Waynesville, North Carolina, USA – October 30, 2009

America Rides Maps now has complete end-to-end coverage of the 469 mile long Blue Ridge Parkway and every great mountain ride in the surroundings! More than 3 years of research and exploration and tens of thousands of miles spent on the motorcycle personally riding, selecting, judging, and cataloging every paved road which connects to and is adjacent to the nations favorite scenic ride are now available in a 7 map package. Designed and created for and by motorcyclists, field tested and proven, these pocket maps are unlike anything else available and are an unparalleled bargain at the $30.00 package price.

Each year millions make the ride down the scenic Blue Ridge Parkway which traces the highest mountain ridges in Virginia and North Carolina from it’s starting point near Shenandoah National Park just outside Waynesboro, Virginia, to it’s southern end at Great Smoky Mountains National Park near Cherokee, North Carolina. Along the way are spectacular views from high mountain overlooks, historic sites, and rugged natural beauty that has endeared the Blue Ridge Parkway as a national treasure.

America Rides Maps expands this 469 mile park ride to encompass the surrounding mountains highlighting more than 3000 miles of the most enjoyable paved two lane mountain back roads in the country. Designed to be accessible and easy to read, the maps fold simply, fit in a pocket, and highlight the kinds of information motorcyclists desire which other parkway-specific maps lack. They overlap and connect, are numbered in sequence from north to south, and provide such important features as the locations of reliable gas stations, distances between roads and exits, locations of significant attractions as well as all other connecting roads, cities, parks, and items of note to the traveling motorcyclist.

As nice as the ride on the Blue Ridge Parkway is, it provides only a fraction of the wealth of scenic, historic, and rewarding sights found in the surrounding rural mountains. With at least a dozen additional roads on each of the 7 maps selected for their challenge, beauty, and enjoyment, America Rides Maps reveals one of the best kept secrets – there is no greater concentration of fabulous motorcycle rides anywhere else in the nation.

“I’d been coming here for more than 20 years and thought I knew of the best roads. It was only after I moved here and spent a few years in the area I realized how little I had discovered” says Wayne Busch, owner and creator of America Rides Maps.

Wayne lives only minutes from one of the most scenic sections of the parkway in Waynesville, North Carolina. A lifelong motorcyclist, he was always enamored with the great ride through the linear park and made frequent trips north from Florida to enjoy it and the surrounding mountains. Once he relocated to the mountains of western North Carolina, he discovered the parkway barely scratched the surface of the depth of great two lane mountain back roads found in the Smoky Mountains.

“I met too many people, like me, who thought they knew the area. I’d mention my favorite roads only to find they’d never heard of them or had been driving right past them for years” he reports. In response, heI began making local maps to help people find them.

“I’d take the occasional job leading tours to help make ends meet, and they always went well – I knew the roads so I could tailor the rides as we went to just what my clients were looking for. It confirmed I knew what people liked”. Eventually, he decided to focus all his efforts on producing maps.

“I know what I don’t like about maps, and I am determined to make mine useful” says Busch. “I tried a bunch of sizes before settling on pocket maps. Bigger maps are too hard to fold, tough to use in wind, it seems what you want is always on the other side, and they are never handy. They end up in the saddlebag which means you rarely use them. I designed my maps so you can whip them out at a stop sign, quickly find what you need, slip them back in your pocket, and keep moving. That’s the way I ride.”

It seems America Rides Maps is onto something. With a dozen maps in production and thousands sold through their on line store, business is growing while other map makers struggle in an age of GPS and the Internet. They don’t just show you where the roads are, any map does that. America Rides Maps shows you where the RIGHT roads are and highlights them from all the others. Just because it’s a squiggly line on a map doesn’t mean it’s a great ride. You never know until you actually ride it, and that’s what they do. There’s nothing else like them.

America Rides Maps
http://americaridesmaps.com/
706 Underwood Cove Road
Waynesville, North Carolina 28786
(828) 734-2164
Fax: 828-456-5243

Contact:
Wayne Busch / America Rides Maps
America Rides Maps
http://americaridesmaps.com/