My wife and I will be driving through Western North Carolina in February. We'll be on an informal recon mission looking at possible retirement and relocation areas. We've stayed a few days in Asheville on previous trips and really like that area. One drawback we've noticed (compared to our home in Minnesota) is there are nearly no bike lanes on streets or bike routes in the city. Streets and highways seem to have no shoulders. It looked to me like the climate was there but the infrastructure wasn't. The only real road bike area we found was the Blue Ridge Parkway and a member of this board advised me that the Parkway isn't all that safe since motorists are looking at the scenery and not at my Hi-Viz neon yellow jerseyed body on my road bike. This time, we plan to drive through Hickory, Boone, Weaverville and Waynesville. Anybody out there have any wisdom on how road bike friendly any of these areas are? Are there more road bike friendly sections in the Asheville area? Are we going to stand out from the crowd as soon as we open our mouths and "Up North" words come out?
We won't be riding on this trip so we don't need specific routes. The van will be full of baby crib, stroller and newborn materials for a soon-to-be grandchild in Georgia. Any wisdom you folks have would be appreciated.

LOTS of road cycling (and mtn cycling) options in the WNC area and upstate SC areas. I am in Greenville, SC, and we have a multitude of roads that are common roads for cyclists, and the motorists are fairly use to us being there. Our local clubs have many, many rides we do together, from one hour 20 mph burns, to long distance group rides for honour and glory! Your best bet for the Asheville area would be to check in with Liberty Cycles or other local Asheville area bike shops, and find the local ride routes, as well as the routes the local clubs ride.... then you can tune in to the routes that we all ride safely and enjoyably...... good luck.... Big John Greenville, SC

Check out the web site for the Blue Ridge Bicycle Club(blueridgebicycleclub.org) and take a look at the ride library.

I dont live in Western North Carolina but visit and ride there often. The mountain areas of the Southeast are devoid of bike paths. You just have to get used to riding on the roads with the traffic which really is not that bad. I live in the mountains of East Tennessee and would not trade our twisting mountain roads with any bland bike path anywhere. Most drivers are fairly reasonable and observant. I have ridden on the Blue Ridge Parkway many times and felt perfectly safe, at least as safe as anywhere else other than on a trainer in my house. Good luck, it truly is a great area

Check out the Winston Salem Lewisville area. I live here and ride quite frequently. WE have training rides that go out almost every night in the summer with anywhere from 15 to 75 people. The riding is quite good, pretty much any pace you desire is available. Before anyone blasts me for having groups sizes of 75, that is the number of riders that show up for training rides that are broken into A,B and C paced groups. If you are interested in more info. PM me and I'll try to help you out.

Ken

I live in Weaverville which is no different. There are lots of places to ride on the road minus bike lanes. The BRP is ridden all the time by cyclist and you are as safe as what you make yourself visible.

I wear bright cycling clothing and use a blinking light on my road bike. It's common sense. Also, the FBR is a favorite route for alot of bikers and past pro's here. I ride it from my house and it is a great scenic view with climbs if you prefer.

I live in Lenoir, about 1 - 1 1/2 hours from Asheville. We have a great local scene here and the roads in this area are lightly traveled. Nearby, we have the clubs in Boone, Wilkesboro, Hickory, and Morganton. We are central to all four of them. Great place to ride here. Check it out.

Some great advice from you folks. Thanks! It looks like our route in WNC will take us right through Lenoir so we'll check that out as some have suggested. For MSHERON, I know what the BRP is but I don't know what the FRP is. It confuses the CRaP out of me! For KONAKEN, the size of your ride groups sound astounding. I'm a daily commuter and a weekend rider so my group size is never more than two and that seems like a crowd. Finally, thanks to you all for advice about the Parkway. It would be a shame to have this magnificient asset and be afraid to use it.

Here's the road report for Northwest North Carolina, including the Boone area:

-Bike lanes are virtually non-existent. The busy main highways can be unpleasant places to ride.

