Riding the Dragon on the Viffer!

I've had my 2000 VFR for about 3 weeks now, and I left Friday morning with a couple of friends from work for the weekend. Destination: Tail of the Dragon. Lee has couple of bikes, one a 1996 R1100RT, the other a 2001 Aprilia Falco. This weekend he rode the Falco. Al rides a new Triumph Tiger.

Our initial ride on Friday was an easy 2 lane adventure over about 180 miles from LaVergne, TN to Tellico Plains, TN. The route took us from I-24 onto highway 280 over to McMinnville, and then onto highway 8 from McMinnville until it meets up with highway 111. We went south there on 111, and then took a right at highway 27 toward Dayton. Then at Dayton, it was right onto highway 30, over to Athens, left onto 39, and 39 all the way over until the turn off for the resort. We stayed Friday night at the Cherohala Motorcycle Resort in Tellico Plains. First and foremost, Mark and Renee are exceptional people and the owners of the resort there. It's a very nice place to stay, with cabins or camping, a good cook, snacks, etc... www.cycleresort.com

Anyway, after a nice night's rest and a small breakfast at the resort, the three of us headed out through Tellico Plains to start the ride on the Cherohala Skyway. For those who don't know, that is highway 165 that runs from Tellico Plains over to Robbinsville, NC. The skyway is a terrific ride with great scenery and lots of curves. It doesn't have the hairpins like the dragon, but is still a very fun ride, and a longer ride. We had to be reasonable with speed on the skyway, since the rain had pushed through all night long, and the roads were still wet. Still, those D220's stick great even on wet pavement, and made the ride very enjoyable.

We turned onto US 129 a while later, and headed up toward the dragon. We stopped, as I guess everyone does, at the Deal's Gap store. There were quite a few bikes there, and the one that really stood out to me was the old Norton Commando that appeared from a distance to be a very nice restoration.

After a snack at the store, we headed on up onto the Dragon. The roads were dry by now, but I let Al lead, since he is mildly agressive. I tend to get a little wild on roads like this. Since it was my first time on the dragon, and my first major curvy road on the VFR, I felt it would be wise to make it through unscratched. As we got into it, I realized that this bike under me, which does so extremely well on the wide open 2 lanes and interstates, is just as at home in the twistys. I hope many of you are reading this thinking, DUH!, we already knew that. Just point and go, the VFR handles it so well, to be such a tame bike.

I quickly realized how much fun it was in those hairpins, so I would slow down in the straights in order to let Al get ahead of me, so when the curves got closer I could roll back into the throttle. The VFR just lays in so well, and is very inspiring to push it harder. I pushed harder and harder (not like I'm a MotoGP rider or anything) to the point where it happened. My left foot felt the grind, and I quickly pulled my foot off the peg. I knew it would eventually happen, but I still wasn't prepared. It was nothing serious, but I did scrape the left peg in one of those hairpins.

Some of you may think I'm nuts, but after riding a V-max for the last 3 years and nothing any better for handling before that, I was very impressed. This bike does it all, and not like a bike that does everything pretty well, it does everything exceptionally well. 140mph down the interstate, 60mph down the 2lane country roads, and 30 or 40 something in curves on one of the wildest roads around.

Okay, where was I. We finished the dragon in undoubtedly less than record time, and took 129 on up to the split onto 72 and on up to 411. Then over to highway 360 south toward Tellico Plains. We stopped about 5 miles down 360 at a restaurant called The Lost River for lunch, and back to the resort a while after that. We spent the evening talking about the different aspects of our bikes, and talking with the Motor Maids. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, Al's wife is a Motor Maid, and they are the ones who had the resort booked for the weekend and allowed us to intrude. They were a hoot to sit around the campfire with, and share funny stories with, though Al was not ready to ride with them Saturday, because they all ride cruiser. And loud ones at that.

Sunday morning, Laurie (the cook at the resort) made us some large and very tasty sausage and biscuits, and I left alone about 8:30 to take my northern route up highway 68 to make my way home to Portland, TN. It was about 40 degrees all the way home, and unfortunately, my heated gloves were not heating all the way home. Oh well, I thawed after a couple of hours at home. I have absoultely fallen in love with the VFR, and don't forsee getting rid of this bike any time soon.

All right...wake up now and get back to work!
Dee

 

Nice write up, Dee. We all like to hear stories of good rides. Glad you enjoy the VFR.

 

I leave this thursday for a 700 mile ride to the dragon from Pittsburgh. we will be there for 4 days and I cant wait.

 

did you see if your picture is on Killboy.com yet?

 

raisin--

Man!! Thanks!! That was a great write-up (especially for someone so new to the site)!!

I am planning on riding the Tail in August with an FZR-riding buddy of mine from Ft. Bragg. Not sure if we will super-slab it out there, or put the bikes on a trailer and get on 'em once we arrive. I need to get a Sargeant seat if we are going to ride all the way there from Bragg.

 

My VFR has been Dragon tested 6 times. Left me smiling every time.

Chris, make sure you go during the school year, during the week. Trust me on this one. I've been there during summer on a week end one time out of 6 & I will NEVER do that again. If it wasn't the eleventy billion police cars harrassing the crap out of everyone on two wheels, it was the Nissan 350Z club that couldn't stay in their lane. I would not have cared that much but I saw at least 20 bikes pulled over in 2 days but not one 350Z pulled over.

KC-10 FE out...
lane: :usa2:

 

Great Advice....Got cha on weekdays, brother, that was indeed the plan. However, August is my unit's "block leave" time post-deployment...."take it or leave it". Wish there was a way around it, because August is my least favorite month of the year. Big fan of October, but we will already be looking at deploying again by that time. Maybe I can wait til the tail end of Aug, that way most of the booger eaters will already be back in school.

 

Nice write up, but where's the photos?

 

The photos are on Al's camera. I'll try to get those when he gets back from Alabama later this week. As for the Killboy photos, they aren't posted yet. I appreciate all of the interest in the write up. I was afraid everyone would be bored to death, but we are VFR riders. I guess we'll read anything related!!!

Dee

 

Here's some pictures...Enjoy!

trip pics