Palmetto Trail - December???

[fastmtnbiker33w]

I'm visiting my family during my Christmas break and plan on taking a crack at the Palmetto Trail mountains to shore.  I know the days are short that time of year, but the weather is usually pretty good and the bugs and reptiles are hidden away pretty good.  I'd like to try to complete it in 3'ish days if the route is still around the 380 miles that sjanes rode a couple of years ago. 

If more than a 4 or 5 others want to take a crack at this with me, let me know and I'll allocate a bit of time to working on the gps track.

I'd like to start on the 26th.

[othersackett]

I rode this in July and I have to say that a lot of the trail is in really bad shape.  Some of it may be easier to pass in winter but I'm not sure I would do it again.  The bug situation would definitely be better in December but there are hunters out instead.  I tried to record my track with my etrex but I must not have done it because most of it went away.  That said, if you do decide to do it I would be glad to share any route knowledge that I have. 

[fastmtnbiker33w]

After talking with othersackett and several people involved with the Palmetto Trail Conservation including the lead cartographer, I'm ready to give this thing a go.  I've got a complete gps file of the entire route....a lot of road connecting the sections closed to bikes and some automatic reroutes of flooded swamps given to me by the cartographer.  This I'm very stoked about. 

I shipped my bike out today....hardtail ti with a bit of a drive train....1x9.....34 tooth up front.  I'm hoping I don't end up having to ride ALL of the roads in the Lowcountry like othersackett did this past summer. 

If the weather looks good in the Upcountry, I'll start at the Northwest terminus on the 27th.  If it's been cold, wet, and sloppy, I'll start on the 28th in Spartanburg.  PM me if you want my SPOT share page.  After my attempt, I'll get Scott M both my gps file and the .gpx track so other can give it a go.  I had no luck getting the VCU crew to respond to my emails and sjanes is awol this fall.  Hopefully I will have a positive experience and others will want to give this route a try.  The Conservation group is really excited as they're trying hard to get more recognition of this route.

[fastmtnbiker33w]

So I'm putting on a pretty sweet layer of fat here in Newberry, SC at my mom's.  I went out today south of town and followed the route given to me by the PT Conservation cartographer.  He did a great job keeping me off the highways and I rode quite a bit of dirt road today.  My wife went with me on her road bike and she was stoked to not be on pavement.  She's such a mountain biker.  It was nice to work a bit harder than I wanted to trying to stay in her draft as we went back to my mom's.  It's super cold here.  That's my only concern.   The rains were plentiful last week and I may have to reroute some sections south of Columbia.  I'll hit the store tomorrow for some batteries and hand and foot heaters.  Then I'll be off on the morning of the 27th.  I'm going to start north of Spartanburg. 

[murf]

Sounds like a blast..have a good trip. .post up lots of pics on the facebooks

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk

[shey]

Can't believe I missed this 

[Mr Cup]

Looking forward to seeing how this goes. Definitely want to do this route in the future.

[mbeardsl]

How did this go?

[fastmtnbiker33w]

Better than I expected but not as planned.  The excessive amount of litter started to bug me and it has kept me from writing about the adventure as I tend to get negative....so I've been procrastinating a bit on a write up.  I covered 300 miles in 2 days 9 hours with plenty of sleep both nights.  The trail became worse and worse as I got into the low country.  Totally overgrown and under used.  I'd see the blazes on the tree and the track on my gps but no visible trail whatsoever.  Sometimes it was a thicket like trying to walk through your neighbors hedgerow.  I ended up stepping on a root or limb or something that wacked me in the achilles tendon and that made me pull the plug.  I later heard that the rest of the trail was pretty wet and would have been impassable anyway.  The big national forest section north of Newberry was pretty decent with lots of frozen horse trail.  There was plenty of stuff that was difficult to navigate due to lack of use.  It hit 28 my first night and on the last day I was in shorts and short sleeve jersey all day even in the rain.  I'm glad I did it.  No regrets on pulling out.  I rode plenty of fun trail, got lost a couple of times...kind of...and rode some fantastic backroads.

[mbeardsl]

Thanks for the reply.  I hear you on the litter.  I'd be very interested in hearing about the ride.  I had done a full gps route from the terminus in the Upstate to the coast with some ride arounds and alternates but nothing like the 70 mile one you wrote about on the blog.  Some of it was without speaking with the folks at the Conservation office on hiking some of the sections while carrying the bike as it was only ~30 miles of hiking over a 500 mile route (they called me back but I had moved from the area and lost interest). 

I was also surprised to see your gps data on Strava for some sections I thought were impossible/difficult (for instance the gated sandy road east of Fort Jackson had me puzzled when I did some recon awhile ago but looks like you didn't have any problems). 

I found the Enoree sections downright impassable when I did some riding there but that was in Spring/Summer with a ton of overgrowth and blowdowns.  The horse section was awesome but the trail on each end of it was very difficult to find and follow and with bridges out etc.

[fastmtnbiker33w]

Enoree wasn't that great for me either.  It was slow going and it got cold that night.  I ended up stepping in freezing water about an hour or so from Newberry.  I was planning on rolling through Newberry that night, but ended up rolling a couple miles off route to my mom's where I bivy'd in the back yard next to a fire.  I ended up rolling out at about 9 that next morning after a good breakfast and drying out my socks. 

Overgrowth was absolutely horrible after Santee.  In fact, at one point I couldn't even see any trees with blazes.  I ended up bypassing a bunch of small sections after that and since my ankle started getting real stiff, I pulled the plug. 

The sandy road after Ft. Jackson.....I remember a waste disposal site where they were burning methane.  It was dark when I hit that and I rode a bunch of sandy roads.  I remember coming up on a gate from the backside.  I was able to go around it easily.  It had a keypad entry thing on it.  Other than that, I don't remember any closed gates.

The gps file they gave me was fantastic.  Without it I would have been a wreck.  They sent me through neighborhoods and on bike paths between all the passages.  The backroads were really great.  I had one car honk at me and it was quite a ways back when it did.....a nice heads up.  I was a bit nervous on Garner's Ferry.  I was told to take it so I wouldn't have to go through the swamp near the power plant just south of there.  It was dark and it started raining.  There was a shoulder, but people were driving 65+.  I was a bit puckered to say the least.  The trails after that were fantastic and I even thought the trails through all the sandy stuff after Poinsett were great. 

I'd never do that ride in warm weather.  No thanks.  Winter is the best time to do it...preferably after the new year to avoid deer hunters....though I never felt uncomfortable as all the shots I heard were far away.