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.

TMMR 2

Jamie Reis’ TMMR outlaw last year was a great event and one of the best courses we raced on the east coast last year. This year looked like it was going to be even bigger and I was so excited coming into it. I won the event last year three or four weeks after spraining my ankle on a trip to Ithaca, Comet HQ. Here I am once again with a healing ankle injury from my trip to LA and going to race it again.


The past few months had been really hard to get through. School was more intensive than ever before, the winter was brutal for Virginia leaving me with nothing skatable for months and then I got injured to the point of not skating for the whole second half of the semester. There’s nothing worse than feeling like shit and not being capable of just going out and skating like usual. All I wanted was to be able to go ride down my favorite mountain runs with my good friends. So with that in mind, TMMR put all that shit in the back of my mind and reminded me why I love the life of skateboarding.

I picked up Justin “should be dead” Metcalf Friday night and headed out to stay the night at my house in Winchester. We stayed up way too late drinking beers and talking about the old days of our first races and then got up way too early to drive up to State College, PA. Saturday morning we both woke up before our alarms and Justin even pulled off a shower before I knew he was even awake. I amazed myself with my ability to roll out of bed on no sleep and immediately pack the car. We got coffee and breakfast from Sheetz and were on the road by eight.

Saturday was the novice race and some freeriding right outside State College. It was cool seeing a ton of young kids from all over show up, some even from my home town. Some kids had their parents drive them, which I thought was awesome since it was an outlaw race. It was fun messing around a little bit and shaking off some cobwebs from my legs while trying to not do something stupid to tweak out my ankle again. We sessioned one hill for a few hours with no problem then moved on to the race site down the road where we got the event off with a half hour to spare before the coppers rolled in. Surprisingly not many kids ate it through the one turn in the course. I think I saw two crashes, one of which was in the final. The final heat for the youngins was EPIC with two kids coming into the left 90 on top of each other and both going straight into the curb and off the road.

After the race we packed up and headed to Wal-mart and the beer store for supplies for the campsite/party. Liquor laws in Pennsylvania confuse the hell out of me. They have stores for hard liquor and wine, stores for cases of beer, and then bars and other stores can sell you a six pack or tall cans. It’s just one more thing on the list of reasons why I dislike that state. At the campsite Jamie had bought 120 hot dogs, a slew of condiments and the largest bag of pretzels I’ve seen in my life. The bag looked like it was for mulch or dog food or something. After setting up camp in the wrong spot and moving to the correct spot we pitched tents, opened the beers and partied all night. Justin made the mistake of passing out on the ground at ten and was subject to some of the funniest shenanigans I’ve seen. Waking up in the womens bathroom with hot dogs all over your face is probably one of the most confusing ways to wake up. In my opinion Blair won the party though but it’s arguable between him and the British dad who nearly fought this drunk camper dweller who was pissed that we were parked in front of his RV. It was an interesting night for sure.

I woke up to the sound of people screwing around and fell out of my tent and managed to tear down in a matter of minutes. It was a slow morning that desperately needed coffee and a substantial meal. Anton, J Raw and Anna, Justin and myself went to some little diner in the town near the camp site and had an awesome breakfast perfect for soaking up alcohol. We got to the race hill just before practice runs were started so we suited up and started bombing. I was worried about being able to stop after the finish line all weekend because my ankle is hardly strong enough to foot break and I didn’t want to slide my wheels since you need to rail the turns and otangs wear out way too quick. It took me the entire length of the run out to the T intersection at the bottom to stop while everyone else was a good 100 or more yards above me at the end. As well as stopping I hadn’t gone more than 35 or 40 since thanksgiving or something so I was a little sketchy for my first few runs.

During the first heats it seemed like there was a crash in every one on the first turn for some reason. Rob Mckendry ended up completely covered in mud because some kid took him out in his first heat. I was so sad about that because riding with Rob is always a fun time. He is by far one of the most interesting and entertaining people to be around and he’s got more stories than I could imagine accumulating in a life time. Last year he was in the final and it was Colorado versus Beast Coast and here Rob completely got shafted. I managed to push in front of everyone in my first heat, avoiding the pile up behind me. Luckily my push is still strong enough to keep up even with a weak ankle. My second heat had Will from Clutch and Sean Graves who are both fast and I was a little sketched at first. Will had something weird happen in the first turn that he just couldn’t explain and slid out. Me and Sean awkwardly went down the straight before the chicane almost side by side looking at each other to see who would take the lead into it knowing we were both moving on.

In the semi final heat Jamie mixed it up and I had Michael Rubin in my heat, who has been ripping unnoticed for some time now. He pushed out ahead and I ducked in behind him while the two kids behind us got a little tangled up in the first left, leaving one standing and us with all the room to just chill and move on together. The other semi final was similar but also disappointing. It had Alex Newton, Sean Graves, J Raw and someone else in it but Jeremy got taken out in the first left leaving Alex and Sean to move on. I always just want to see my friends on the podium and when a kid who rips as hard as Jeremy doesn’t do well at races it hurts me. That kid rips harder than probably anyone else on the east coast, no one knows it yet though.

