Miles: 323
We joked that Black Mountain has too many hippies and therefore no place was open for breakfast before 8;00 so we had to go to Dennys. I don't know why this was the case but it dint bother us all that much. Today was going to start out good but as we moved east we knew the roads wouldn't be as twisty as they were the first three days. However, we did start out on Blue Ridge Parkway and we had decided to ride to the top of Mt Mitchell. Despite the numerous times we had passed by this road we had never been to the top. The morning had started out very cold in Black Mountain and by the time we began our ascent up Mt Mitchell from the BRP the temperature had dropped even further to just above freezing. We were prepared for the cold but it was still a little too cold to be perfectly comfortable. When we got to the top we left our gear on as we took some pics and watched the activities in the parking lot happen as there were many hikers preparing for the day and even a ham radio operator holding court. After milling for about 20 minutes we continued back down to the Parkway and head east. We jumped off at NC80 and down past Lake Tahoma and Lake James where we stopped on the very northeastern end of the lake for a brief stop at the boat ramp. It wasn't that great of a stop, but there wasn't much to choose from after this point. We rode for a couple of hours and stopped at Two Boros Brewery in Wilkesboro NC for lunch. The brewery was in an old building that reminded me of some sort of general merchandise store and the beer and pizza were quite good. The brewery was across the street from the restored Wilkes County Courthouse, so naturally we walked over to take a few pics. We continued another 100 miles and stopped at Forgotten Road Ales in Graham for a quick beer before heading into Raleigh. Forgotten Roads was an interesting place as it was located in an old Mobil gas station with some outside seating in back of the station. We were staying right in downtown Raleigh and had targeted a couple of local breweries before heading to dinner at the 42nd St Oyster House. Steve's work Brough him he frequently so he knew the lay of the land. The Oyster House was pretty phenomenal and with a nice bottle of wine and a plethora of oysters it easily was in the top 5 tabs of all time tabs for our motorcycle trip. We both felt it was worth it. The downtown Hampton had a nice little outside seating area where we enjoyed another bottle of wine within sight of our bikes before calling it a night. Not a great day of riding good roads but the start of the day, and then the nice weather in the afternoon made this still a good day overall.