Riding The Cold Coal Mountains of TN and KY

Thursday, Jan. 22, 2015.  Starting temp, just above freezing with a tops of near 50 degrees today.  Destination, local MickyDs for meet-up and then head for the TN-KY border and back roads, especially KY 74.  Biker friends Paul and Ken met up, drank our coffee, and at 9:45 a.m. we pulled out heading West to Knoxville and then North on I-75.  This is one of the few times we run the interstate which was to save time getting to our ride destination.  At Caryville, TN we left the interstate never to return again this day.  From now on it will be backroads with some four laners every once in a while.

This is the general route for today.  There are several short loop roads not indicated.

Meet-up, Sweet Thang, Ole Yeller, and the White Rat.  Ole Yeller is a Honda Goldwing which gets about 20K miles a year on it and some long trips.  This past Fall he rode up thru the New England states into Maine.  Next month he's heading to Keywest, FL to meet up with his lady friend for a few weeks.  He hauls a small pet cage in the passenger seat for his minature Yorkie that travels with him on overnight rides.

Going North out of Knoxville we rode I-75 which is a nice scenic highway.  This was taken in order to hasten the travel to lesser roads but roads with more interest.

First of the lesser roads, TN 90 northeast from Caryville, TN, heading toward the Kentucky border.

Leaving Caryville the riding starts, nice paved highways with sweeper curves.  Sunny, blue sky and slightly chilly.  Just a good day to ride.

Going through the chute beneath the railroad can be rather hairy when meeting a large truck but today it was a snap.  Just have to watch for wet spots to make sure they are not frozen.  No wiggle room in there.

The pictures of KY 74 are on a video and shows just how wild this highway is.  Very narrow, lots of dips and curves and mostly without any lane striping or guardrails.  It is a very poor area, this TN-KY coal area as these houses indicate.  A run down mobile home is upscale living in this area.  Very little land suitable for agriculture, no industry other than logging or coal mining and most of the mines have closed down.

One area had a nice size stream running along the road in places often disappearing around some bend into who knows where only to show up again a few hundred feet farther up the road.

This is a nice sweeper curve, just keep the throttle in place, set yourself up for the turn, and lean your bike over.











Coming into Middlesboro, KY the land flattened out a bit and some nice farms were alongside the highway.

Along our route I found this an interesting picture, an outside church with benches for pews, a wooden cross in the background and a podium for the preacher's Bible.  It was a Methodist Church.

Residential area west side of Middlesboro, KY.  An old town and for the area the major town for shopping.

Interesting old buildings dating back into the late 1800s and early 1900s.  The main street, like many small towns, is where the action is and the highway is the main street.

About half way through Middlesboro the railroad tracks crosses the high.  It had a sign attached reading "Magic City".  Don't know what that refers to but it was different.

Going into KY from TN you go through a long tunnel and coming out the route we took you do the same.  Just outside of the tunnel we turned off and went through the western tip of VA then back into TN.

Inside the mountain with it's eerie yellow glow from the lights.  Always clean and well lit.

Leaving the VA area quickly puts us back in TN, more back roads and small farms, old farm land with old buildings.

Then you pop over a rise into a valley and there you find large fields interrupted only by fence rows dotting both sides of the highway.

A few miles later we've back on a multi-lane highway, U.S. 25 with nice scenery and long curves.  Carb cleaning time so crank it up a bit.

As I have mentioned before, we do a lot of back roads and this is no exception for a few miles of carb cleaning we were once again back on the smaller rural highways.  Where do they lead?  Who knows, just follow them to find out.  Hopefully it won't be in a front yard with several barking dogs that look hungry.  Been there, done that.