The final heat was pretty epic. I wasn’t expecting to get past the second round with my ankle in the shape it was yet there I was standing on the line with my friends racing for the win. It was Sean, Alex, Michael and myself and everyone had a good push and the skills to ride this hill as fast as possible. I didn’t care at all where I finished I was just so stoked to be in the final heat again that it really didn’t matter. When we heard “go” that’s a different story though. I kicked as hard as I could but definitely had the weakest kick. Alex was out in front and Michael behind him with me and Sean next to each other going into the first left. I went wide giving Sean room to pass and then dove hard inside to get in everyones draft before the chicane. It was a mess of passing going on and I sat back and watched, air breaking before the right-left to see if anyone would go down and let the opportunity to pass arise since I was getting sucked in. There is a pretty substantial dip going into the last straight and I actually felt my unnecessarily long front kingpin hit getting out of it giving a quick wobble. Going down the final straight everyone else was basically three wide creating a huge air pocket for me to get sucked into. I flew past Michael and Alex with not quite enough steam to make it to Sean.

This was a great event that went off without a hitch and I have to thank Jamie Reis for putting it on. It takes a special kind of person to throw all this together and put up with a group of sketchy skaters complaining and being rowdy. I can’t wait for the next race in the Beast Coast series!

Final results:
1st Sean Graves
2nd Anthony Flis
3rd Michael Rubin
4th Alex Newton

VA to LA

A lot of my adventures start the same way, with me freaking out over school but my head is in the clouds day dreaming of getting picked up from the airport or stepping out of my car onto new terrain. It was no different this time, with my spring break plans firmly set on LA and mid terms out the ass leading up to it. The winter has been hell this year with more snow falling than in a hundred years. Two blizzards and a number of other storms later, the roads are still mostly covered in grit and sand leaving me with severe seasonal depression from a lack of skateboarding, hence the plane ticket to LA. I luckily got a quick glance at skating the weekend before, heading up to Harrisburg, PA with Dean Moriarty himself, Chris Ono. We didn’t get to skate much, or anything very gnarly, but we shredded whatever we came across with J-Raw, which always makes for a fun time. It was the affirmation of why I love skating and a cure for my depression.

After making it through an unnecessarily stressful week of midterms it was time to clean the house and bolt back to my parents to do laundry through the night and redrill/put together a new board. It was a drowsy night of catching up with my mom and dad while trying to figure out how I was getting to the airport in the morning. It was a nervous night as I waited for my laundry to finish at 2am and I knew I was getting up in five hours. I woke up and took my time, getting coffee, making breakfast and setting up my ride to the airport. Somehow I ended up getting a shuttle to National Airport from Vienna regardless of the 24-hour notice rule they have. Then I had some time to kill but was tweaking on way too much coffee. I smoked a few cigarettes and kicked my board around a little in the cul-de-sac. I can’t imagine what my neighbors think of me after all these years; the same kid, now grown up and still skates in circles on this street. The newer neighbors must be a little put off by the fact that someone as old and as sketchy looking as myself is in their neighborhood influencing their kids. Before I could think too long about it I realized I had to get on my way.

The van driver taking me to the airport was a French black guy that had me intrigued the whole ride. There were four other passengers in the van but no one paid any attention to each other. The majority of the ride was silent staring out the window at the landscape of my adolescence streaming by, reminding me where I’m leaving from regardless of where I’m going. The driver had on a French radio station that kept playing this same song underneath of what seemed like commentary for a soccer game. He seemed to be really into it but was holding back in front of his fare, but I could see him making small gestures with his fingers and hear him speaking under his breath. I wanted to ask him his story, how he ended up in this place and why he left his country, wherever that may be. I let it go, and never said but a few words to him except when giving him a tip. I made up back-stories in my head about his crazy hardships to get to and make it in America and now here he is driving ME to the airport. His driving was sketchy like most professional drivers with an air of confidence but seemingly unaware of where he was going. It put ideas of crashing or going the wrong way, making me miss my flight and what I could only hope to be the best adventure of my life. I had to get to LA one way or another.

My flights were uneventful as I mostly just worked my way through On The Road for the fourth or fifth time. Before my flight out of DC I sat down at the bar and got a whiskey and coke and began talking to a man and his wife next to me. They were on their way to “Las Wages” the man said. I’m confused about how our conversations got going but this guy had done everything there is to do in the world. He’d been to or lived in Egypt, Greece, Rome, all over Asia, England, France, Germany and did three tours in Vietnam. He worked for the CIA and military doing covert operations he couldn’t talk about. He could talk about partying with Mick Jager before he was famous and having the original Rocky Horror Picture Show cast stay and party at his house in Frankfurt before they were known as the Rocky Horror Show. We were both on the same flight to Denver and it was just hard to take this guy seriously but at the same time you can’t make shit like this up. I had a few more drinks with him and by the time the plane started boarding I was kind of drunk since I hadn’t eaten much and I finally understood why people drink while flying. It’s a much more pleasant experience to deal with strangers and forget the fact that you’re traveling 600mph a couple thousand feet above the ground and that regardless of the built in safety features you’re probably fucked no matter what if you crash not to mention the fact that commercial planes, like most highway bridges, are not maintained to the standards they ought to be.

