Trail Wanderlust
A couple of weekends I ago I spent some time with friends doing some chair lift assisted mountain biking. I did not a take many pictures as I was playing with a new video setup. Here are a few.
Here is a Megan cruising on by.
James and Dale zipping down Brake Through
Dale cruising by
Michael pointed in the right direction.
Last week on my way up to Mammoth Mountain for some chairlift-assisted mountain biking I met up with Dave and Michael for a run down the Lower Rock Creek trail on my way into town. We met up at the lower trailhead and then made our way to the top for some great riding back down the trail. I had so much fun that I did not take any pictures. You will have to take a look at last year’s post for some pictures. Michael did snap a few pictures and one of those is below. I was however running a video camera. A fire came through this area back on August 5th that burned 122 acres. Now wildfires are pretty common but the cause of this one was interesting. The USFS has determined that fire was caused by a mountain bike pedal strike against a rock. I’m not one to argue on this one, plenty of pedals have steel bits that can create a spark if struck against the right stuff in the right way. Whatever your thoughts here is a clip of us rolling through the burn area.
Update:
Here are a few links to articles and forum post on this fire.
Cyclist incensed after being blamed for a forest fire.
MTBR’s NORCAL forum thread. (Be prepared some comedy in the responses here)
SFist Article (Read the comments)
My work projects in Bahrain finally got to a point to where I could come home for a few weeks. Combined our schedules have been kinda nuts lately which included Nichol needing to move a vehicle across the country. I was able to swing my schedules around to allow for a few days at home before getting back on a plane to the east coast. There I would join Nichol for the country drive that started in Norfolk VA.
Day 1 was spent taking care of business in Norfolk before heading off to my folks place in North Carolina. Along with a great visit, my Dad cooked up some of the best pulled pork BBQ I have ever had. On the evening of Day 2 we pulled into Asheville NC. We spent the evening enjoying some of the tasty microbrew scene along the Asheville Ale Trail that included Burial Beer and Wicked Weed Brewing. Not that we had much of a plan to ride here but any thoughts of that were pretty much washed away with all of the thunderstorms they were having with more planned for the following day. Day 3 we made our way to Little Rock Arkansas where we enjoyed some more tasty beers at Lost Forty Brewing before hopping into a hotel for the evening. The next day we made our way Albuquerque NM for tastings from Ponderosa Brewing. Yes, why yes we were making exceptional time! Don’t worry we left no contrails.
The following day we made a rather quick jaunt over to Flagstaff. We had made arrangements for some rentals bikes from Cosmic Cycles. I must stay they some really good rentals at a very reasonable rate for what we got. If we would have been super on our game we could have gotten out for late afternoon ride, but we somehow managed to find ourselves enjoying some tasty grub and beer at Flagstaff Brewing Co while we planned out what the ride was going to be the following day.
The route we were going to do was a sampling of the Arizona National Scenic Trail. I had ridden this section of trail back in summer of 2010 and figured this would be a great intro to the countryside of Flagstaff for Nichol. We parked at the trailhead along Forest Service Road 418 and took the forest service roads back south along the bottom of Hart Prairie before catching trail that took us up near Aspens Corner and the junction with the Arizona Trail.
Working our way up to Aspens Corner
The connector trail up to Aspens Corner passes by a nice little pond. This views did not suck
Once on the AZT we were treated to a mix of single track goodness through stands of Aspens
Views from Hart Prairie
Stands of Pines
A ferns that were sometimes head high. The last few miles along this route were just “La La La La La” singletrack awesomeness that required very little pedaling and very little breaking as you swooped through pines, aspens, ferns, wildflowers etc…. all the way back to the trailhead.
We enjoyed some tasty Asheville goodness we brought with us for a post-ride refreshment at the trailhead.
And what a great place to enjoy a tasty post-ride beer. This was our view next to the truck. By the end of the day we would make our way to Las Vegas where we delivered and the truck and other move related goods. The following day made our way back home.
Makes Bill a Dull Boy!
Since the fall of last year, I have been spending way too much time working in the island country of Bahrain in the Persian Gulf. I certainly can’t complain about the accommodations.
It has been virtually one project right after the other and I am looking forward to getting it all of done.
The work is certainly rewarding but I am ready to get back home to be with family and friends and back on some dirt.
Not this kind of dirt.
This kind of dirt!
So with all of this time I have had over here to pour through all of the MTB resources over here, I have boiled down things into my number one tip for planning a mountain biking trip to Bahrain…..
I’m sure you could make some kind of lemonade with the bitter lemons of this place. Maybe with a Fatbike and riding at night when its only like 95 but really try Death Valley in summer first.
Okay finally finished up the rest of the Colorado Trip pages with the inclusion of the
Doctor Park Trail and the “Table of Contents” for the trip.
Wow, I have been away from the BLOG for way too long. Between work being….well…WORK and a ton of other life things I have been away from the keyboard. The 401 trail is thoroughly covered in snow right now but I finally finishing off my pictures and notes from the fall Colorado trip.
I spent a few days in Crested Butte and got in a couple of great rides. One of those was the 401 Trail.
I have spent the last month working out of the country and pretty much had no-time and less mental energy to finish up my pictures and thoughts from my Colorado trip. The Monarch Crest trail was my day six excursion and it did not disappoint. Much of the route is part of the both Continental Divide and Colorado Trails. This is certainly a bucket list quality trail that I’m super stoked to have ridden.
View from along the trail
Nudging up close to 12,000 feet of elevation.
Looking down into the Silver Creek drainage that I would soon be riding through.
Near the bottom of the Silver Creek Trail.
Day Five of my fall vacation through Colorado was riding around Twin Lakes between Leadville and Buena Vista. There was plenty of nice trail and killer views. Find all the pictures, maps and blabbage here.
Riding “The Commando Run” that is, you Dirty Minded Bastards! On day four of my Chasing Aspens vacation was a ride that goes from Vail Pass Summit down into the town of Minturn. The route we rode was used by the Army’s 10th Mountain Division during WWII as training for alpine skiing combat and commando raids for the war effort. We rode a series of forest roads to the Bowman Shortcut trail to the Two Elk trail. We did a total of 17.7 miles with 1,870 feet of climbing and 5,200 feet of descent. This was one fantastic trail that pretty much kept all of your trail riding skills on their toes. Check out the write up, pictures, map and GPS files I have added to the site.
Day 3 of my Chasing Aspens Tour through Colorado was in Winter Park where I could to make some new friends as well as spend some quality trail time with old friends. It was an outstanding introduction to riding at elevation and pretty fall colors. I can find a few more words and a few dozen photos of that outing here.
