Memorial Day Southern Adventures

Chris Buono is one of the best people you’ll ever meet. He’s always got a goofy, shit eating grin on his face and ready with a quick joke or comment on some girl walking by. He’s an ironworker, never went to college, got shitty grades in school and one of the happiest people on the planet and probably more content than you. I’ve met some people through my life that remind me of bits of Neal Cassady, the fabled main character of Kerouac’s “On The Road” and in Tom Wolfe’s “Electric Kool-aid Acid Test” but none even come close to Chris Oh No. The guy just goes like no one I know. He can read people on the spot, make friends with anyone while at the same time freaking them out a little.

He came out to my parents’ house in Fairfax to skate some of my favorite hills from when I was younger. I didn’t know where to start since I had less than a quarter tank of gas and all the hills are kind of boring. After an afternoon of skating some mellow downhill and hanging out, his desire to go swimming found our way into a river near Great Falls to test just how waterproof my GoPro is. We sat on the rocks talking about all our adventures from last year and about the ones not too far into the future. We’ve had some crazy trips and when we get together there is always something happening. We decided right then that there was no better way to spend our Memorial Day weekend than by being out in the mountains skating. During the trip we had an Atmosphere CD playing for most of Saturday with the beginning of the first track saying: “No poor bastard ever won a war by dying for his country, he won by making the other poor bastard die for his country.” It was a fitting theme for a weekend holiday celebrating our fallen soldiers who where supposedly fighting for the freedom we were thoroughly enjoying.

I was substituting for my old drum teacher for two days to help him out and get some money together for the weekend. The last lesson I was teaching was a middle aged gentleman who had just started playing and taking drum lessons. He was a typical white collar, middle class, white guy with exactly those characteristics as he tried to play drums. Sure he had just started but for some reason old white guys have the worst sense of music, especially drums. I often wonder if it’s some sort of genetic inheritance or if it’s because of the hundreds of years of standardization and scholarly approach of western music to be something left to professionals and not of the all encompassing, participatory nature of other cultures. If you notice all popular music of the United States comes from underclass African Americans. It’s probably not alright to say these kinds of things to this guy because it would come off as offensive to someone who’s clearly worked as hard as him to live in northern Virginia especially in the first few weeks of him learning to play.

I got out of the music store as soon as I could and headed towards the Unitarian church for a gathering of old friends with drinks and show and tell. I showed up with a six pack only to find out there was a huge stack of beer cases next to coolers filled to the brim. Hardly anyone was there and I began a conversation about skating with Van, a middle aged, Vietnamese music fanatic who was previously a rocket scientist and now hangs out and goes to concerts. Its always interesting explaining downhilling to people unfamiliar with it. There’s the string of questions you always get.
“ How fast do you go?”
“How do you stop?”
“Where do you ride?”
“What kind of safety gear do you use?”
“You’ve gone that fast!?”
“Are you out of your mind?”
I don’t see why people think it’s crazier than half the stupid extreme sports you see on TV. I suppose that most people don’t really pay attention to those things but the idea of doing a backflip on a couple hundred pound dirt bike over a 100 foot gap seems much more insane than going 60mph on a skateboard. The subject turned to LA when I brought up my recent trip. Everyone talks about Venice when they talk about their travels to LA or I just hang out with people who are sketchy hippy/artist types. All travelers to LA understand the gnarly canyon roads though and it’s easy to relate that to skateboarding for those not in the loop. It was good conversation as I drank some beers and loosened up. I don’t have conversations with people outside skaters and the people I live with very often so it was a welcome change.

After being at the party for a while, with more people showing up, I get a text saying that Keith Rabbleweiner is backing out on the weekend. My immediate reaction was “shit, now there’s just two of us for Saturday and riding one at a time is possibly the least fun way to go skateboarding.” Chris had thought of grabbing an extra person from the area just in case but now it was down to the wire to find someone willing to blow off his or her plans for the next two days and go on an adventure. It seems hard to find people willing to do that for any reason these days let alone for skateboarding. In the end you gain so much but that’s not how such an activity is seen usually. Most people we tried didn’t pick up or there was no chance of them coming. Chris got through to King while he was driving in to Fairfax and found him at a small party. After a good amount of convincing and interesting interaction with a skanky, pill head girl King was on board. He had three dollars, no skate gear and the clothes on his back.

By the time we got that sorted out the birthday party I was at was raging with people trading a guitar and microphone and a small harp recital. Nearly everyone I have known since high school was there and it was fun announcing that I had to leave. I hadn’t seen or talked to most people in a few months if at all and made rounds to everyone, saying good byes explaining that it was time to start a new adventure, which in fewer words means it’s more interesting and important than them. It makes me feel like the biggest asshole doing those things but there’s nothing I can do about it. I hopped in my car and booked it home through all the back roads I drove to get home from school years earlier. I had forgotten to tell my parents I was leaving for the weekend and walked in the door and first thing said I was going to be gone for two days.