The rest of my flying experience was dull. I got lost in the Denver airport looking for the smoking lounge for ten or fifteen minutes walking in circles around the place. I think I was in a different terminal than last time through Denver because the smoking lounge was in a different place. I chugged a beer and chain-smoked two cigarettes before hurrying to the gate of my next plane where they were already boarding my row. A tall blonde dressed really fashionably sat down in the aisle seat of my row, with me at the window. She had these pastel blue headphones that looked really loud and obnoxious and I wondered what she was going to LA for. She seemed like a good match for the superficial and fake side of things but people like that can surprise you sometimes. The middle aged asian lady between us prevented conversation but I didn’t really give a shit anyway since she looked pretty empty.

When we landed I realized I hadn’t eaten since 8am and it was 9pm on the east coast now and I was starving and jet lag was very prevalent. I got an overpriced, half-assed cheese steak from a sandwich place in the terminal before going to get my bags since I was going to have to wait for a ride anyway. I sat down on my board in front of the carousel watching the bags go by amidst the crowd from the plane, inhaling the sandwich I just bought, grossly overstuffing my mouth and watching crumbs fall on the floor. I must have looked a little crazy since I didn’t even take my backpack off and the sandwich was gone in seconds it seemed. I slurped down the pickles it came with pretty much whole taking no time to savor anything.

After grabbing my bag off the conveyer belt I walked outside and sat down on a bench to smoke a cigarette and wait. Max Dubler was out to dinner and then going to get me. I sat there for a long time watching people coming and going. I can’t think of a place where you could feel lonelier than at an airport arrival area, watching people reunite with loved ones after who knows how long. Men with their wives and girlfriends hugging and kissing, grandparents greeting grand children and it’s all a big relief to have each other together, safe and sound. Watching this made me kind of depressed as I sat there smoking cigarette after cigarette waiting in the cool, rainy, big Los Angeles evening. I waited for an hour or so before getting picked up and it was a huge relief to hop in the car.

On the drive to the skatehouse I was caught up on the all star crew that’s been rolling through in the past few days. Andrew Chapman had just been there and Martin Siegrist was going to be around for a while. Hearing that you’re getting to hang out and skate with a guy who travels the world year after year downhilling and has won multiple world championships is an awesome feeling. I got to take a run with Martin when I went to Maryhill and although I kicked ahead of him he blew by me and everyone else in two or three turns. Not only is he a balls fast skater he’s an incredibly smart guy with serious design skills. It makes me wonder what conversation would be like with less of a language barrier. The guy is so passionate about what he does and takes care of himself better than literally every skater I know, wearing his leathers and fullface on every run and never putting himself in a compromising position but still blasting fast as hell because of his mad skills.

I picked up a 30 pack of beer as a sign of good intentions and to be a good guest. We got in to the apartment and Louis and Gabriel, a kid from Sweden by way of Australia, were hanging out. Matt K. was at a wedding in Georgia, I don’t know where James was and Brian was out with Martin and Brian Holden. I made myself at home, in an excited daze of wanting to get on my wheels, and sat down on a couch while everyone was minding their own business on a laptop. After hanging out for a little the others got back and we talked for a little while, drank beers and watched some footage from a previous session they had. I was exhausted from traveling and as we all made our sleeping arrangements I took stake on a couch that pulled out into a bed but was way too lazy and tired the whole week to deal with converting it.

I forgot that I was going to their residence and it wasn’t just their vacation too. I was expecting a week long party as if it were a skate trip on the east coast. Since everyone in the east only gets to skate as a vacation we geek out whenever we get together. The beer flows and the nights are long, there’s little sleep and long days of skating until we can’t physically go anymore and then doing it all again. It’s that stoke that drives us through mundane life so we can get to the weekends and trips to skate. Out in LA these kids live skateboarding. That is their day to day life so the vibe is much different. It’s not that they aren’t stoked, they just skate some of the gnarliest roads every day in a beautiful climate when the rest of the northern hemisphere is mostly covered in snow and rain. They have a rich and full existence living their passions like most only dream of. It’s the same story as any subculture not based on monetary gain. When you look at a culture in this light you see it as more of an art rather than an outlaw type of life style. The point is that they move at a slower more relaxed pace as apposed to the “get as many runs in as possible” mentality on the east coast. It doesn’t matter because they wake up the next day and still have the option to go skate that awesome terrain.