BUT

-There are tons of lightly travelled secondary roads in the area...many of them are scenic and some are pretty steep in spots. To second the poster from east TN, there's no way I'd trade these roads, for all their faults, for some "modern" bike-laned thruways. Our back roads have soul!
-The Blue Ridge Parkway, contrary what you were told, is a wonderful place to ride, assuming you are fit enough to handle the hills. The Parkway offers off-the-charts scenery and challenge, all on a road with no commercial traffic and a 45 mph speed limit.

If you have questions about the area, Boone Bike and Touring, Magic Cycles, Biking Buddies and the Brushy Mountain Cyclists Club all have forums where you can post questions. The area's only club is BMCC in Wilkesboro, but there's tons of folks riding in Boone.

Some web links for you:

Boone Bike and Touring Forum http://www.boonebike.com/forum.html
Brushy Mountain Cyclists Club, Wilkesboro www.bmcc.us (http://www.bmcc.us)
BMCC Rider's Forum www.bmcc.us/phpbb (http://www.bmcc.us/phpbb)
Road Cycling the Blue Ridge High Country website (some photos and info to inspire you) http://blueridgebiking.tripod.com

Have a great trip!

I spent a few days in the Andrews/Murphy area last year. The riding was excellent when you avoid major highways. There are lots of back roads that offer great cycling.

Only problem is if you hate being rural for the everything else in your life you won't like how far out you are. On the other hand if you like rural you would be happy.

Only problem is if you hate being rural for the everything else in your life you won't like how far out you are. On the other hand if you like rural you would be happy.


I would say Asheville would have just about anything most people would want

I am sorry, I meant the Andrews/Murphy area as being so rural that you may not like that area if your use to having alot of things on hand.................the Asheville area has anything that you could want.

I am sorry, I meant the Andrews/Murphy area as being so rural that you may not like that area if your use to having alot of things on hand.................the Asheville area has anything that you could want.


You are right, Murphy/Andrews is pretty far from a decent sized city such as Asheville or Chattanooga TN

You are right, Murphy/Andrews is pretty far from a decent sized city such as Asheville or Chattanooga TN

Which is a good thing for sure, imho(hence the great riding).

..Brevard is better(that is if'n you need a city close by) maybe since your right smack dab in the middle of the best mtb trails(290 miles) east of the Miss River. And also near the Parkway etc...but also near Asheville(40 miles maybe?).

If I could not live where I do now (Tellico, Tn), I would not be the least bit depressed about having to move anywhere in Western North Carolina. After all, I pretty much live out in the middle of nowhere myself. A few years ago before I moved to Tellico I almost relocated to Balsam NC, a very beautiful place.

I've been riding in the Asheville/Hendersonville area for the last few years. There are no bike lanes to speak of, but the two lane roads are wonderful. Traffic is not too bad, and drivers for the most part are fairly courteous. The scenery is great, and I love being able to leave my front door and go for as long a ride as I want(or as long as my wife lets me!). The FBR is the French Broad River, a popular route that goes between Asheville and Marshall. Good Luck on the move.

The best place for road cycling in NC is...in SC. The Greenville-Spartanurg area is known as a hot bed for world class road racers like George Hincape and is actively trying to further enhance its status among cyclists.

Check out this link:
www.biketownspartanburg.org

Also this item from the Greenville paper:



