Deals Gap / Tail of the Dragon.

Well, Decided to go to Deals Gap yesterday and ride the tail of the dragon, long trip so we took the jeep down and stopped at Pigeon Forge, The Smokey Mountains and Gatlinburg, TN. Then went to NC and rode the dragon. Not really impressed with it compared to WV roads. If I had never been in WV before I would have thought it was awesome, but really didn't see any turns that were worse then the ones at Cool Springs on 50. I would say if your there, ride it. But don't make a special trip.

Here are some pictures from US129Photos.. Killboys should be up tomorrow.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Just got home today around 5 and got everything unpacked. Its a long freaking trip down there. I think we drove 9 hours to Deals Gap one way. There is nothing there either, just the road, a motorcycle gas station and a carport selling tshirts. We both bought shirts and a couple stickers. Jamie got a pressed penny from there that has Tail of the Dragon on it. That was cool. We see alot of nice bikes.. not really any cool cars on it.

But when I say nothing, I mean nothing was there.. for miles.. like 35 miles of nothing but trees lol....
ANyhow.. We took alot of pictures while riding it from the passenger seat. I will post them as I upload them. We took a video too.

Too bad you have to pay for those pictures. Those are pretty good. I have been on the Dragon on a motorcycle. I think that is where it is more fun. Not too sure that I would enjoy taking a car down it.

Yeah, I could see fun in taking a motorcycle, taking a car was like regular WV roads..

Did you notice its definately out in the boonies? Nothing around but you, the road and the crickets. lol

Yea! It is a nice ride in the fall though. But definitely deliverance material!

Deal's Gap was fun in the old days when the speed limit was 55mph and the TNHP didn't live there. It's not any single curve but the amount of them over such a long distance. It will wear you out at speed. especially with a manual transmission and no power steering. We used to run it hard.

It was also fun spending the weekend and hanging out with a bunch of other MR2 owners. Some of them I only saw once a year.

89SC wrote:

Deal's Gap was fun in the old days when the speed limit was 55mph and the TNHP didn't live there. It's not any single curve but the amount of them over such a long distance. It will wear you out at speed. especially with a manual transmission and no power steering. We used to run it hard.

It was also fun spending the weekend and hanging out with a bunch of other MR2 owners. Some of them I only saw once a year.

Definitely a lot more fun back in the days before it became over run with cops, people, and lowered speed limits. WV definitely has some nice roads but 200 plus curves in less than 12 miles were hard to beat.

318 turns on 11 miles. There really isn't a straight part in it. There's one section of shallow turns where you can see a bit ahead. There's some scary off camber turns and gravity cavity where the road just drops away from under you. They usually keep the pavement in good shape too. The roads are getting really bad around here.

Scott, you drove by two nice waterfalls, Yellow Creek Falls and Bear Creek Falls. Both are on the NC side. Yellow Creek Falls has a really hard geocache. It only gets found a few times a year. It has 30 Finds and 20 DNFs. I found it but it took awhile.

On the weekend, the kayaks come out and they release water from the dam to give them a good ride. I think there would be money to be made taking pictures of them too.

Here's an old video clip from Deal's Gap. It's uses an old codec, MPG2. I had to download it to watch it again.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Cool. I went ahead and bought this picture from Killboy today.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

looks like fun.. i've been wanting to go to deal's gap for a while now. hopefully someday i'll have the free time to just up and go.

My Killboy pics:

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

I wanted some of the 93 but never got around to ordering them.

At the Fontana Dam. Everyone goes there for group pics:

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Me behind Deno's MK1.5:

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

That is one wicked little MR2. He was the first to put a 2nd generation turbo motor in a 1st gen body. It's somewhere around 350hp. Look at the rear tires and flares.

Very cool. I have about 30-40 pics of the road I will upload soon.

i want to bring the bike there so bad!

My first time over the Dragon was also the first time I saw sportbike riders dragging their knees on the road. They put bolts in their knee pads and throw sparks. I thought the first one coming at me was pretty cool but then I realized the second one was on my side of the road.

There's a crazy guy who goes there several times a year and runs the 11 miles in 11 minutes on a Goldwing. It's amazing to see.

When I was there I saw a guy in a Jock Strap on a Super Moto bike.

Here is some more photos from the run.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Here are a few more photos.. I like the little Indy car they had from Killboy.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

The dragon tail with the bike is new since I've been there. They did a lot of work to the building, added a restaurant and rebuilt the motel part right before TN got all cranky and about closed the road down. Did you check out the Tree of Shame?

89SC wrote:

Did you check out the Tree of Shame?

Looked everywhere for it, never seen it.

It's in front of the rooms you can stay in to the left of the main building.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

I honestly did not see that. I actually looked for it too.
Maybe thats why I am not a good geocacher? I couldnt find a tree that big and I look for things as small as a dime.. ha ha

It looks like things have changed quite a bit since I've been there. They may have removed the tree.