It’s hard to swallow and makes me think about what exactly I’m doing with my life and if I’m working towards my goals in the right way. I suppose anything you experience can give you this feeling if you look at it with the right eyes or angle but to see people actually able to live and skate downhill seems pretty unreal. I can’t help but think that maybe I should have just gone to California instead of going to college. Second guessing your decisions and the path you’ve taken really only leads to regret and takes you out of the moment you’re in. It’s those hang ups that hold you back and if instead you just act then you end up pursuing your dreams and in LA with a skate house, no winter and some of the best roads in the world.

The whole week went in basically the same way with a few minor differences depending on the plan of attack and the person driving. We woke up between nine and noon, ate and skated until the evening when we’d come back and sit in traffic for a while before making it back to the house. The skating was gnarly and I couldn’t give a play by play for each run but I could describe in detail each fall I took. I never hit the fabled rock wall on Tuna but I did hit a different one for the dumb reason of not controlling fresh wheels. I rashed my right shin trying to session a corner on the first day and then the next day I got my right bicep and right side of my ribs in the last right on Tuna. In the end the whole right side of my body seemed to be scabbed up.

After a few runs down Tuna on the first day we got lunch and when we got back to the top of the run Raggie was there with a guy from Vegas. Somehow it wasn’t surprising to run into someone from British Columbia while skating in LA. They followed us to Corral canyon for some different riding and on the first run down Vegas locked wheels with Gabriel in a right and they went down while I narrowly check slid and avoided them as Max slid directly into Gabriel’s shins. It was such a dumb unnecessary crash that put some ill feelings in everyone. A few days later as I was skating to the coffee shop for breakfast I saw Raggie and Vegas driving up to the skate house and we spent the day skating with them after a late start and rigorous search for car keys. Vegas was a lot more solid riding down Latigo although it’s probably an easier road. My legs were burnt out and I couldn’t really tuck so I wasn’t very close to anyone for the whole run but it was cool to see this guy charging the hill even though Vegas is flat except for gnarly parking garages. Raggie is also a gnarly sketchy mother fucker who rides with almost complete abandon for his own well being. He ended up with one leg in a drain pipe on the outside of the last left of Tuna and was covered in road rash and ripped his pants to hell. It was the complete opposite of the way Martin approaches skating and interesting to compare and see both sides of things.

There were eye opening sessions during the week where I got to see somethings I’d only dreamt about or seen in videos. Following James down Tuna is an incredible experience that changes the way you think about downhill skateboarding and what’s possible on a downhill board. The kid is a freak of nature throwing the smoothest, most stylish toeside standers that I’ve ever seen. One run I think he took more corners switch than regular while I was just trying to hang on and remember what corner was next. I saw him do a switch toeside predrift into the first left and do it better than most riding normal. It’s kind of humbling to see someone skating like that. I went to LA with the intention of progressing and riding hard but was finding myself listening more to that voice of self preservation as James was shredding beyond belief. I don’t think there are many people in the world who can ride at that level and it’s something that even videos don’t capture but when you see it in person you understand what it looks like to be completely in command of a skateboard. Even when we went to the Venice skatepark one morning there were guys that were just killing it. It’s confusing how many people out there seem to just live skateboarding.

The end of the week came quicly. My perception of time seems to be speeding up more and more lately and a week passes almost like a day at times. I felt like I was basicly just back to where I was with skating last summer and hadn’t progressed at all. It almost felt like I had been wasting my time by not charging harder or something. The winter had softened me up a lot and my confidence was not what it once was. On Friday we were sessioning Tuna and with fresh wheels on I slid out into a rock wall for the first time. I was tired from the week of skating and not used to new wheels. It wasn’t THE rockwall so I didn’t feel too bad but it was just a random rock wall in a left bend where I was trying to check slide. That crash completed the road rash up my entire right side by cutting up my thigh. After sitting out a run and driving we were going to take one last run then head back. I blasted the top sweepers through the forest awesomely and thought I was doing pretty well regardless of how tired and beat up I was. I decided to slide early before the last right but the road is super narrow and there is really only one line because of pot holes and rough patches of pavement. My front wheels caught some bad asphalt shooting me to the left of the road and as I tried to bail off my board I smacked feet first into a storm drain. My right foot went in and the shin hit the cement while my left toes caught and bent back almost to my shin. It was the most painful thing I’ve ever felt and I jumped up throwing my helmet and gloves to the ground as I fell back down to my ass screaming in pain.

It took me a while to figure out if I wanted to go to the hospital or not. I’m pretty scared of hospitals and needles and am still of the impression that I’m indestructible. While I was there everyone seemed much more concerned with the cut on my right shin since it was bleeding a lot but I didn’t even know it was bleeding. I didn’t give a shit if I was bleeding because I get road rash all the time, I was pissed because I couldn’t walk or move my foot really and that’s why I was in the ER. The doctor said I might need one stitch so I asked him if that was even necessary and he got really defensive saying he didn’t have to do anything. He also tried to convince me I needed a tetnus booster shot and that you should get one every time you get an open wound. I laughed in his face. Here I am covered in road rash and he tries to tell me that. I think I pissed the guy off a little but he also seemed really aloof about my whole situation anyway so fuck him. Nothing was broken, just a bad sprain so he wrapped my ankle in an ace bandage. He had the nerve to ask if I needed crutches too after I came in without being able to walk at all. I wanted to get out of the hospital as soon as possible and was so glad when they let me go.