As I packed the car and waited for Chris and King, I finally cleaned out the car from my last trip. I was getting antsy as I felt the beer in me getting processed out of my system. I wasn’t actually drunk before but had that urge to keep drinking. When they arrived the first thing we decided was that we needed beer for the night and had to get it before leaving since it was almost midnight. We went into 7-11 but that particular one didn’t sell alcohol. The clerk directed us to CVS with a few minutes to spare. On our way in we noted the silly beach chairs outside and away from the door so on the way out the obvious bad, yet great decision was made by Chris and we, or I should say he, now had outdoor seating for the weekend.

We decided to take the scenic, scary route out to Winchester. Driving through the fake, quaint little towns in the middle of the night is always creepy. I know they are inhabited by rich old white people that were probably government contractors and not actually nice communities like you would think or at least that’s how Middleburg is and the rest just seem creepy. There are stretches in between the towns where all you can see are the trees lining the sides of the road or old stonewalls that have been there for two hundred years. We drank a beer on the drive, taking our time and absorbing everything we were seeing. We stopped for gas at one point and as I pumped it King and Chris ran off to check out a cemetery and then came quickly running back after some creepy unnatural sounding noise startled them. We jumped back in and headed up the first big mountain pass that takes you into the heart of the Shenandoah Valley. You can see all the lights of night time Winchester off in the distance below you twenty or thirty miles away. It’s one of my favorite things to see in the world.

By the time we got into my house it was a little after 12:30 or maybe a little before 1am and no one was around but all the lights were on. It was a little creepy at first. We sat down to enjoy our beers and watch Sector 9’s short film Second Nature for the millionth time since getting it. Toward the end my roommates came home wasted and being good people. It was great to be back and Danny sat down and tripped out on what we were watching so we started it over. I played catch up after being gone for two weeks or so from the house but no one was able to stay up for long. I was exhausted and we all started to get ready for bed. As Chris was getting comfortable on the couch Jon leaned over him and said something like “Why can’t you just be gay” or “I’ll turn you gay yet,” which visibly freaked Chris out and had me giggling a little.

I set two alarms for myself: one at seven and one at seven fifteen. When they went off I managed to get myself up and dressed but when I got upstairs to find my sleeping comrades they were out cold and I could hardly see straight. I ended up going back to bed fully clothed with my shoes on until eight. I felt better on my second attempt and woke the others up. The first thing that needed to happen was get coffee in my system. We went to Sheetz and picked up some breakfast for the road and got on the highway. I had written down directions to a hill the night before. It was a run someone found last year that never got ridden since I dismissed it based on poor Google Earth skills. The road was five and a half miles long, the longest run in Virginia that I’ve found yet with an elevation change of over 500m.

After nearly two hours on I-81 we turned off on to I-64 and I looked at my directions. There were only two lines and I wasn’t sure if they were right since I was a little drunk when I wrote them. It said exit 10 for route 60 east but we were at exit 55 and there was 60 east so I took it doubting my drunk self. Well of course I was wrong and we ended up nearly back on 81 and in the town of Lexington, which was a sight but not nearly what we were after. We back tracked to 64 and started for exit 10, 45 miles away. I was getting frustrated since it was so much further than I thought and Chris was wanting to get out and ride everything we passed. Once we got off the interstate for good there was literally nothing around. It was beautiful country but there were only fields and mountains with the occasional farmhouse. I always wonder how people live out there like that. It’s a common conversation on these southern skate trips.

The road we were on snaked it’s way into West-By-God-Virginia for a minute and suddenly a huge beautiful brick building peaked out from behind a row of trees. It was a couple hundred feet long with four great porticos with big white columns. It was a simplistic take on ancient architecture. We had to stop and check this building out. There was no town, just this building and a few others that were part of a campus of sorts out in the middle of nowhere. The historical marker on the road read “Sweet Springs, Settled by James Moss, 1760. William Lewis bought the site in 1792 built the inn where he entertained Van Buren, Pierce, Fillmore and others. Thomas Jefferson designed the main building which was erected in 1833.” To stumble on something with this history isn’t that uncommon on the east coast, especially the south, but to do it in an unsettled area is odd. We walked around the building a little and found a four stair gap underneath the big balcony that we knew had to get skated so Chris grabbed his board and rose to the challenge for the camera. After getting the necessary shots we had to move on since it was around noon and we hadn’t found our hill yet.

