The first state on GAS, the Route 50 Fiero tour, is
Maryland.
Last month's discussion was of
Virginia. And there are now some pics in that thread, too.
This month's topic is West Virginia.
Wulf Berg's book,
US50 Coast to Coast, is not separated by state. It doesn't even have page numbers. Instead, each day of his trip is another chapter, and the page count starts over with each chapter (e.g. "Day 02 - Page 1"). This is fine when having a casual read of his journey, but not so much when going back time and again as a reference guide. Nobody would recreate that trip exactly the same way, traveling the same number of miles each day, and stopping in the same places. This is one reason I would love for us to publish a new book, detailing our own trip. But I digress.
Wulf enters West Virginia describing the road winding up & down mountain ranges. At Romney, there is an excursion train offering a scenic 3-hour tour (a 3-hour tour sounds familiar... where have I heard that before?
), but I doubt that we will want to take the time for that. These discussion topics already have us talking about spending extra time in DC and Virginia than I had originally envisioned. But we shall see how this all works out, and later delete from our plans whatever stops must be deleted in order to ensure we'll be in the right places at the right times.
He says Mount Storm usually has fog so heavy the locals call it "Pea Soup Mountain", but the view is nice on clear days.
He enjoyed the forest of Cathedral State Park at Aurora. Then more mountainous roads, causing him to average "about 20 miles an hour". He mentioned the Cheat River, and Cool Spring Park.
Then, near Grafton, he stopped at Tygart Lake State Park. He was very impressed with the lodge and restaurant, and says "This state park is very beautiful and I highly recommend it."
He suggests detouring a little farther south to a covered bridge called Philippi Bridge, where in 1861, the North and the South fought the first land battle of the Civil War. But again, this is something I am not sure we will take time to see.
In Grafton, Wulf toured a church and a military cemetery. Then on to Bridgeport, Clarksburg and Ellenboro, and stayed at North Bend State Park at Cairo. Then he made his way to Parkersburg, where you exit West Virginia by crossing the Ohio River.
Check out the map on the GAS website... Click the logo in the sig, go to "Route 50 Info", and select West Virginia.
And check out a few items of GAS merchandise at
http://www.zazzle.com/justsaygo. Stickers, mugs, keychains and mousepads.
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The Fiero Store is the
exclusive sponsor of GAS[This message has been edited by Just Say Go (edited 10-12-2008).]