The rest of the night was spent with my foot on ice and smoking. Packing in the morning sucked since everyone else was asleep and it’s really hard to be quiet when you have one foot to work with. I got my bags out to the curb myself and sat smoking a cigarette waiting for Max to get back from the coffee shop to get to LAX. Martin came out on his way to get coffee and we said our good byes and he gave me some advice and anecdotes about when he sprained his ankle with a week and a half left of one of his trips. Martin is an awesome guy that I can’t wait to cross paths with again.

I got to the airport with about an hour until my flight. I found out quickly after Max pulled off that I was at the wrong terminal. My itinerary said United but in small font and in parentheses below read: “operated by Continental,” which really means “your flight is with Continental and disregard the fact that we are telling you it’s United.” I had to put my duffle on my downhill board, sit down with my crutches and backpack on and push with one leg to the next terminal. I ended up missing my first flight and having to wait for a half hour or more as I got some stand by tickets to try and get home. At least then I got a wheelchair and a guy to push me around for the rest of my trip. The problem was that I had no pain killers of any kind, over the counter, prescription or of the illegal variety and I had to sit in cramped quarters for hours on end. Luckily I got on a flight to Houston immediately and just had to hope I could get from there back to Virginia.

The three hour flight from LA to Houston was one of the lowest points of my life. My leg was throbbing and I hadn’t slept much the night before because I had to readjust myself on the couch every 15 minutes to keep my leg happy. I got out my copy of On The Road but couldn’t look at small print and focus. I would fall asleep for a few minutes but couldn’t stay asleep. The crash kept replaying in my head in slow motion and I couldn’t help but think about how preventable the accident was. “If only I had just manned up and banged out a toeside or waited to slide” was all that was going through my head. I wanted to get out of my mind but was trapped in this plane with hours left to travel and the possibility of not getting home until the next day looming in my head. I didn’t really have enough money to drink either. It was the worst inner turmoil I’ve felt in a long time and I was feeling a little crazy. I was so done with this trip and all I wanted to do was be home and comfortable and under the influence of something to alleviate my pain and sleep.

When I got off the plane I left my copy of On The Road in the seatback pocket. It seemed almost too perfect to leave that book on that plane as if someone had written it into the script of my life. The irony was so thick and rich that when I realized it while waiting for my next flight it lifted my spirits. My potential next flight had been overbooked and I might have to spend the night in the airport but the fact that such perfect irony exists made it a little alright. I was going to get home eventually and it would be ok once the moment was passed.

I find myself always looking at my travels through the filters of great books I’ve read and the generations that created them. The 20th century is full of these authors who I idolize and wrote based on their travels. Kerouac went on his adventures because of some call to just go and see what happened, Hemingway went looking for romantic adventure, Hunter Thompson and Tom Wolfe were reporting to the world the happenings of strange things but all had these interesting purposes for their travels that inspired great works of literature. This is what I compare my adventures to and I guess my reason for living. It’s silly to me when I compare the motives of my journeys against those of these authors. I go purely for love of some absurd activity and regardless of costs both monetary and physical. Kerouac was just out to see what America was all about. I still get to experience and live that but it’s through a focused activity instead of spontaneous motion. Traveling through quaint southern towns in the middle of the night, huge international airports, and massive cities that are melting pots of incomprehension are all part of what it means to skateboard to me. It’s hard to understand how people live without something like that in their life and why you would want to.

I managed to get on that first flight out of Houston to Dulles since my name was put on the stand by list so early in the day when I was still in LA. There was a long stand by list on top of the five overbooked seats and there was a lot of tension in the air. At first it looked like I was for sure getting on since a flight from Mexico was running late with a few passengers for my flight but the crew was also running late. More and more people trickled in late because of a broken train blocking the way between terminals and the situation looked worse and worse for getting home. When the guy at the podium called my name the biggest feeling of relief and thanks went through me. There were two women sitting near me in the terminal also on stand by who had been waiting all day for a flight and were just as down and out as I was and I wished them luck as I boarded. It was nice seeing them make it on the plane too. Not only did we get on but they even gave us a semi-legit meal of a turkey or ham sandwich, baby carrots and a fun size bag of M&M’s which caught me totally off guard. I haven’t been on a flight that actually gives out a meal in years and thought it just didn’t happen anymore. It was great for me though since I hadn’t eaten since being at the skate house.

