Mountain Bike Bill, The Dirt on the Dirt

Tag: Colonnade

Dirt Time in Washington

So I have been in Seattle for a couple of weeks on a work gig but just managed to hit the dirt. Man can not live in the dirt alone so I have been enjoying some of the other wonders of the Pacfic Northwest, thier great microbrews. In addition to the 10+ brewpubs in the Seattle area I have swelled hoppy goodness at, I attended the Bremerton Beer Festival. The following weekend was spent in Portland for the 24th Aniversary of the Oregon Brewer’s Festival. In addition to the madhouse that was the Brewer’s Festival some of the local goods were also sample directly at the source. Deschutes, Bridgeport, Widmer, Tugboat and Amensia Brewing were on the “tour”. Needless to I was stupidly happy about sampling some of the best beers around. My liver on the other hand felt differently after taking more than one for the team.

So I have been in Seattle for a couple of weeks on a work gig but just managed to hit the dirt.    Man can not live in the dirt alone so I have been enjoying some of the other wonders of the Pacfic Northwest, thier great microbrews.    In addition to the 10+ brewpubs in the Seattle area I have swelled hoppy goodness at,  I attended the Bremerton Beer Festival. The following weekend was spent in Portland for the 24th Aniversary of the Oregon Brewer’s Festival.    In addition to the madhouse that was the Brewer’s Festival some of the local goods were also sample directly at the source.  Deschutes, Bridgeport, Widmer, Tugboat and Amensia Brewing were on the “tour”.   Needless to I was stupidly happy about sampling some of the best beers around.    My liver on the other hand felt differently after taking more than one for the team.

As part of the MTBBill Liver Recovery Act of 2011, it was time to get some pedals turning.   The I-5 Colonnade MTB Skills Park is less than 10 minutes from where I’m staying so it is always good for a quick afterwork fix.

Working part of the weekend is part of the work gig for this project, but Green Mountain was close enough to where I was working to allow for some grunting and grinning in the dirt after work.

Air Time

Duthie Hill Mountain Bike Park is the Seattle areas second MTB Skills Park and it is simply awesome.   With 120 acres to work with they are produced a trail network that caters to nearly all types of riders.  Wither you are looking to get your wheels in the air…..

Or wither you want to get that natural outdoor experience on a meandering trail through the trees.   This place has all of that right in Seattle’s backyard.

 

One of the lines I did not hit out here 🙂  I believe this trail was Semper Dirticus.     The freeride double black diamond trails here are quite impressive.  On this trip it was mostly from a spectactor perspective.   I got the bike, I just need to develop the skills and get some testicular growth happening.   I did hit some of the stunts and tagged my largest gap to date to thier is hope that I will get intouch with my inner hucker at some point.

One of favorites from a trail with features perspective was Ryan’s Eternal Flow.  It is more of XC trail with stunts and features more so than a series of features with a trail between them.  Considering how close this place is I will certainly be back a few more times before this work trip is done.

Washington Area Added to the Website

I have finally gotten around to compiling all of my pictures and notes from my April trip to Washington.  It was enough stuff to add a Washington section to the site.   If you have been following the blog a good portion of the stuff will not be completely new to you.  I have however added more pictures and in some cases some maps and GPS files.   So click away.

Puget Sound Area Overview Page

Seattle’s I-5 Colonnade MTB Skills Park

The orginal plan for today was to pickup and rental bike for a shop in Seattle and go for a ride on Friday and get the bike back Friday evening.  Well things went smoothly and I am pulling out of the bike shop and I have maybe two hours of light left.   What is close by?  After a minute or two of Googling I found out that Colonnade was sorta close by.   Before you know it I was there.   For those that have not heard of the place, Colonade has gained national attention due to novel concept and the excellent use of land.   This model is starting to find it’s way to other parts of the country.  Read more about Colonnade

Once I saw how cool the place was I had to get to riding.  I had not checked into my hotel yet, so all my stuff down in my suitcase.  Screw it, forget changing I grabbed just my helmet, shoes, and gloves and hopped on the bike.  Polo shirts and MTBing, thing could be a new fashion trend.

 

Blah Blah Blah,  I rode a bunch of it, I got nervous ticks looking at some of it and if I lived up here I would make this a regular stop.   On with some pics:

Wall Ridage

You don’t measures technical trail features per trail here, it a per foot thing.

 

 

Pick your poison

More Wall Ridage

It is not all about getting in the air and steeps, take a look at the skill stuff near the bottom.  There is stuff for the newbs and dews.

Check out Zelik riding this log,  can you say excited?  Zelik’s Dad was nearby and watched his kid giving the smaller stuff a go for well over an hour.   It is so awesome how the mountainbikers here took an underbridge eyesore and turned into a killer skills progression park and a wonderful place for young kids to learn about mountain biking and develop some skills other they video games.