600K -- May 27, 2007 (Pre-ride of June 2 Ride)

Route: Morrisville to Wilmington & back, via White Lake

Miles: 375

Time: 32 hours, 45 minutes.

Riders: 2 -- Me and Branson Kimball.

Ride time average: 15.5 mph

Sleep time: One hour total of catnapping.

Weather: highs in the low 90s, sunny to partly cloudy during the day, a moonlit night. We had a light headwind for the 188-mile outbound leg.

Wildlife sightings: 2 foxes, 1 baby copperhead snake (think twice before sleeping in that ditch!)

Route description: The 600K is largely flat. About 60 miles in, the course crosses I-95 near Wade. The bridge over the interstate is about the last coasting you’ll do for 200 miles. The majority of the route is on quiet rural roads, but the approaches into Wilmington and Morrisville are now urban/suburban areas. Pavement is good on the two ends of the route; the middle portion has lots of chip-and-seal.

Ride notes: Branson, a first-year Randonneur, apparently has a fondness for extra miles. As I waited at the start of our 600K trek, I was surprised to see him ride up on his bike with 15 miles already under his belt.

Branson would put in another 15 or so bonus miles over the next 32 hours. First, he forgot to get his card signed in White Lake and had to back track about six miles. Then he apparently got confused about one direction on the cue sheet. He doubled back for five miles on Hwy 210 to make sure he hadn’t missed a turn.

Branson proved his mettle on this ride. Just before White Lake, he developed severe pain in his left thigh. Our pace slowed to about 10 miles an hour. When we reached the White Lake control, he signaled his intention to abandon. That bad news sank my morale. It meant I’d be riding the next 400K by myself. I said a quick goodbye and pushed on, trying to wrap my mind around the prospect of so many solo miles.


The highlight of the ride came about 20 miles outside of White Lake when my cellphone rang. It was Branson. He’d gotten his legs back and was on the road again. We pushed on separately for the 75 miles to Wilmington, then reunited for a moonlight jaunt back to White Lake, rolling in around 4:30 a.m.

We decided not to stop for sleep, but took a catnap on the steps of a church outside White Lake. I got another 10 minutes of shuteye at the McDonalds in Angier.

We rolled into Al’s at 2:45 Monday, tired but in a celebratory mood. The successful 600K meant we were both qualified for PBP.

History Lesson: When you’re on a randonnée that passes through the killing fields of the Civil War, it helps to have a history buff like Branson along for the ride.

Branson can regale you with facts about that dark corner of U.S. history. For instance, I learned Arlington National Cemetery is on an estate once owned by Robert E. Lee. The property was seized by the federal government, ostensibly to cover a small tax debt, after Lee defected from the Union to lead the Confederate Army. Before the war ended, more than 16,000 Union soldiers would be interred there. Here's more from the Arlington National Cemetery Web site:

Arlington National Cemetery was established by Brig. Gen. Montgomery C. Meigs, who commanded the garrison at Arlington House, appropriated the grounds June 15, 1864, for use as a military cemetery. His intention was to render the house uninhabitable should the [Robert E.] Lee family ever attempt to return. A stone and masonry burial vault in the rose garden, 20 feet wide and 10 feet deep, and containing the remains of 1,800 Bull Run casualties, was among the first monuments to Union dead erected under Meigs' orders. Meigs himself was later buried within 100 yards of Arlington House with his wife, father and son; the final statement to his original order.

Branson and I talked history as we rode through Averasborough on Memorial Day. I find that stretch of road humbling. A dozen highway markers line the road, chronicling the Battle of Averasborough that raged there on March 15-16, 1865. An estimated 1,400 soldiers were killed in two days of fighting.

The conflict marked the first formal resistance of Gen. Sherman’s troops faced as they headed north from Atlanta. A column of Sherman’s army under the command of Gen. Henry W. Slocum made a move to the west -- a feint to fool the Confederates into thinking the Union soldiers were headed toward Raleigh. In fact, their true destination was Goldsboro. The Confederate forces made a tactical decision to attack Slocum’s wing while it was separated from the rest of the Union army. About 6,000 Confederate troops led by Lt. Gen. William Hardee dug in along the old Raleigh Plank Road, now known as Highway 82, which is part of the brevet route.

Here’s how the battle is described by the American Battlefield Protection Program on a National Park Service Web site:

On the afternoon of March 15, Judson Kilpatrick’s cavalry came up against Lt. Gen. William Hardee’s corps—consisting of Taliaferro’s and McLaw’s infantry divisions and Wheeler’s dismounted cavalry—deployed across the Raleigh Road near Smithville. After feeling out the Confederate defenses, Kilpatrick withdrew and called for infantry support. During the night, four divisions of the XX Corps arrived to confront the Confederates. At dawn, March 16, the Federals advanced on a division front, driving back skirmishers, but they were stopped by the main Confederate line and a counterattack. Mid-morning, the Federals renewed their advance with strong reinforcements and drove the Confederates from two lines of works, but were repulsed at a third line. Late afternoon, the Union XIV Corps began to arrive on the field but was unable to deploy before dark due to the swampy ground. Hardee retreated during the night after holding up the Union advance for nearly two days.

I found these maps online at David Rumsey’s site. His site shows a scanned page from the “Atlas to Accompany the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, 1861-1865.”


Today, the route is lined by expansive wheat fields but at the time of the battle the area was swampland.

One Web site describes soldiers sinking down in the mud to sleep. The site also recounts this incident from one soldier’s journal:

While plodding through the muck on the road to the front on the night of the 16th, Capt. Daniel Oakey noticed Sgt. [Thomas?] Johnson stooped over with one arm buried in the mud up to his elbow. "He explained that he was trying to find his shoe."

River Crossings The 600K crosses several scenic waterways. My favorite is the Black River. I took one shot standing on the bridge, then walked back and got a photo of the sign warning of mercury in the fish. That kinda killed the urge for a fish sandwich.