The smell of factory farms permeates the humid air. Instead of bringing relief, the wind brings the rench of offal & overcrowded animals. I'd like to bring every person who orders the Colonel's original recipe here to rural Carolina to get a whiff of industrialized agriculture. I still eat meat, albeit sparingly, but at least I know where my meat comes from, and the often horrid conditions of its brief life before it lands on my dinner plate. At least the deer tied to the trunk of a passing car had a relatively pleasant life before bleeding to death from a bullet wound. From what I can see & smell, the chickens, pigs and turkeys in these parts lead a decidedly unpleasant life encircled by stainless steel & concrete, crowded into pens with hundreds of other ... read more

I stuck to the backroads on my ride from Greenville to Goldsboro, North Carolina, but my faith in my DeLorme road atlas was substantially shaken. I had planned a simple route to my destination that entailed turning off of a state route onto the smaller "Pate Road," making a left onto "Turner Hill Road," and then finally turning at the intersection with "Hood Swamp Road." The only problem was that the roads weren't there. Or rather, they were there, but the names of the roads had changed since my atlas was printed. I rode along, repeating to myself the name of the next road I needed to turn at, but I never saw it. Finally, I stopped in the little hamlet of Jason, and consulted my map. Jason was shown on my map as being at ... read more

As I rode south of Scotland Neck, North Carolina, I began seeing a new structure among the barns of many farms. Standing two stories tall and measuring perhaps 20x20 feet with no windows and a single door, I kept wondering to myself what they were. Many of these buildings were sided in wood, but some of them were covered in sheet metal. All of them though looked as though they hadn't been used in years. Doors and siding were falling off, and in some cases the roofs were rusting through. I finally stopped and asked about them, and I was informed that the unusual buildings were tobacco drying sheds. In that context it made sense why they stood in disuse, for I had yet to see a single field planted with tobacco. In fact, I had ... read more

As I was riding down a small trail off of a harvested field at sunset, looking for a place to pitch my tent, I wondered to myself, is it deer season yet? The single shot in the distance answered my question, and I quickly threw on my flourescent yellow vest over my sweatshirt. Even though I was off my bike, after a moment's consideration I also put on my white bike helmet for extra visibility, and then began thinking about what my last words should be, in the event that an eager hunter mistook all 6 feet, 5 inches of me for a deer. I decided it would be rather Larson-esque to declare, "Look, they only call me 'Buck...'" But failing that, I figured that stating the obvious would work while trying in vain to plug ... read more

Route 666 & the Home of the Gatling Gun I started out my journey in Suffolk, Virginia, with plans to cross the North Carolina border on my way to the Quaker Meeting in Woodland. I spent some time looking at my maps, trying to figure out a route that would keep me off of Route 58, a rural, 4-lane divided highway filled with trucks. I patched together a path that took me through cotton and peanut fields along paved roads devoid of painted lines and traffic. I saw more horses along my route than cars, and enjoyed the peaceful solitude of farmland that had been worked for hundreds of years. As I rode past quiet white farmhouses I imagined what a vivid shock the invasion of blue-coated soldiers into this countryside must have been a century ... read more

I spent the better part of Sunday in a congested fog, and slept on the couch, recovering my strength for the week ahead. Sunday night I ran into a friend and ended up spending the better part of the evening hanging out with him & enjoying his company. Since I had been planning on making homemade powerbars on Sunday evening, I had to put off my baking endeavors until Monday morning. Which meant that I didn't get on my bike & out of town until Monday afternoon. Which meant that I was riding with rush hour traffic, away from Norfolk. I spent quite a bit of time looking at my maps, trying to figure out if there was some way that I could get from Norfolk to Suffolk, Virginia without getting onto a major highway. But ... read more

I started off my day in the western suburbs of Richmond, and even though my host had warned me against riding down Monument Avenue in the morning, I couldn't resist seeing such a shrine to the Confederacy. Well, most people in Richmond would not admit that Monument Ave. celebrates the Confederacy, but would rather insist that it memorializes Virginians. But the vast majority of those memorialized happened to wear Confederate grey. Of course, Monument Avenue has, in the opinion of some, been desecrated by the inclusion of a statue of Arthur Ashe, the great tennis player, who just happened to be African American. The opponents of the Ashe monument just happened to be White Americans, and vociferously denied that their opposition to the Ashe monument had anything to with protecting the memory of slaveowners such as ... read more

I woke at sunrise at the Little Flower Catholic Worker, and made it outside in time to still see the moon glowing in the indigo western sky. After a hearty vegetarian breakfast, we all headed down to the pond for a group picture before I left. Several of the Catholic Workers rode into town with me, making for a festive departure. There I met up with "Bike Shop" Sean, a member of the Twin Oaks intentional community who offered to ride with me part of the way to Richmond. I had a few questions for Sean about Twin Oaks, as I remembered reading about the community in a book entitled, "Getting Back Together." As we rode, he answered a few of my questions, and invited me to stop for lunch at Twin Oaks. Since I had ... read more

The ride out of Charlottesville started out on a brisk note. As I rode down the hill into town, my fingers grew numb with the chilly breeze. I kept thinking back to the warmth of the hospitality I received from Aron and Ted, and their two sons. They opened up their house to me the night before, allowing me to dry out from a wet ride. I spent an hour in their basement cleaning my bike of road grime, and utilized their laundry facilities as well. And I finally got my shoes dry... Before I left Charlottesville I decided to swing by the local library & make a blog entry. With some vague directions, I crawled up and sped down a few hills. I attached my Palm Pilot & GPS receiver to my handlebars to guide ... read more