A few minutes later we were finally driving up a mountain pass. The way up looked like it could be fun but was gravelly and had wet patches in places you don’t want to see. We drove down the east side that had gotten sun all morning and it was nice and dry with little sketchy pavement. The state line was the top of the ridge so we were back in my home state and finally getting to ride a mountain. King and Chris took a run and I wasn’t too impressed with the hill so I convinced them that we had to keep going. Who needs three miles of “meh” downhill when you can get five and a half over the next ridge? There was a small town called Paint Bank in the valley in between the two mountains with a sweet looking general store/restraunt all done up for the holiday weekend. The barbeque smelled great and there were tons of people there for being in a little valley and town called Paint Bank. If it wasn’t so late in the day I’m sure we would have stopped there and I still wish we did.

The way up the next pass was also pretty fun looking but when you know what’s on the other side you would probably keep driving like we did. There was a small forest road at the top on the left as you come around a right turn and then all of a sudden the trees go away from the road. You’re looking down a gently winding straight away open to the sky and looking over the valley. It continues like that for about a mile until you hit a never ending left hand sweeper that comes around on it self with green grass everywhere. The forest looked like it had seen a wild fire a few years before and was just starting to reconsume the area. There were rock faces and boulders jutting out along the rest of the run and if it weren’t for the trees it would have looked similar to roads in Colorado or California but the lush forest and gentle aesthetic gave the warm feeling you can only get in the south. It was five miles of long flowing straight aways into right left chicanes following the curves of the mountain.

We quickly drove back to the top to gear up and take the first runs down this beautiful stretch of pavement. As we were putting pads on a truck came out of the forest road and we got a friendly wave. It was an older retired woman in a burly truck with tall, thick tires for handling the sketchy forest road. She lived with her husband in the National Forest on 24 acres of land that they had purchased to retire on. We had a friendly conversation on how nice it must be to live out there and she wished us luck and safety as she delivered a package to a mail carrier.

Our first runs were fairly slow and surfy. Long straight aways can be made much more interesting by slaloming through reflectors and carving edge to edge when going more than 30mph. Chris was being a goof and getting as sketchy as possible balancing on one foot going around 35mph or hitting every cat-eye in the road for a period of time. It was a lot of fun messing around, I had forgotten what it’s like to not just tuck and go as fast as you can down a road. We knew we could tuck it and rail the corners but we chose to have as much fun as possible. King had a rough time on his two runs he took. On his first I passed him and started to slow down into the right-left I knew was the tightest and he passed me going into the left on a bad line and slid off the road. He was fine but on his next run he wobbled out riding my board while trying to foot break and took a pretty scary slide. I think his nerves were hurt more than anything else.

We had been using the Gopro mounted to the hood of the car but it was sketchy to get the car close enough to really capture anything. We were also taking it so easy it probably wouldn’t have looked very good. On the third run down I put it on my ghetto rigged boom cam for Chris to play with. It was my first real world test of it so I told him not to crash or else. He looked so A.D.D. with it the whole way down but figured out some really cool angles since neither of us had used something like it before. He chilled a little too much and went fairly slow, really carving it up and jamming on the hill so a lot of the footage looks rather uninspiring but you can see that huge Cheshire cat smile on his face the whole time. The next run it was back to me and him riding and I told him we were going to pass the camera off but I wanted to start with it. There was one bar of battery left which is how much each run took up so I thought we would cut it close getting the whole run. It ended up being the gnarliest and fastest run we had taken, with us tucking almost the whole thing and just playing with each other. We passed the camera more times than I can remember and were constantly passing each other as well. At one point we were shoulder to shoulder going 40mph, both holding the boom and yelling at the camera. Further down the hill I was trying to hand off the camera and Chris was jamming on every reflector down the straight as I gave it to him. We went so fast into the really tight right-left that Chris actually checked his board side ways for a second while I surfed it, drifting out little by little diving in on him with the camera. We got down to the flat section at the 4.5 mile point and I looked down to see the camera off so I had King pull up next to me and handed it off through the window to him before finishing out the run. When we went through the footage later we found out the camera died after the first thirty seconds and we got none of that run.

After that we drove up to an overlook and picnic area half way up the mountain and hung out for a little to decide our next move. We decided to drive to Roanoke to skate the roads we already knew and get a late afternoon lunch there. We rode the hill out and then jumped in the car and continued on this road I’ve never been on before but knew went to Roanoke eventually. It went through the town of New Castle, which I’d always seen signs for on 81 but never been to. On the outskirts of town we came across an evergreen tree that had hundreds of coffee mugs stuck on it. We had to make this detour to really look at it. Each mug had a date for when it was put on the tree and some were quite a few years old. We kept running into these odd things that you’d never find on the highway or the suburbs we came from. I’ve traveled all over the south skating but every trip I find new things like this.