It was the most satisfying feeling to see the night lights of the hell hole that is Northern Virginia from my window as we descended on Dulles. It’s not that the area is bad, it’s more so that the people for the most part are horrible human beings but it was nice to be back and in relatively one piece. My parents were waiting at the baggage carousel as I was wheeled in and they just kind of looked at my with a sarcastic smile and gave me shit for a while with questions of concern thrown in. I didn’t give a shit if my bag showed up or not (surprisingly it did) and just wanted to get home. It was raining and my dad drives like a little old lady, further annoying me but when we got home my mom got me a drink and made me food at midnight. My journey was over and I worked my way clumsily up the steps to die for twelve hours or more and face the reality that is college the next day.

GOING TO LALA LAND

There’s three feet of snow on top of the couple inches from last week and I just found a gnarly new, hairpin filled road 20 minutes from my house. I will not be able to skate for a long while now but on the bright side of things for the second week in March I will be in LA hanging out and skating with the boys of www.skatehousemedia.com! I’ll be missing the first race of the year on the east coast for this trip but it will be totally worth it. Check back to read about that adventure, which is sure to be action packed and see the video that comes of my journey.

In the meantime check out my youtube channel: www.youtube.com/anthonyflis

Buffalo Bill Downhill part 3

The morning was filled with immediate disappointment as I looked out the window. It was drizzling and the roads were soaked. The top of Lookout Mt. was surrounded in an impenetrable fog and it seemed like it would be a rain race. Once again I was greeted by the Staub’s and offered coffee and food as they prepared lunch. Even though it was raining I at least had my duffle bag with my board and leathers, which got delivered while I was at the campsite. It was incredibly disheartening to look out the back window in the direction the mountain should be, only to see fog, when the day before was perfect, not too hot, little wind, clear skies and bright sun. We packed up the car, and I made sure to leave nothing behind since my final destinations were unclear.

The conditions on the hillside were horrible. Visibility was down to twenty or thirty feet and the road was absolutely soaked as the mist continued to come down. Few people were at the top of the race course yet since it was still early but we were eager to find out the conditions and the plan of attack for the race. The word was that we would wait a few hours and hope for it to dry up or at least improve. Justin’s wife rolled up with breakfast burritos and hot coffee, which was awesome and warming. As more people showed up, every tool thinkable was used to make rain wheels. Everyone took turns pushing each other along the flat to cut grooves into their wheels. I decided I didn’t care enough or have any wheels I was willing to cut into and would just go for it with what I had.

It started getting late and things weren’t getting much better as everyone started getting antsy to skate. Finally Justin decided to give everyone one practice run and then go into heats. I took it really easy on my way down, doing a lot of foot breaking, mostly concerned for the sweepers where normally you don’t expect to drift but have a lot of force sideways on your wheels where in the wet could be really dangerous. I managed to make it down without falling but also went at a pace that felt stupid. At the bottom, while waiting to get in the Uhaul to go back up, I watched Louis pick up one of the biggest, fastest, slimiest worms I’ve ever seen and try and get people to eat it. I also saw Hugh Kibbling puking next to the Uhaul and when he was done, turning around and telling Louis to throw it and he’d catch it in his mouth, and he did. He swallowed the thing down hardly a minute after puking his brains out from the night before. It might be one of the most off the wall things I’d seen on this trip. It’s one of those stories that doesn’t seem real when you see it happen even.

I really wanted to do good at this race, hoping to go back to the east coast with a good story of how my heats went and do it up for the east coast. My first heat had Dubes in it and he kicked way out in front on the soaked asphalt, screaming like crazy, catching me off guard. I kicked behind him but not as hard and navigated all the sweepers on top fine still not pushing it balls out. I got to the right hairpin and slowed down a lot but just slid right into the hay. The other two people in my heat caught up at this point but also crashed. I got on my board and kicked as hard as I could to stay in front and perfectly hit the left and the next right hairpin and had a good lead. Dubes had probably already finished by now since I hadn’t seen him since he disappeared into the fog at the start. I came into the last left with a little too much confidence and tried to rail it like I had done in the dry, surfing it with both hands in the air but my wheels caught and I did a somersault and as I slowly got up I saw the other two riders pass me and realized I was done for the day. I think I only found a picture or two of me from race day and both of them show me eating shit.

I took the shuttle back to the top after the first round heats and go out of my leathers and took a skate down the course to the first left hairpin since you could see the last few corners from there. James had also gotten out and brought a backpack of beer down with him so we drank some beers and watched the racing. I saw Krimes throw some nasty standers in the last left in the wet and you could hear the grooves he cut in his wheels just sucking on the pavement. It was almost as unbelievable as when I saw Louis throw a big standing 180 before the same last left and take it switch the day before. Seeing the kind of riding that these guys were throwing down in person and talking with them about their approach to downhilling opened my eyes to the fact that I wasn’t nearly as experienced riding turny, big mountain roads and really changed the way I skated afterwards, reshaping my outlook on how to spend my summer.

