300 Miles From Our Comfort Zone
Headed To The Tail of The Dragon

We got an early start on Day 2, leaving Bally’s Hotel and Casino in Evansville, Indiana, a little before 7 in the morning. We had more than 300 miles to cover if we wanted to make it to Athens, Tennessee. Getting that far would put us in a good spot for riding the Cherohala Skyway and Tail of the Dragon the next day.

We’ve done some pretty long rides before, but we’d never ridden this far from home on the motorcycles. We also wanted to stay off the interstate as much as we could, so we planned to take a mix of highways and smaller backroads through Kentucky and Tennessee.

One of the best parts of the day turned out to be a road we’d never even heard of before. Kennie had spotted a hairpin turn on Dodson Road while looking at Google Maps and decided to work it into our route. That turned out to be a great decision! The road had plenty of curves, hills, and some really pretty views of the countryside.

Coming from central Illinois, where just about every road is straight and flat, we were loving the change. We rode through little valleys with farms tucked between the hills, and even found a beautiful spot beside a creek where we stopped to take a break. Kennie was especially impressed with that spot and probably would’ve stayed there fishing if we’d already bought our Tennessee fishing licenses.

When we got close to Cookeville, we started running into rain. We ended up getting caught in two separate showers, stopping at a sporting goods store to wait them out. Luckily, it didn’t last very long. We got a little wet, but by the time we reached Athens, we were mostly dried out. We had rain gear with us, but the showers were so short that we never bothered putting it on.

We also made a stop at Watts Bar Dam, not too far from Athens. We’d spotted it along the way and figured we might as well pull over and check it out. Between the dam, the nearby nuclear plant, and the mist coming off the water, it was a pretty neat place to stop and stretch our legs.

By the time we made it to Athens, we’d ridden more than 300 miles, making this our longest day on the bikes so far. We found a room at a Days Inn, grabbed some Wendy’s for dinner, and called it a day. Nothing fancy, but after that many miles, a decent bed and a place to park the bikes were about all we needed.

Even with the rain and a few sore body parts, it had been a really good day. We’d ridden some great roads, seen some beautiful countryside, and made it all the way to Athens like we’d hoped. Dodson Road was probably our favorite part, which was pretty funny considering we were heading down there to ride some of the most famous motorcycle roads in the country.

Now we were finally close enough to get to the roads we’d been looking forward to since we started planning this trip. Tomorrow was going to be the fun part!