We made it to Salem and I thought I knew where we were since the town melds into Roanoke with no clear boundaries. I saw signs for route 11 north and followed them hoping to find a familiar site as we got into Roanoke. We wanted to go to Sonic since it’s a tradition when we’re in town so Chris looked it up on his GPS. We got on the right road that led us to a run known as the vineyards and near the Sonic but when we reached our destination it was a different one than we usually ate at. It was one of the worst fast food experiences ever and we watched the manager make a drug deal in the parking lot while we were eating. King seemed fairly out of it and didn’t want anything more than one of the frozen fruit type drinks when we offered to get him food. We spent a while staring at a map trying to find out which way to go to find the vineyards and got directions from one of the cooks. We were on the right road we just weren’t sure of which way to turn.

We got back in the car and started out to skate one of the steepest gnarliest roads on the east coast. After about a mile I realized where we were and was finally capable of navigating. It was the first time all day I was off the highway and knew exactly where I was going. The vineyards were exactly as I remembered them from the countless times I’d skated the road. There was a lot of traffic because the winery was open at the top and my ankle still wasn’t strong enough to slide confidently to skate the road in a fun way. After one run we called it quits for our health and headed to Mill Mountain and the Roanoke Star. I made several wrong turns trying to get there through the city but found my way eventually. I drove Chris and King up the old road to the top to see how gnarly and narrow it is. When we got up to the big mansion where I thought the road ended we noticed it went over itself making a 270 degree turn with posts blocking you from driving any further. There wasn’t enough room to turn around so Chris skated down and I backed down nearly a mile of windy narrow road until the first hairpin. As Chris passed through the front of the other mansion on the hill a landscaper with a leaf blower stood staring at him in disbelief as he threw big predrifts into the two hairpins open to the front yard. It was great watching the guy’s reaction.

When we got back onto the road to the top of the mountain we found a downed tree blocking almost the entire road. We drove around it on the grass and got excited that we’d have a basically closed road to skate down. We spent a lot of time hanging out at the top of the hill underneath the giant light up star. The sun was going down and our legs were tired from the afternoon on the five mile run. On the overlook King ran into his former boss from the past semester. It was a funny coincidence to come across in the most random of places. We got a quick lesson on the history of Roanoke from the girl King’s boss was with, who works at Hollins University across the valley from our vantage point. Chris got out his beach chair and we sat in the grass looking down on the city while the colors in the sky got more and more intense. We could hear music coming from the center of town and debated checking it out or just going straight to Blacksburg when we were ready to go but settled on Blacksburg knowing Justin was waiting restlessly.

We got up after a while and took a walk around the area since we’d only ever spent time on the overlook but there was a small zoo and other things up at the top. We found another less used overlook down the path and then saw something amazing. It was the top of the road down to the mansion where the road goes over itself. We walked down to scope it out and found that it was the most gnarly thing we’d ever seen in our lives. It was wet and covered with sticks and leaves and then cars around the 270 that were in the worst places but we made plans to come back later in the summer and do some serious filming.

It was starting to get dark so we walked back up the mountain to ride the hill out. It was getting darker by the second as we rode down the first section. You come down to an intersection at around 50mph if you charge it and need to slow down to make sure there are no cars. As we slid into the intersection we saw a car turning around and noticed signs closing the road down to where the tree had fallen. What a great site to see as we were losing precious day light. We charged through the signs hoping King would figure out which way we went and go around the signs since he had no idea how to get around Roanoke. As we first dropped into the second section Chris said to still treat it like an open road since we had just gone around the tree before and others could do the same. Half way down the run I see him blowing by me in the other lane yelling “I’m treating it like a closed road!” We slowed up to go over a rough patch that we knew would be scary in the dark and cruised down a flat section. We came up on a clean up crew for the fallen tree and they just kind of looked at us as we went past. I waved and gave them a big grin then realized that King was driving behind us down a closed road by the people who closed the road.

As we got out of the woods and into the neighborhoods at the base of the mountain we started carving and sliding around enjoying the last ride for the day. The road bottoms out then goes up over a set of train tracks and a small river. I saw Chris make a turn down a ramp from the top of the bridge and I ran out of speed right at the turn. As I quickly threw my gear in the car Chris called out from down the ramp that we needed to come check something out. We got down to the back of this industrial complex and on the other side of a chain link fence was a train graveyard. There were a good number of these once powerful machines rusting away, a symbol of what brought Roanoke into existence now crumbling.