In the end the race came down to Zak Maytum, Louis, Will Brunson and King Brian. The road had gotten pretty dry and the hairpins were mostly dry for the final heat. It was a pretty close heat with Zak in front taking it home for the locals followed by King Brian ripping with his floaty, stand up style through the hairpins wearing shorts and a wind breaker type jacket. Will Brunson and Louis were a little behind them and in the last hairpin Louis took a suicide line on the inside and made the pass on the white line with his hand over the grass. It was chaos when we got to the top of the hill with beer being splashed everywhere, schwag getting thrown into the crowd a podium in front of the Loco. All the local kids were battling it out for free stuff, wrestling over boards and shirts. It was an awesome scene of celebration at the end of a successful event.

After all the podium shots were taken and everyone packed up to leave there was still the problem of course tear down. I was riding in the big passenger van so I could both get to the after part at Coop’s house and get a ride to the airport the following morning so I stayed and helped huck hay. The hay was soaked from the snow and rain, but I did my part, throwing bale after bale, and I’m a scronny person, into the Uhauls we had. It was cool seeing how the riders all take care of each other to put on these events since I wasn’t the only skater doing this. Will Brunson, Rizzo, Jason and K-Rimes were throwing hay as well as Justin Dubois who’s event it was. Will’s wife was throwing hay too, giving us all shit that we had a hard time with the 50lb bales since she deals with 80lbs daily on her farm. It’s cool to look at the way these events run because none of them are for profit, there are no big corporations and crews of people to run them. It’s all just done for each other. It’s the kind of thing you don’t see very often in the world.

Once we had the Uhauls literally packed to capacity with what hay was salvageable we needed to take them to the farm supply store to sell them back. The only problem was there were too many cars to people, so I drove a Uhaul full of hay down Lookout Mountain and a couple miles down the interstate after drank a few beers and never driving anything that big before. We had the walky-talkies from the course workers so we could communicate between the two uhauls, passenger van and Justin’s truck. It was a lot of fun driving that huge thing trying to keep up going down the mountain, cutting lanes as if it were a sports car or a skateboard. We finally got the hay unloaded and sold back with Justin coming out close to even on hay. Then we had to take the Uhauls to the rental place all the way back near town, hop in the van, then drive the hour to Coop’s for the party. We stopped in Boulder for dinner at some little Mexican burrito place before moving into the mountains to get to wherever the hell we were going.

It was getting dark and rainy as we left Boulder towards the after party. We had been driving for a while with no other cars around, completely unaware of probably breathe taking scenery that was indiscernible through the thick, dark, cloudy night. As we got settled into the drone of driving through the night we see slowly rolling along in front of us none other than the Loco Express in full rave mode. The strobe lights were on, everyone was dancing with drinks in their hand and it looked like a mad house. Justin called from his truck and said we need to try and mess with them and pull them over so we started flashing our lights and honking trying to signal them over but they were having too good a time to even notice. The bus couldn’t make it up the passes very well so we ended up passing them and took turns throwing things as we passed back and forth for a few miles. Somehow we started individually turning our lights off between the van, Justin’s truck and the Loco, sometimes resulting in no ones headlights being on as we drove through the pitch black mountainous terrain. Whenever a car was spotted we’d turn the lights back on but one time the Loco didn’t turn their lights on and there is no way the car passing saw them until they were right next to it, with the full blow of wild dance party taking place. It’s one of those scenes that sounds made up or out of some movie about hippies in the 60s or something but it was a crazy ass drive. Eventually we just went on our way leaving them to putter their way up the mountains.

When we finally got to the party there was already a ton of people, a huge bonfire and the keg was flowing. Coop’s compound is an incredible place. There are huge rocks off in the backyard framing a stage, a big six foot tall super wide mini ramp, and the most intimidating zip line I’ve ever seen. To get on the zip line you have to climb a ladder to get on top of a shed then climb another six feet or more up into this pine tree that sways with each ride down, leaving everyone clutching to stay on the platform. At the other end of the line you get stopped by a knot with a towel in it that you hit swinging you in every direction just far enough from the other anchor tree so you don’t hit it. After you stop you’re still six feet off the ground and need to hang upside down, unhook yourself off the pulley and then unhook the pulley so the next person can use it then you hang and drop to your feet. Justin Dubois’ band played a set with the rocks as a back drop and in no time there was a pit going. Dubes was in charge of the fire and it just kept getting bigger and bigger through out the night. At one point Coop threw a fallen tree on and we all took turns running over the fire on it. I also remember someone searching the dark forest floor with a head lamp and asking if anyone had seen a large quantity of weed laying around and then later finding out that it was just under his hat.

