39.1 miles on the New River State Park Trail

 

Meadows of Dan to Fries 

May 17 2026 Sunday

Next stop on our road trip is Fries Virginia. Pronounced “freeze”, not French “Frys” We’ve really been enjoying these short travel days between stops, we arrive with plenty of time and energy to take in a half day extra at the destination.

The trip from Meadows of Dan to Fries was an easy drive on Hwy 58, a road we’ve taken many times before. Fries was new to us, located a few miles north of Hwy 58 we just passed by it on previous journeys. It’s a small town, only about 350 people live here. A Dollar General store is the only market, luckily for the residents, the larger town of Galax is nearby.

town of Fries on the New River

Fries sits right on the New River and in its hay-day was a mill town with several fabric and thread factory's on the banks of the river. The streets of the town are lined with the small mill houses so common in these company dominated towns of the south. The houses were owned by the company and rented to its employees. This arrangement had good and bad significance for both parties, mostly good for the company and bad for the employees but that was life back then.

Fries New River RV Park

We are staying at Fries RV Park right in town. It is located in a narrow split in the hill behind the town. I’m going to say it is relatively new and the owners have done a fine job of building it in what I’m sure was a challenging build site.

Our site (#12)

Our site with a deck and a small creek

The New River State Park Trail is the reason we’ve come to Fries; it is a Rail-to-Trail that follows the shore of the New River for 57 miles. I was looking for a challenge on this ride, I wanted to make it my longer than my previous 34-mile one day distance. Looking at the State Park Trail map I decided to go from Draper station to Fries a distance of 40 miles.

My 39.1 mile route along the river

My reason for this route was, Millie could transport me and the bike to my start point in Draper. She would return to the RV at Fries RV Park and I would bike back to her. I thought it was a reasonable distance that I could do easily, but there is one important geographic feature I forgot about.

The New River is one of the few major rivers in the USA that runs north. From its origin in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina it travels north through Virginia into West Virginia. The railroad tracks which is now the trail follows the river. From south to north the river is running downhill. My planned route from Draper in the north to Fries in the south would be uphill! A continuous gradual accent for 39.1 miles on a manual pedal bike, well I was looking for a challenge!

7:30 am at Draper Station

I started pedaling south at 7:30am from Draper Station with the temperature in the low 60’s.  In the first couple hours I only saw 3 other people, all of them going downhill! Having the trail all to myself was grand, the only sound was my tires crunching on the finely crushed gravel. Biking uphill wasn’t a concern at this point.

The river and the trail

As I got closer to Foster Falls, the halfway point of the trail, there was an increase in the number of hikers and bikers I encountered, all but one going downhill. I was still feeling strong and not having any problem with my uphill challenge. Just then an athletic looking guy came up from behind and passed me like I was standing still!

The Foster falls visitor’s center was very busy with new arrivals arriving to enjoy a Sunday in the park. While there was not a lot of traffic on the trail, I noticed more of them passing me and going uphill, they all were on E-bikes!

The further I got from Foster Falls the less people I encountered, most of those were E-bikers on their return to their cars at Foster Falls. Soon I was riding long stretches with no other people in sight. Occasionally, I would cross paths with someone and we would nod, or say hello, these brief intrusions into my solitary journey were acceptable. I was about 25 miles into the ride at this point, had only stopped for brief intervals to take pictures and hadn’t spoken to anyone yet.

Going uphill all that way, somewhere around 25-30 miles I thought to myself, I’m not enjoying this anymore. Then it dawned on me that I could drop down a gear to make the pedaling easier and still make decent time. That worked out fine and I pedaled at a casual pace the rest of the way,

At Fries Junction I stopped to take a picture of the sign that said I only had 5 ½ miles to go to get back to the RV Park. There was a couple sitting at the rest area and I explained that I was sending pictures of my progress to my wife and he said you won’t get a signal here. That began a pleasant conversation about the trail, the town, the lack of cell service, etc. So, I am capable of conversation once and a while! Lol

Soon I was entering the campground road to the RV, still going uphill. I had told Millie I would be five hours on the trail, my actual time was six hours. Not bad for an old guy using only muscle power to go almost 40 miles uphill!

6 hours 39.1 miles all uphill

Afterwards I felt fine, the only after effect from the ride was for several hours when I got up from sitting, one or both legs would try to cramp up. Nothing I couldn’t release; it was a good day!