It was completely dark as we got back onto the highway to head for Blacksburg and Justin’s apartment. I decided we needed to call him to say we needed food, girls and beer. None of us had ever been to his place either so we needed directions or at least an address too. He agreed on the food and I said I’d get the drinks but he hadn’t gotten out much since moving back down for summer classes so he was unsure of girls. We stopped at CVS once in town and the roads and parking lot were soaked. We were hoping for dry conditions for Sunday so we wouldn’t die trying to skate the road we were after. As we followed the GPS directions we began snaking through a dark neighborhood in a part of Blacksburg I’ve never seen but I knew Justin lived in an apartment complex. The final destination on the GPS was a dark house with a car similar to Justin’s but something wasn’t right. After checking the address again Chris realized he put in the wrong address and we were on the wrong side of town. We found our way, parked and met Justin in the visitor lot and ran in and opened the beers.

We set up my laptop and GoPro to watch all the footage from the day and chill out. My legs were completely dead from riding the five miles down Potts Mountain all afternoon and sitting on a comfortable couch was the best thing in the world. Some of the footage was alright and Chris did a good job playing with the boom camera for his first time ever. We got to the last clip that was supposed to be our epic run of passing the camera and getting all sorts of sketchy and it was a really small file size. The battery died after 30 or 40 seconds just as I was getting into my tuck on the first straight away. We were so upset but were still stoked to at least have the memory and practice of playing with a camera and each other like that. Justin had mentioned something about a hot tub and pool that were open for another half hour so our thoughts shifted rather quickly. We grabbed beers and were out the door and across the parking lot.

There were two couples in the hot tub when we got there. They were stereo types of the kind of people I expect to see at Virginia Tech, the same kind that make me feel so out of place and give me looks when I’m on campus. The guys were the preppy, polo shirt wearing, seemingly assholes from the suburbs that are the reason for my discontent of Northern Virginia. The girls were an orangish color from tanning too much but had some great bodies. I couldn’t tell if they had much going on in their heads or not but that’s the last thing I was interested in after drinking some beers and getting into a hot tub after a day of skating. We all stripped down to our boxers since no one was prepared for swimming, even Justin whose place it was. At first it was awkward and the girl I sat down next to moved over in between her boy friend and the other girl as I scooted closer to make room for the others. I thought it was kind of funny since I knew how dirty and crazy we looked and after drinking a few beers I’m sure me and Chris were yelling without realizing it.

We talked amongst ourselves for a little until someone questioned Chris’s tattoo or commented on one of the girl’s tattoos. Chris got up and showed the work on his leg and then the one just outside of his pubes. One of the girls caught it and cracked up hysterically making the rest of them want to see it. The tattoo is simple font that just says 100%, which led into Chris explaining that we were downhill skaters. “You gotta give 100% no matter what you’re doin, whether it’s in bed or skating down big mountain roads where it’s life or death.” Then we got the normal run down of questions from them and drunkenly talked ourselves up a little bit. As we started talking about injuries after noticing King’s really messed up looking arms I explained that Justin should be dead after his crash. I listened as Justin told his story and they intently asked questions in the most sincere tone they’d used since we got in the hot tub. Chris mentioned that we should have brought the GoPro but just pointed it at the girl’s tits and used that as the interview we were there to do with Justin. People love hearing stories like Justin’s. So many people just live vicariously through the horrible news stories and action in movies and TV shows that they don’t get out to experience.

Eventually our new friends got out and left. On their way Chris noticed the intense tan lines on one girl’s ass and called out “I like your tan lines!” She called back “I like your beard,” thinking it was me who yelled to her. I just said thanks and let it go and we laughed to ourselves. I was the only one who brought more than one beer so Justin made a run to grab a backpack of beer for us all and came running back. I got up to pee and get another beer. When I got back out of the pool house Chris starts telling me to check out this bug in between the hot tub and pool. On closer inspection it’s just a leaf and I’m in the air with Chris’ arm taking me down into the pool. I let it happen saving my ankle a lot of pain and holding my beer out so it wouldn’t get shaken up. Apparently while I was peeing everyone had jumped in the pool and they had to get me in somehow. I saved my beer and the pool felt really good actually so I couldn’t be mad about it, I was already wet anyway. As we finished the last of the beers we brought a guy comes out to tell us that the pool area is closed, there was no alcohol allowed and we had to leave.

We had our fill of water and it was time for some food anyway. Me and Chris hung out with the case of beer on the balcony while Justin and King were making food inside. We drank a couple while examining our lives, as we often do, talking about the girls that have been in our lives and how everything fits together. Justin lost his keys and ran back to the pool twice to find them and on the second time cut his foot on a bunch of glass in the parking lot I had warned everyone about when we walked in earlier. As we sat down to eat we put in the Second Nature DVD and watched it again with Justin, inspiring us all once again. As the film ended we all were on our last leg and had to get to sleep. I spread out on the floor with a blanket as my pillow and nodded off.

