ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 1 ก.ค. 2024
- A great day of scramblin’! Met up with 3 other riders in Townsend, TN, to take on tourist drivers, primitive dirt and twisty paved roads, all tied together by the beauty of the Smoky Mountain National Park and surrounding National Forests. Several 2-wheel manufacturers represented, Triumph (Brutus the Scrambler), Royal Enfield Himalayan, Harley Pan America, and Honda Transalp. All the bikes did great at everything we through at them.
Cades Cove was a bloody mess, but it was not surprising. The one-way, one-lane, 11-mile loop road is meant so that visitors can slow roll and checkout the scenery and the wildlife. Going only about halfway around the loop took us quite a while. Thanks to a few stops to see bears, we were able to negotiate through the cars and make it to the backside of the cove where we picked up Parsons Branch Primitive Rd.
Parsons Branch had too many concrete fords for me to count accurately. Thankfully the branch was fairly low at most the crossings. It is a great road for beginning ADV riders, if they can stand the slow moving traffic for 5-6 miles to get there. We should’ve started about an hour earlier at around 7am when Cades Cove normally opens to moto traffic. Note on Wednesdays and Saturdays, the road opens later, 10am I think, to allow bicycles to have some alone time on the loop.
Parsons Branch is a one-way dirt road that takes you to US129, affectionately known as the Tail of the Dragon, about half way along the track. We turned south on 129 into North Carolina until we reached Joyce Kilmer, which would take us around a beautiful little lake to a forest road that parallels the Cherohala Skyway, referred to by locals as the Gravel-hala Skyway. We would only do about half of that route before turning back towards Tennessee to ride half of the paved skyway. We ran right into a storm cell that opened on Deal’s Gap and the surrounding area. We were able to dive into Tapoco Lodge’s covered motorcycle parking to let the worst of it pass. When we got back to the Tennessee and passed the Dragon, the roads were perfectly dry.
00:00 Introduction
01:53 Pigeon Forge and Wears Valley
03:11 Group Meetup in Townsend
03:43 Cades Cove
07:48 Parson’s Branch Primitive Road
11:48 Tail of the Dragon and beyond
13:48 Gravel-hala Skyway
15:21 Cherohala Skyway and wet Tail of the Dragon
17:25 Foothills Parkway and End (some beautiful scenery in the closing scenes) - ยานยนต์และพาหนะ
![แม่กลองสองใจ - ซีแกรม โตเกียว มิวสิค [ OFFICIAL MUSIC VIDEO ]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/GSQfVjcr_f4/mqdefault.jpg)
It was a great day and Parsons and Gravelhala were a blast. Great vid Jeff. Damn rain!
Great to ride with you again...rain or shine! Looking forward to your video!
Scramblin! Looks like a good time
It really was, totally worth dealing with the tourists and the rain.
Great ride! I did the same loop a few weeks back on my 900 RP
Wow, what a great episode!
I’ve driven the Cades Cove in my little Bronco II, and it was brutal with all that traffic.
I’ve taken our old KLR650 all around the Smokies, including the Dragon, etc.
My NC relatives have given me some inside knowledge about the area, which allowed me to explore the area without all the traffic.
Looking forward to getting back up there soon.
P.S. mum’s the word on Townsend, TN. That’s a (supposedly) well kept secret.
Come on down to Terlingua, TX, and I’ll show you around to some spectacular MC rides.
Happy Trails!
Thanks, Allen. The KLR! It's a dual sport legend! Townsend has a done a great job keeping it subtle, a great contrast to Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge. Ever since I got my Scrambler, I've wanted to run Parsons Branch. Knew it would be fun, and I was right. It was closed due to down trees and such for a few years, and just re-opened a couple of years ago. Planning to pick up a toy hauling camper next year and do some traveling and riding. Eager to do some desert riding out west!
Nice video. Im planning on going up there next month but I have gotten tired of The Dragon and this trip will be all adventure riding.
You should checkout highway 32 out of Cosby. It's paved and curvy as hell until you hit the TN-NC line, then turns to gravel/dirt. We call it the redneck dragon. I did a video on it recently. Lots of great adventure riding in that area. Also a lot of great riding around Robbinsville and Tellico Plains.
thats no what the law states , be safe !
I need the tracks for that ride
Wish there was a way to get you to Parsons Branch without having to go through Cades Cove. Here is the route I built in Gaia. Takes you from our meetup in Townsend to the end of the first part of the "gravel-hala" and puts you on the Cherohala Skyway. You should be able to follow the link and then download a gpx file from there, but let me know if you have problems getting to it. www.gaiagps.com/map/?lat=38.3417&lon=-98.0859&zoom=4&loc=10.4/-83.7512/35.5035&pubLink=gYYGCHlYJo6u615g5cKgi41n&trackId=243c69ca-c7d3-46d3-900b-56f7cc14cad7
@@RoadRash1 thank you
Do you obey any of the rules of the road?
Most of them. I think motorcycles should get an exception on double yellow passes. It's kind of like lane filtering/splitting.
Oh, Jesus...the first seven and a half minutes in the video of this ride are excruciating...looks like a line for ice cream at the fair.
It was as painful to ride as to watch, believe me. I wanted to leave it in both for the beauty of the cove as much as a warning to anyone that wants to do this Parsons Branch Rd. I think the Rangers open the cove at 8am (except Wednesdays and Saturdays when the opening for moto vehicles is delayed to allow bicyclers to have to themselves). There is usually a line there waiting to open. If you get there like an hour before opening, you might avoid the wildlife peepers/creepers. I'm sure if a ranger saw us making those passes, we'd have gotten in trouble. We got some snide comments from the car folks also.
@@RoadRash1 I guess as a motorcyclist you just have to be a little selfish, for our own safety's sake, and embrace filtering/lane sharing like the delivery guys in the big city do and forget about what the cagers think...