>Professional cyclist George Hincapie of Greenville says he expects
athletes from around the country and foreign countries to buy
property at a high-end residential development and performance
training center that he and partners plan in northern Greenville
County. Hincapie and Greenville developer Ron Vergnolle said
Thursday they are planning the 300-acre development -- called Pla
d'Adet -- along Wood Hayes Road off Old U.S. 25. They said it would
include a 35,000-square-foot training center with a weight room,
indoor pool, aerobic studio, indoor cycling studio, spa, dry sauna
and media center. It would also include a hotel, conference center,
bicycle shop, restaurant and two four-mile tracks outside, one for
cycling and the other for mountain biking and trail running, they
said.
>
> The development would also include 20 1,800-square-foot chalets
that will be commonly owned and available to property owners for
their guests. Hincapie and Vergnolle said they hope to sell 85 two-
acre lots in the development priced between $500,000 and $1.2 million
each. The name Pla d'Adet (pronounced PLAH-da-day) is taken from
the place in the Pyrenees mountains of southwest France where
Hincapie won one stage of the famed Tour de France race in 2005.
The development would be the second high-end residential development
planned for northern Greenville County that's affiliated with a
celebrity athlete. The other, The Cliffs at Mountain Park, is under
development near the intersection of U.S. 25 and State 11 by the
Cliffs Communities Inc. in conjunction with legendary golfer Gary
Player. The Pla d'Adet property is near the "Bakery Run," a route
popular with Hincapie and other cyclists that runs along Old U.S. 25
through the 29,000-acre property preserved to protect
> the North Saluda Reservoir as a water supply. The route ends at a
bakery in Saluda, N.C. Vergnolle, president of PHC Communities LLC,
a residential development company, said he's close to meeting a pre-
sales goal necessary for the development to be feasible. "We have a
group of potential buyers flying in this weekend to look at the
property," he said. "We believe we'll be attracting buyers in large
part from the Southeast, but we know of at least 30 potential buyers
we've identified as far away as New York." Vergnolle said he's also
scheduled to talk to potential buyers at the Tour of California, a
pro cycling event next weekend. He said he plans an official
groundbreaking on the development the weekend of the U.S. Pro
National Championships, a pro cycling race scheduled for Greenville
in September. "I believe that this community is going to put
Greenville in the focus of cycling nationally in the country,"
Vergnolle said. The development is designed to appeal to
> athletes involved in "performance training" -- cyclists,
triathletes and marathon runners -- although anyone can buy property,
Vergnolle said. His company has developed numerous residential
developments in Greenville and northern Florida, but its plans for a
20-story office and condominium tower in downtown Greenville haven't
materialized. Vergnolle said the tower is delayed indefinitely
because of high construction costs. Hincapie has helped legendary
cyclist Lance Armstrong win the Tour de France seven times as part of
the Discovery Channel and U.S. Postal Service pro cycling teams. He's
also a four-time Olympian. Hincapie and Vergnolle identified other
partners in the project as Rich Hincapie, Hincapie's brother; Alex
Crawford, who owns PHC Communities along with Vergnolle; and John
Helmers, principal of Swiftwater Capital Management LP, a Greenville
investment firm. <

Now I realize that you are unlikely to want to have a home in George's development - but you get the idea. When the city of Greenville honored George after his win on Pla d'Adet in the Tour de France by holding a big parade and declaring the week George Hincape week, he was quopted in local media as attributing his improvement as a pro cyclist to living and training in the upstate of SC.

Other factoids:

3 organized night road rides per week during the winter (T-W-Th) in Spartanburg usually around 30 miles long.

A winter bike training league which had its 5th ride of the season last weekend - a 106 miler with 2-5 mile attack zones followed by mandatory regroups. These rides have been attracting over 100 riders each.

http://www.cyclecarolina.com/carolina/Photos/Trainingseries07/tabid/106/Default.aspx

Home of 3 good and reasonably friendly (to each other) clubs that cover the whole range of road riding.

www.foothillscyclists.com
www.freewheelers.info
www.greenvillespinners.org

Point of origin for one of the premier cycling events in the country - The Assault on Mt. Mitchell. http://www.freewheelers.info/assault.html

Yeah there aren't shoulders on some of the roads. That is coming. Basically they don't need em to store plowed snow in the winter. But check out the Palmetto Cycling website - the state is committed to an evolutionary migration of the roadways in that direction. http://www.pccsc.net/

Finally, 2 other really great things about Spartanburg are that if you ride south is is relatively flat and deserted and if you ride north it gets hilly - and if you go far enough it gets mountainous. Your choice. And it is still relatively inexpensive real estate-wise.

John

I f you say...............WNC has more former pro riders than anywhere in the area due to the terrain and excellent training routes.

WNC really is a great place to ride. Who wants to look at flat land when the real goal is to climb that mountain and once at the top bask in the fact you did it.

