Spring Cleanup (Mar. 22, 2009)

It is another incredible sunny spring day and I had decided to get out on my new cross country bike and go for a ride up Menzie's trail in Golden Ears Park and do some trail clean up. This was winter has been one of the snowiest on record and fallen trees and snowy winter conditions had kep the park closed to vehicle traffic all winter long. A sudden wind storm hit our area just a couple days ago and I knew there be even more falen debris on the trail. This was also my first ride on my new xc bike and I was stoked to test it out.

Right off the bat thebike proved to be amazing. I was able to sprint up hills that I was barely able to slug my way up on my freeride bike. The light weight and especially light rolling weight made for a very quick and mostly painless climbing bike.

It didnt take long for me to encounter fallen trees on the trail. I manage to drag a couple fallen trees down into the bushes and off of the trail, but others I had to cut with my trusty collapsable saw. I only manage to get out 2.5 km because of the extensive debris. I will definitely have to get out and do some more. Here are some examples of the cleanup:

Before.

After.

Before.

After.

This is what the trail should look like, meandering through the forest with the sun filtering through the canopy.

Of course there is more to this adventure than just biking and pretending to be a lumber jack. I was approaching the lookout and it was a pretty technical ascent so I was looking forward to reaching the top and resting my lungs and have a drink of water and a rest while admiring the view of Allouette Lake. Instead of a view of the lake I got a view of a middle aged man completely butt naked! I suppose he heard me coming up the trail because he had been racing to pull on some pants and sweatshirt. So I simply stopped on the trail just outside of the clearing and had a drink of water before going out to the view point. I wanted to give him a minute to reclothe himself. Now as if being naked wasnt weird enough, he had a tall tripod set up with an slr camera mounted on it! I have no idea what this guy was doing and I didnt ask. I simply commented on the nice weather and he agreed that it was and then I left. You never know what you'll find out on the trail.

Birthday ride 2009. (Mar. 21, 2009)

Birthday 2009. It has become an annual event going on four or five years now. My uncle's birthday is two day before mine so we end up having a joint celebration. This years ride consisted of my dad, my uncle Jim and cousin Jesse out from Nelson, and my cousin Jordan who bussed it out from Kamloops.

The group L to R: myself, Jesse, Jim, Dad, JordanO.

The weather on Saturday was perfect, super sunny. We all met up at the Woodlot parking lot and set out up the mountain. Jesse, Jim and Jordan decided to hike Shotgun from the parking lot and see if they could beat my dad and I, hiking up the main trail, to the main road. Well, they won, by a small margin. I'm still not convinced that I would rather hike up Shotgun.

The ride started off a little chilly, but the air was steadily warming as we made our way up the mountain. There was a little bit of snow on the road from the bottom of Crazy Carpenter up. Once we got to the power lines there was several feet of snow! At one point I actually fell through snow well up past my knee! Crazy Carpenter had quite a lot more snow than I had expected and was probably not the best trail to have ridden since there was about four inches of mushy snow covering the trail. Still fun none the less.

The Jesster with his glowing green pants ready to drop in to Blood Donor.

We cut out of Crazy Carpenter and trudged our way up a wet and snowy connector trail to the top of Blood Donor. There was still some snow on the top of Blood Donor which made the berms great for drifting. I managed to slide around a corner and fall and continue sliding for another 10 feet. The rest of the trail was clear and we managed to rip our way down and along the log/ ladder bridge sections and stop for a some photo opportunities on a small gap jump. Finally we ended up out on the Stovetop connector where I successfully landed the jump at the end of the trail this time.

Jesse cruisin one of the log rides on Giant Killer.

At this point Jordan and Jim decided to take B-Line, and Jesse and my dad and I continued on with Giant Killer. My dad ripped on ahead, while Jesse and I took our time to school the log ride sections before riding up the ladder bridges and over the elevated teeter totter. The two of flowed the last section of the trail. I wussed out of launching the seven footer near the end and Jesse and I detoured around and ripped down to the main road.

Uncle Jim finding the perfect line down the rockface on Hoots.

The sun was out in full force now and it was time to weave our way through the clear cut into Hoots. I pummelled the roots and rocks on my way down with Jordan close behind me. We conviened where the trail enters the forest and it was time to play on the jumps and natural obstacles. First up: the big ol rockface. After Jordan and I nailed a sweet line down the rock we in turn coached the others as I snapped the pictures. My dad who initially walked down, climbed back up and then blasted right down the middle of the face. That's a way of redeeming yourself. Jesse then managed to crawl his way down despite his less-than-excellent braking power. And the last man down the rock was my uncle Jim who managed to find the smoothest line down up and over some roots along the right side of the rockface! We than took some time to get some air on the next few jumps and snap some pictures.

