz car, about 1880s.
Note the monocle windshield on this car.
A 1944 Ford delivery van. A quart of milk for 5 cents, and phone number 32? Different times, different world.
A Mercedes-Benz sports car.
Wild country side somewhere in Virginia.
Crabtree Falls off US 56 off the Blue Ridge.
Crossing the Shenandoah valley to West Virginia, we happened upon Green Bank, WVa, and quite by chance discovered the US National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO). The NRAO ( http://www.nrao.edu/ ) is located in a lovely, nearly depopulated valley, surronding by relatively high mountain ranges. The entire area is a "National Radio Quiet Zone," meaning that the NRAO has a strong say over radio, TV, cell phone and other signals permitted in the valley to reduce interference with the radio waves from the universe its scientists study. Above is a picture of the largest dish's focal point. The dish measures about 100x110 meter in diameter.
Just like car engines interfere with your car radio, they interfere with radio signals from the universe. Hence, the "no sparkplugs" sign.
A neat landscaping design feature ... The sun marker in the foreground is followed by those of Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars, each also marked by a colored flag (red, orange, yellow, green), the distance to the sun marker in proportion to how things are in the solar system. The Jupiter marker can barely been seen, that for Pluto took a bus ride through the grounds.
My ST1100 in front of the Seneca Rocks.
Lake Moomaw, about 30 miles or so from Covington, VA.
