A Week of Fun Riding

On Sunday, my dad and I woke up early and left from the house for a ride. It was really foggy when we left, but as we started climbing, we went right through the clouds. By the time we got back down, the sun had burned off most of it though. Rode a rockey trail down and almost out of the forest, then turned around and took a different one back up. Climbed a steep and loose trail to the top of the mountain, which is one of the big ones you can see from my house. The mountain is called Bald Knob, because of the large boulders at the top, where there aren't any trees. Ride passed that and you come to that steep, technical descent that I talked about earlier. Did it in the daylight, and it was much more fun. Down the road, up a trail, and back another rocky ridge to the house. Ride time was about 3 hours, and we had to get back to help get ready for a party that we were having for the local mountain bike club.

On Tuesday was the Bicycle Shop group ride, and it also turned out to be really fun. Up a climb, then down a really fun 20 minute singletrack descent. Usually at this point, you take a fire road through a gap, and connect to a rocky trail that goes through a really dense hollow. Instead, we took the gasline up and over that ridge to the trail. Up an encredibly steep wall, then down the other side. By the time we got to this difficult trail, my dad had already snapped a chain, but we got that fixed pretty fast. While we rode off the gasline, another mechanical occured, and a derraileur got snapped. Threw a singulator on it and singlespeeded out. At that point, it was night. The John Wert path is a difficult trail in the day; riding it at night was completely different. Big rock gardens, and low trees and other plants that try to grab ahold of your light. I'm 2 for 3 this year on the "Sea of Rocks" rock garden. It's one of the hardest ones around, and when I did it the first time I thought I would never be able to do it again.

Today was my birthday, and I got mostly riding gear. Which I'd actually rather have than anything else. Some new gloves (I tore mine when I broke my collarbone and they started giving me blisters), a waterproof jacket and baggy shorts (I was borrowing my mom's jacket because mine leaks through). I also got a helmet cam. It's the same one that Gunnar used to record his Bear Creek videos, I'm looking forward to learning how it works. On Sunday we'll go out to R.B. Winter and do a fun group ride out there. It's hard to believe that it's only 45 minutes from my house and I've never been there. Can't wait.