Jordan in my grandpa's blue coveralls getting some air on my wife's Kona Stinky Deelux. Unfortunately my camera was not setup to capture a crisp action shot.



My dad getting airborn on Hoots.

The birthday ride of 2009 ended with us racing down Shotgun and hitting the newly rebuffed jump. We exited the forest out into the parking lot and went our separate ways before meeting up that evening for a piece of birthday cake.

New bike.

"Bisosceles"

I didnt manage to get out riding this past weekend, but I was working for a friend, which scored me some extra cash to purchase an "new" xc bike. I was originally looking at a very intro mountain bike that would suffice for some on/off road riding but for an extra 50 bones I got a sweet xc rig. The bike bike just happened to be another Devinci. A 20" frame Devinci Cameleon, mint condition, plush little 80mm Manitou Splice Comp, Hayes hmx-1 mechanical discs, shimano disc hubs laced to Alex anti-snakebite rims and WTB Weirwolf 2.1" tires (super light wheel combo). Everything on this bike was new, including the tires. SRAM X7 shifters and derailers, shimano cranks, WTB SpeedV seat, Cane Creek headset. I took it for an afternoon rip around some neighbourhood trails, super fast. I can't wait to take this baby out on an epic trail ride, and finally make a serious attempt at the TCT. No more part swapping on my free-ride rig to make it xc-able!

Tsuga in the snow. (Mar. 8, 2009)

Sunday I headed out for a spur of the moment ride with my dad at the Woodlot. I was nice and sunny out except for a big dark cloud that sat right on Blue mountain and the Woodlot. We hummed and hawed on our way out towards it. "Should we try Bear Mtn instead, or should we just risk the rain and push hard up the mountain and rip down." As we aproached the Woodlot we realised that it wasnt raining at all but snowing and snowing hard.

Old man in the snow storm near Quick Hit.

We pulled our bikes out of the Silverado and trudged up the mountain on fresh crunchy snow. It snowed on us the whole way up and yet the sun was bright and still managed to shine on us at the same time, very weird conditions. We made our way up to Tsuga, a trail I have never ridden in the snow before. With our armor and fullfaced helmets on we descended in tothe trail, tires coated in snow. There was enough snow to cover any possibly frosty rocks or roots and made for a soft and almost silent ride. Snow covered bridges were a trat to ride over. We opted not to attempt the challenging rockfaces that are sketchy enough when dry.

Myself on the snow covered road near Toad.

We blasted our way down the last stretch of Tsuga towards Snakes & Ladders. I love riding all the log rides and ladder bridges on this trail in the snow and this day was perfect with nearly three inches of fresh snow covering everything.

Who's that coming out from the trees? That's my dad at the end of Snakes&Ladders.

The two of us finished of our snow-biking with Shotgun and left our bike tracks in the snow all the way back to the parking lot. Of course the sun was shining and it wasnt snowing anymore, but I have proof that it was snowing that day despite how sunny some people claim it was.

Poco Bike Skills Park (Mar. 7, 2009)

Friday night a light snow dusting came into town. Saturday awoke windy and sunny and the snow quickly melted away. And with that Cory, Jordank and myself were off to the Poco Bike Skills Park in Port Coquitlam. The park was designed and built by Jay Hoots, of Norco Bicycles and Hoots gear. The plan was to play around on the table top jumps, drops, ladder bridges, log rides, wall rides and other cool stuff, hone our skills and take some pictures.

Jordan practicing one of the ladder drops to a nice dirt transition landing. There were three drops that got succesfully higher.

Cory hitting the first of four table-tops in a row at speed. There were three sets of table-tops to jump. Each set was significantly larger than the next.

Me getting skinny with it. This was a really long log ride section that linked several logs together end to end. There were a couple other really good log rides to practice on that were interrupted by large boulders that you had to negotiate over to get on to the next log.

Cory "the cinematographer" had his sweet home built steady-cam setup to capture Jordan and I on some stunts. Cory also brought along his digital SLR for some sweet still shots.

After a couple wall ride attempts and a couple jumps on the big table tops we decided to pack it in for the day and just in time too. As soon as we left the park driveway onto Shaughnessy street the snow started coming down hard.