When I woke up to my alarm I realized that I didn’t want to get up and no one else probably did either so I went back to sleep for another hour like the day before. I spent some time not making any noise unsure of whether to wake everyone. After going to the bathroom I decided it was time for coffee and skating. I just started saying skateboarding in everyone’s ear to wake them up. Justin got up and made a full pot of coffee and we cleaned up the apartment. To make room in my car we took all the unnecessary stuff and put it in Justin’s then made our way to 7-11 to grab some quick eats for the road and lunch. The destination was Mountain Lake, which is Justin’s home turf and the gnarliest mile and a half I know of on the east coast. The first mile is 55mph sweepers and the second half is technical turns that require big slides at 50mph or so. We saw so many cops on the highway pulling people over at speed traps, giving me bad feelings. When we finally got to the top of the mountain ready to ride we see a big inflatable arch over the start of the run, cones separating the road and people everywhere. It was the day of a big uphill bike race so there was no chance of us riding. I drove up to the hotel to turn around since I’d never driven around more than where we skate before. I never realized it’s actually a little resort out in the middle of the mountains.

We had come all that way so I turned around and let everyone else get out and pad up to ride the mellow side of the mountain back down. King got on the third board of the weekend for him and I watched him take it real easy, doing big pendulum slides when he got unsure of what the road was going to do. We got to the bottom and walked over to a covered bridge to examine it and decide what we were going to do with our day now that our plans were screwed. The bridge had clearly been there for a long time by the way all the wood was clearly cut by hand tools. I made the decision to head towards 81 and either go to Roanoke or Chris was pushing for Potts Mountain again. As we got back near Blacksburg I remembered a run I skated once last year on the way back from North Carolina outside of Floyd. We quickly put Floyd into the GPS and it was only 30 minutes away. It was a little after 11am and I ate my lunch while driving. I started explaining how we found this road while driving up the Blueridge Parkway on our way home. We were just looking for any twisty interesting look road that intersected with the parkway and eventually stopped for lunch at this little diner that we were the only people in. We were on day five or six of a skate trip and I had on my craziest shirt and we were all dirty and a little crazy. The woman who clearly ran the place asked us our story and when we said we were downhill skaters she told us to turn left out of the parking lot and drive three or four miles and we’d find a really nice run that some guy had skated a while back. That guy happened to be Bert from North Carolina and the run happened to be full of super fun banked turns for 3.5 miles.

While on route 8 headed towards Floyd we came to the top of what looked like a big hill and Chris immediately asked me to stop so he could skate it. I screeched to a halt pulling into the gravel shoulder and yelled at everyone to hurry. It ended up being a 45mph bomb for about a mile, nothing too special. We got into the town of Floyd and it’s another one of those small southern towns that looks unchanged since the 50s. We finally made it to the road and drove down to scope it out and show everyone the steep banks in all the corners. There’s one really crazy left that you could dive all the way inside into a cement drainage ditch but it would be asking to get destroyed by a pack of motorcycles or someone’s hot rod, of which there were plenty because of the holiday weekend. We went back to the top and geared up in the parking lot of a tiny Baptist church that was letting out. I called skating first run since I’d driven for two hills already in the morning. I was grooving on the song in my head as we were ripping through corners, dancing down the straight aways. We got in a few runs, really starting to warm up to the road when we were waiting at the top as people were peeing and saw a cop car drive down the mountain. We waited a while, enough time to make sure he’d be long gone by the time we started our descent.

I decided to bomb it pretty hard and Chris started to follow as we came into the first turn, a really long standing left. Then it sweeps right into a long, steep straight that shoots you up to 50mph before hitting banked turn after banked turn with right left chicanes one after another. As we came into the straight I kept tucking since my legs were tired and I wanted to get down faster but then I heard a siren. I looked back and saw blue lights passing Justin driving the follow car. I threw a big slide to stop and jumped into the grass as Chris stopped next to me while King did a big pendulum using both lanes a few feet in front of the cop car. We all stood half smiling, half pissing our pants as the cruiser came to a stop with Justin pulling in behind him.

The cop got out and was immediately yelling at us. “Are you guys trying to kill yourselves? Do you realize how stupid you are?” He looked at King and said, “You don’t even have all your pads on what is wrong with you boys? I need all your ID’s right now.” I fished mine out of the console of the car while Chris dug his out of his pocket. King didn’t have his wallet because he wasn’t expecting to be in Floyd on a skate trip. “Don’t you know what you’re doing is illegal? Don’t you?” He looked at me and I wanted to argue with him, “it’s no different than a bike,” Is what I wanted to say but what came out was “I don’t know…” Chris gave me the look of “shut the fuck up dude, don’t fight him right now” and spoke up saying, “Yeah we know it’s illegal.” “So why are you doing it then?” “Because it’s fun,” I answered.

