Today's Ride

Man the Ski Bowl is way excellent.  It's very solid intermediate fun.

Will see if I have any pics after dinner.

Looking forward to the pics Harv!  Me and Poindexter will be spending some time on those trails in July.

From what we rode today, I say the terrain is for motivated intermediates. You have to do some climbing, but very little that I saw was experts only technical.

It's a hugely fun place to ride.  Or maybe mountain biking is just naturally fun.  It doesn't really matter.

A few shots from today.  Saving some for a blog post I think.


Climbing In


The Usual Suspects


Doggies Dig The Bowl


Sounded Good in Theory

Last night on my backyard trails ^^.  Beautiful evening but very humid.  This spot is on our "Blue Trail" (see below), one of the flowier trails in our network.  Woods are very open and rolling, mostly pine with some oak and beech.  The blue trail has really accumulated some pine needles since blowing/raking everything at the beginning of the season, so I leaned my bike against a tree (see, I lean it for a purpose, not just for taking pictures!) and raked half the blue loop.  Rides much better now, smooth & fast.  I'll have to rake the other half of that loop next time I'm out.  The rest of the network doesn't seem to accumulate as much debris for whatever reason.  Those trails (the green loop & yellow loop) are tighter, twistier, more technical.

This time I leaned it just for the photo:



My standard route hits the green, then the yellow then the blue for a 7-mile loop, all singletrack except one short section.  I'll do that loop in just over an hour if I don't stop for trail maint, photos etc.  Here's a map put together by my buddy Kev:



And my track from Thursday night with an elevation profile.  The big hump between mile 4 & 5 is the yellow "Ridge Trail."



Anybody in the Wilton / Saratoga area wants a tour, give me a shout.  We've done quite a bit of work over the last year to mark things better (color coded ribbon on each trail), but some of the turns can still be tricky to find the first time.

Today's ride was a tribute to Rule #9.   - at least that's my story.

1). The radar image....


2)  The pile of his and hers drenched  clothes.  


3)  Rule #9.   Or how to rationalize trying to beat the odds and losing.


Badasses we are.  

Nice shot Marcski. Where are you riding there?

I've been getting so many flats this summer on my roadbike, just swapped out front the front and back with a 28mm Gatorskin and a Maxxis Refuse 23mm and new tubes. I hope this does the trick because I'm getting pretty sick of wrenching every week.

ml242 wrote

Nice shot Marcski. Where are you riding there?

I've been getting so many flats this summer on my roadbike, just swapped out front the front and back with a 28mm Gatorskin and a Maxxis Refuse 23mm and new tubes. I hope this does the trick because I'm getting pretty sick of wrenching every week.

I was up in Vermont, riding some trails just west of the town of Dorsett. Not super technical but had a nice climb with a fun loop up top and then an awesome run back down.  

As far as road bike tires, I'm a big fan of the Conti Grand Prix 4000 S II tire. Not the super lightest but very durable with good traction.

those are good tires, had a pair get stolen with nice rims while parked at BAM.

Catching the last rays of the sun on this evening's ride.  Falls a-comin' fellas.

Rolling through the Lost Coast & Redwood National Park with my old lady

Wapati Elk

Sweet Surf Spot

That might be one of the most scenic MTB spots around..Thanks for sharing...

Folks were asking for a map to the Ski Bowl mtb trails in North Creek.  Here it is:
http://www.wildernesspropertymanagement.com/trail-maps--docs.html
Maybe find a spot for it in the Directory?

Wow thanks for the heads up!  I'm going to email Steve and see if I can get larger files.

Thanks Jeff!

Have you ridden them yet? They are sweet.

Steve has an article in the current issue of Adirondack Sports & Fitness with the map and a link back to his website, that's the first I've seen the finished map.  No, I still haven't gotten out there.  Keep meaning to, summer's flying by.

Solo effort down in Devils Gulch yesterday.  This is the gold standard of WA state MTB trails.  A 12 mile single-track descent with a little bit of everything from vertical exposure to difficult stream crossings.  It's a physically as well as mentally exhausting effort.  A loss of focus in some sections can lead to a long bike recovery effort.  People typically shuttle it.  The upper trailhead is pretty close to me, so it's more efficient for me to loop-it from the top.  By the time I get to the lower technical sections, I'm usually looking forward to the climb.  With the correct fuel consumption strategy, the climb really isn't all that bad.  A full pull is about 23 miles with about 4k of climb.

At Lower TH
 
Left side is descending route

We're on vacation this week at Cape Cod.  Yesterday was pretty overcast, so it was a good day for a family ride on the National Park Service Province Lands bike trail near Provincetown.  The bike path passes through a combination of forest and dunes, and when the sun's out it can be brutally hot.  Beth and Sylvie:


The whole loop is maybe 8 miles, and it's surprisingly hilly.  It's great for families since there's no automobile traffic.  The only drawback is there can be a high percentage of cyclists who aren't familiar with basic rules of the road.  Not that we're "serious" cyclists (well, Beth is kind of a serious rider), but by comparison you'd think we were in training for the Tour de France.  



One guy literally rode right into Beth.  According to Daniel's eye witness report, the guy was on the wrong side of the path turned backwards on his bike taking a selfie (with a stick) and texting while eating a tuna kale wrap when he ran into Beth.  On a rental bike.  Fortunately no one was hurt and we laughed about it after picking the guy up out of the brush he fell into.



One spur off the loop leads out to Herring Cove, a beautiful strip of beach at the northernmost tip of the cape:





After the ride we did a bit of paddleboarding and swimming at the beach nearest to the house we're renting, on the bay side.  The beach was deserted and the water was amazingly flat:





Ended the day with a beachfire on the Atlantic:

There is a similar bike path that runs almost 25 miles, most of it mid cape..
http://www.railtrailbikeshop.com/railtrail.html

 My inlaws live at exit 8..some great mtb at exit 6...I might head there on Wed..

Beth's done the railtrail. I try to keep my bike off pavement.
Exit 6, is that Nickerson? Shoot me a pm if you  want  to  try to hook up   for a ride, not sure if I can break away from   the  fam  but maybe.

Stuck at work for the rest of the week..