That's my kind of riding. We are a little more limited here in Illinois, but there are places like that to ride if you search them out. I prefer an MTB. Much more versatile. I don't mind doing 40-50 miles on my Trek 820 fitted with 2.1" Maxxis Crossmarks. It just takes a little longer.

Versatile in different ways. There are many flavors of versatility. Different days we choose different mixes. That is why we have more than one bike.

A mountain bike with big tires allows me to go places where a car cannot go, and that is the type of dirt road exploring I have available to me. I live near bottom lands of two major river systems. Many of my "dirt roads" are under water part of the year. During dry times they can be rocky and muddy. See the pics.
I've been Georgia. You are very lucky to have those mountains available to you. If I lived where you do I would have a set-up like yours.

Yes, I ride areas like in your picture on my mountain bike. That looks like the kind of place where mosquitoes would thrive.

It is about a 4 hour drive to the nearest mountain, but there is no shortage of hills nearby. I am lucky in having a wide variety of terrain to ride around here.

Another Sunday ride on dirt and paved roads. I worked out the missing connections and made a good 45+ mile route with lots of beautiful scenery and almost no traffic. Highlight were ambling through the little community of James and finding the old Folendore Dairy Farm. What a great way to spend a nice fall afternoon!

https://www.flickr.com/photos/bluesda...th/5196134179/

DirtDawg2 by BluesDawg, on Flickr

11_21 by BluesDawg, on Flickr

11_21 by BluesDawg, on Flickr

I like that old store pic...or could it have been a gas station? If those walls could talk.

The silos are great, we have a couple a few miles away. I keep meaning to go get pics. Most my old dirt paths are paved now as I mentioned, but there are still hundreds of great back roads to ride.

Blues Dawg, you hit me right over the head with a strong dose of nostalgia. I grew up on a dirt road about 80 miles from NYC. In those days there were two other families living on that road and if a car drove by we ran to the window to see who it was. The man who drove the town grader would stop by the house for coffee when working on our road. Those were simpler, and in my judgment, better times.

At the time, as a boy I rode a bike that weighed about as much as a compact car of today. These days I ride a Specialized Secteur, a poor man's Roubaix, with 28mm tires on Velocity A23 rims. I tried 32mm tires but they would not fit. Next year I hope to ride a fund raiser in Vermont that is mostly on dirt roads.

Another Sunday, another ride on dirt and paved roads. This time I took some side roads off of the roads I had been riding just to see where they ended up. One took me into a kaolin mine pit. I rode some of the service roads around the pit trying to find a way around, but had to backtrack to get out. I also took a short ride on a freshly paved but unopened section of a new road, part of the Fall Line Freeway which will cut across the state from Augusta to Columbus. It crosses over one of the dirt roads I later rode.


11-28-15 by BluesDawg, on Flickr

11-28-10 by BluesDawg, on Flickr

11-28-13 by BluesDawg, on Flickr

11-28-02 by BluesDawg, on Flickr

11-28-05 by BluesDawg, on Flickr

11-28-06 by BluesDawg, on Flickr

Excellent. I'm lovin' that red Georgia clay. Did you lift your bike over that gate or was that where you backtracked?

That was not the place by the kaolin mine where I mentioned bactracking, but I did turn around at that closed road.