After the cop ran our names he came back cooled down and a little more reasonable. After Chris mentioned that we race and are pretty serious about skating he understood why we were out there. He was mostly concerned with our safety because of all the motorcycles and cars cutting the corners raging up the hill. It was a pretty valid point since the traffic was heavy. He said he had to write us all tickets anyway but all he could give us was “playing in the highway.” Justin got off without any charge since he was driving even though the cop knew he’d been skating since his kneepads were still on. He started telling us that we should close the road down and have a legit event but there was an even better road a couple miles away on the other side of the county. He got out maps to show us what it looked like and how to get there. Officer Dillon ended up being really chill and before we parted ways he said, “Hell, I don’t really give a shit anyway.” He gave us his card and told us to contact the county Chamber of Commerce about tying in our downhill event with an already existing festival. We got in our car and headed for the Blueridge Parkway to find our way to this supposedly better hill.

While driving the parkway we were stuck behind a few slow cars and had motorcyclists looking pissed off behind us. One guy started doing wheelies and revving his bike real high and then finally they made a move to pass over the double yellow. I pulled over to let them go ahead and have one less car to over take. We ended up catching back up with some of the bikes again and all off a sudden a car slammed on it’s brakes trying to turn into a campsite they almost passed. The bikers behind had to slam on their brakes but one guy had to swerve around the car as his back wheel locked up and he ate it into the ditch on the opposite side of the road. We stopped for a second to make sure the guy was alright, his fingers looked broken and his beautiful custom Harley was a little banged up. The woman driving the car got out and started making it seem like it was the bikers fault even though she was the lost one that slammed on her brakes. We left once we saw things were manageable and wondered if Officer Dillon was going to be the cop to show up.

I missed the turn for Squirrel Spur road, our destination, because it was kind of hidden and turned around in a field to find the turn. The road sign was barely visible through the woods and it didn’t look like the road went down any mountain. We drove through a bunch of fields and a few houses. There was a run down, overgrown, droopy house with big wrap around porches and balconies that I offered to sell to Chris as a fixer upper for five dollars. It was a teasing road that kept antsy King and Chris thinking we were on the hill but it was just little ups and downs. Then you could see over the edge and we knew it was the top of the hill. The pavement changed at the top to beautifully smooth, gray asphalt. There was a long left sweeper then a steep straight into a big right hairpin followed by a gently winding straight away you could get going stupid fast into the next section of banked left-rights. The road was real open to the surrounding incredible forest scenery. We drove back up to pull into an over look and do a video interview with Justin and check out the view.

As we got out of the car an older man on a motorcycle pulled up. He took off his helmet exposing his tan, wrinkly, leather face. He had a loose fitting blue denim button-up shirt on and was taking a sign out of a cardboard casing to hang on the bulletin board of the overlook. It was a sign for a mountain music heritage trail that I had seen in Floyd and some of the other small towns we’d driven through around the area. I asked him what it was all about and in a raspy voice explained the community effort to keep the old southern mountain bluegrass alive. He knew we clearly weren’t locals and asked what we were doing. As we explained downhill skating to him he was interested to see our boards and we started talking about our run in with officer Dillon. The man we were talking to ended up being the county supervisor for Patrick County, VA and we started pitching the idea for have a race on this road. We talked about how much the motorcycle enthusiasts enjoy the road as a few guys on crotch rockets flew up and down the road during our conversation. We exchanged information and turned our talk to the valley below and places to swim. He gave us the run down of things to do in the county and pointed out aspects of it from our overlook showing us another county officials house and the road to a swimming hole.

Our new friend went on hanging his sign and we set up a shot for the interview with Justin. It’s weird trying to interview someone like Justin, who I’ve known for so many years and already know the answers to the questions I should ask so I don’t know where to start. It was a cool experience and came out pretty well for taking a whole ten minutes. After that we got in the car and began the search for the creek we were given directions to. We decided to take the more interesting way, which took us down a windy, scary gravel road through the woods. I played around a little drifting the car through turns. We went by the house that was pointed out from a thousand feet above and saw a guy on a moped next to a small creek. It was really pretty in the mid afternoon sun being tucked into the folds of Appalachia with few people around and greenery surrounding everywhere except for where it runs into the sky. We got to an intersection with a narrow one-lane asphalt road that ran parallel to the creek we were trying to swim in. Along the road were small cabins for people to enjoy the feeling we were having and there were a few private picnic areas next to the creek with people relaxing on their holiday weekend, drinking, cooking out and watching their kids be kids.