I have no idea how long the party went on for. Some people probably went all night. I spent a good amount of time talking with Rob Mckendry by the keg hearing some of his crazy stories from his travels. That guy has more experiences than I could ever hope for. I also sat by the fire with Dubes reminiscing about when we first met in 2007 at a freeride in North Carolina. I think he was still living in Florida then and was pretty sketchy and now he’s one of the fastest guys in the world. I had also been bugging Zak for bushings the whole weekend because there was no way I would ever buy bushings online or anything so this was the only time I’d be able to reasonably get Venoms. I was pretty drunk when he finally brought some bushings for me and he didn’t have exactly what I was looking for. I somehow ended up with three barrels and two eliminators for a good price and just pocketed them without thinking about what I got but eliminators didn’t even fit my downhill trucks. It was a funny drunk moment in my life, to me anyway.

As things started to die down and only the hardest partiers still going, I found myself nodding off in a chair by the fire. I decided sleeping in the van was the best option that way I couldn’t be left behind in the morning. We were going to wake up and go to Justin’s house with Graham Buska and Krimes so that we could skate and I could get a ride to the airport with Jason. I managed to stumble to the van, find my sleeping bag and pass out almost immediately regardless of the cold.

I woke up hours later to the early morning sun shining through the trees and Graham digging through gear in the back of the van. I managed to climb out into the brisk morning and survey things in the day light. The ramp looked much bigger and I could really take in the beauty of Coop’s land. Over the trees you could see the the snow caps of the Rockies looming up. Most people were in the house with Coop cooking eggs for those still around. Everyone was laying around recovering from the night before, watching a little t.v. and sharing experiences like we’d been doing all weekend. It was another great family scene of downhillers all doing what they do. I know I keep mentioning this aspect but it’s something that is actually hard to describe if you aren’t a part of something like this.

We soon said our goodbyes and Kevin, Graham and myself piled back into the van and headed to Justin’s house where he, Jason and Rizzo where. Justin lives in a really nice little town nestled in a valley near some resorts or something. It’s a picturesque small Colorado, ski town. When we got there we just missed the viewing of the Sector 9 movie that Rizzo had been working on, that has still yet to be released and I’m not sure if it ever will. The trailer for it has been online for the past year and looks so sick though. After some coffee and hanging out we decided it was time to go skate and Justin said he had the perfect little neighborhood to session.

We all piled in the van and headed down the street a mile or so to a nice little private neighborhood with a good number of hairpins and nice pitch. Jason was hurting from a bad hipper he took so he decided to just drive and film. It was such an honor to skate such a road with Rizzo and Kevin. I’ve never seen people rip so hard in my life. Rizzo was on a 36” deck with 70mm race formula wheels and throwing down so hard. Kevin was throwing standers longer than I had ever seen in my life on his avenger. Watching Kevin throw huge thirty foot stand up slides into hairpins and doing huge 180s and switch checks was an eye opening experience. Also seeing Rizzo riding a similar style on the small pool deck, sessioning the ledge at the top of the hill as well was sweet and totally changed the way I wanted to ride a skateboard. I had so much fun trying to keep up and shred this gnarly, steep, sand coated run. We only had enough time for a few runs but what we got in was so much fun and I witnessed some of the best downhill skating ever.

After that quick session we went back to Justin’s to pack up and head to the airport. On the drive back there were a couple of Caribou hanging out next to the road. I’d never seen game that big or with huge antlers like that before. It really tripped me out and completed my experience in Colorado. As I was putting my board and extraneous gear in my duffle bag I was talking to Rizzo as he was packing his stuff up and out of no where he offered me a set of Sector 9 race formula wheels. It was awesome getting to know him because he’s been in the sport for so long and such an interesting guy. As we were finishing packing, Dubes rolled up looking to go skate fast. Him, Graham and Kevin borrowed Justin’s truck to go skate Rist while Justin, Rizzo, Jason and myself headed to the airport. It’s crazy that I just missed skating the fastest road in the world and that I watched a group of guys on their way out to do it. While I was boarding my plane they were going in the upper 70s on skateboards.

The drive back to the airport was pretty fun and interesting. We drove around the opposite way from when I was picked up which takes you far off from Denver. It was interesting to realize that half of Colorado is plains and that Denver is just on the edge of the Rockies. In one direction you look out and see flat fields to the horizon and in the other you see a wall of mountains growing into the clouds and covered with snow caps. I was sad to be leaving so soon. The landscape was so beautiful and I’d only just begun to see any of it and only skated two hills in a sea of mountains. The last memorable thing before I boarded my plane was stopping on the highway just outside the airport for Rizzo to get out and pee in a field. We got to the airport and Jason had barely enough time to make his flight and I had an hour or so to wait around. When I got on the plane I passed right out and woke up in Charloette but with enough time to make it to my next gate and hang out unlike on the way there. I’m pretty sure I passed right back out once on my connecting flight too and woke up home in Virginia. It all seemed like a dream that I just woke up from and needed to continue trying to be in. This trip completely set the pace and direction for the rest of my summer which I filled with the most traveling and skating I’d ever done. It was one of the best trips of my life and I hope so badly I can do it again and stay longer this year.