Ideally, I think you need a variety of different types of terrain. It is very hard to maintain your power consistently in steep rolling terrain - actually it is impossible. If you want to do time trial training steep rolling terrain is not very useful because you cannot maintain a target power. When I do TT training I look for a nearly flat loop with few side entrances or intersections. Also the flatter rides come in real handy for winter base building and recovery. Besides, this time of year there is a good chance of snow or ice on those WNC mountain roads and the roads south of Greenville-Spartanburg are clear essentially all year.

Many cyclists think that hard anaerobic efforts on short steep hills are more significant than they are. Yes sharp grades are important tests of strength but you need to be able to do that for an extended time at least 5-10 minutes and ideally longer. You can get some monster climbing rides in from Spartanburg - my all time was 130 miles and 17,000 feet!

The point is that Greenville-Spartanburg gives you a good base to approach all types of terrain , a very supportive and growing cycling community and a good quality of life.

I think the OP wants just mainly roads to ride that are safe was what I gathered. The mountains are almost ridable year round. Being from the arctic mid west our temps here are very tame for you. I'll admit this year has been a bit cooler in the low 20's and teens some with neg. temps. with the windchill but hardly any snow this year.

As far as wanting areas of flat land to ride there is plenty in the mountains on country roads that I ride alot. Most folks who only ride here every so often think it is all hills......wrong. More flats than hills can be found. The luxury of living here is that any flat your riding you can almost always take a side road once you know the area and tackle a hill or mountain of varying grades to suit your needs. You don't get that anywhere else within a hundred mile radius for the most part without riding another 50 miles.

I say you take a weekend travel to the areas you are considering and make up your own mind. I will say this to winters.......if you don't mind snow at times but hate ice storms stay away from the lower NC counties and into SC because most often they get ice before snow. And you being from a area that sees alot of snow you know that travel in ice is impossible and 2 feet of snow is more passable than the 1/4" of ice.

If you come this way let me know and I will show you areas in Asheville, Weaverville (where I live) and others in the mountains that offer great riding from your own house. I routinely leave my garage for some of the most beautiful flat mountain riding with optins to climb if I choose. No one else can boast that...............no bragging but that is why I chose this area as well.

I am not knocking the upstate SC area.............I actually love it there. I just hate when folks think that all we have are hills and mountains to climb with nothing else to offer. Like I say.............most that come here either are put on roads by recommendations from locals thinking they want to do climbing and they never see the flats that are abundant.

Tom-
Got your e-mail but was unable to e-mail direct to you. I would be happy to show you some areas of riding here in WNC and especially the Asheville/Arden/Fletcher/Weaverville areas. I live in Weaverville and love it. I am not down playing the upsate SC area but WNC has alot of flat areas and decent climbing areas.

I have several ride areas I ride.......some that I have to load my bike and drive 30 minutes away but still very doable. My home route is a 24 miler from my garage to the historic town of Marshall and back. One hour 20 minutes of pleasure riding and beautiful views.

Housing...............well depends on what you consider affordable and not. My neighborhood has a few houses for sale. Middle class neighborhood with people who are professionals and college educated. Not snobbish what so ever. We just try and keep a nice neighborhood. Getting ready to institute our homeowners association since we have fulfilled the convenants of the charter. Homes go from high 200K's to under 600K.

There is a forclosure that will take place in our neighborhood when you first come into the estates. Nice home the guy just got way under and did a second mortgage for what ever reason and could not swing it. It is probably a 2700 ft. + sq. ft. home. Like I said, I don't know what your looking for but I have some real estate friends that I can hook you into as well that are great and will help you find what you want.

Like I said................e-mail me direct and give me the time you will be coming through and we will meet up and show you the roads we bikers ride and if you stay the weekend I can even let my real estate contacts show you some homes if you wish. Just some old fashioned southern hospitality. Even can show you the best kept secret places to eat.

Talk to you later.

I really think that any of the areas that you originally mentioned are fine places to bike, and with the number of retirees, yankee invaders, halfbacks, etc.; your accent will fit right in! Once again, the area around Asheville is wonderful. I have to second msheron that you can ride as few or as many hills as you want. In my opinion the scenery is second to none and well worth the lack of bike lanes.