We came up on a nice spot with a few people and a place to park that clearly wasn’t anyone’s private spot. As we walked down the path to the water we were greeted by a woman cooking on a camping stove. Chris was ahead of all of us, already talking to her. We stuck out a bit but everyone was super friendly and drinking. The lady introduced herself as Sheila saying “everyone’s down the way drinking beers and carrying on.” It was a beautiful seen of southern America enjoying it’s day off. There were a couple of families there and it was hard to tell who was related to who. A girl who looked no more than 17 had a beer in one hand, cigarette in the other with a bunch of piercings. Chris started tripping out on the scene saying things like, “Realize that this is how the majority of our country lives. We’re so used to just seeing the two coasts which is really just like fifty miles wide but then theres all the stuff in the middle and most people are actually like this.” It’s true though, there’s a lot of nothing in the middle filled with good people just living their lives. It was the heart of America we were looking at.

The creek looked pretty shallow and was really rocky from what I could see. We started getting egged on by a rather drunk guy who looked oddly like Jeff Foxworthy, telling us to do a back flip off the big rock across the creek. We walked around in the stream, throwing rocks in the crisp cold mountain spring water before Chris made the command decision to strip down and get in. I was the first one to find out how deep the water got by taking one step and falling into a pool that had to be eight or nine feet deep. Chris dove in and scaled the boulder to jump off. It looked fun but my ankle was swollen and too weak to make the climb. The Jeff Foxworthy character was saying there was no way he was getting in the cold water but after a while I saw him walk up in swim trunks, put down his beer and do a race dive into the shallow water, swimming to the big rock. He first did a big dive from the top of the rock then got back up and did a backflip. The guy was wasted and having the time of his life. An older woman joined him up there and jumped off too. King made his way up the rock and did a can opener and was going to do a backflip. As he was walking around on the now wet slanted surface of the rock trying to set up for his trick Chris turned and said, “Wouldn’t it be funny if he just fell on his ass.” “I was just thinking that same thing!” Sure enough right after that was said he slid on his ass and managed to jump off the rock before sliding all the way in, just barely getting far enough to not hit the submerged parts of the rock.

The water was cold to the point that if you didn’t move enough it would start tightening up all your muscles, making it hard to move and giving you shivers. I felt bad since Justin didn’t get to skate much so I thought we should go skate even though the swimming and people were great. I was cooled off and done with the water. We had to ride the hill we were just checking out at least once otherwise we couldn’t live with ourselves even though the trooper who ticketed us knew we were there and could drive by and screw us over even more if he caught us. King took the car both because he was beat up and so if we did come upon Officer Dillon that he wouldn’t get another citation. It was a fun run that we just mostly chilled on. Once we got down the big straight away and into all the turns I decided to step on the gas and caught up to Chris by cutting the lanes on a left and then we went the rest of the run playing back and forth railing banked sweepers. We got to the bottom, jumped in the car super quick and stopped in a church parking lot to repack the car and take off our pads.

There sun was in a late afternoon position giving off a more golden light, making the landscape more dreamy now. There was another way to get back to Floyd that went around the opposite way we came and back up the road we were skating earlier. After consulting a map we began our trek to Blacksburg. We got turned around in some small town at one point because the highway dog legged and I was scouting out a hill and it started to rain once we got through Floyd and on our way to Christiansburg. We got lucky that it didn’t rain any other time since there was a consistent chance of it all weekend. When we got into Blacksburg we were thinking about dinner and as we passed a Bojangles I mentioned I’d never eaten at one, which meant we had to turn around and go there. After eating we went back to Justin’s to drop him off and grab the things we’d left behind. We found out there were some beers left over somehow so we grabbed those for the road. I said my good byes to Justin and we all made plans to come back down for our court date and make a weekend out of it.

It was a long drive back with a couple of stops that I usually don’t make. I filled up the gas tank and grabbed an energy drink to go with my beers before rolling out of Blacksburg with the clouds parted and the sun setting. It’s usually a four hour drive straight through but we had to make at least two pit stops to pee and stretch, which I’m unaccustomed to. I usually just power through the drive home on these trips, set on getting home as quick as possible so I can be in a bed. When we finally got back to my street and Chris’ truck it was 12:30am and I was just about delirious. I walked inside and set some stuff down near the front door and got an icepack for my ankle. As I made my way to the steps I ran into my mom who was investigating the noise I was making and I mumbled something about going to bed. Once my head hit the pillow I was out and the weekend was now just a dream in the back of my mind.