Thanksgiving long weekend ....
So the race season may be over, but we are trying to make the most of what is left of the biking season and headed down to a place I had heard about for a long weekend of fun.
Wow what a weekend. The plan: drive down Friday night (5-7hr drive), smaller ride Saturday, full day ride Sunday, smaller ride Monday, with some eating and drinking in between!
Saturday was one 2 hr climb up and a 1hr back down. The cold had set in, even with the hard work of the climbing, the feet and hands still didn't get blood back into them until about half way up, to go numb again on the descent. What amazing views at the top!
Finishing the day off with roast chicken, BBQ salmon, veges, and wine !
Today was my first real longer ride and test on my new Norco All mountain bike - Fluid 2. What a lot of fun!
Sunday was the day - the big day - we got to the trail head at 10am for a 8hr day ahead of us, with -6 deg start, we were boppin and hoppin around trying to warm up - but all was good with blue bird skys!
We started our 4hr climb, winding in and out of the forest and open sunny views. Crossing frozen creeks, regrouping every time we spread out too much, to reach what was finally a warm sunny meadow that we stopped and had a bite to eat, looking up at the summit we were about to embark on via a grinding 30mins hike a bike.
8000ft summit was reached, taking in the 360 deg views. We had a ridge traverse and then down 'angles staircase', tight switchbacks on a loose rocky bouldery trail with a drop just a foot from the trail.
What lead into a flowy but dusty fast super fun trail. We had now one more climb. We got trapped by 20+ horses coming down the trails and 2 motorbikes heading up having a stand off, we decided to throw our bikes back on our backs and cut the switch back by hiking up. One more tough climb, then we were done, all downhill from here. Time to race what was left in the sunlight to make it back to the car.
2hr mixed trail downhill, flowy, rocky, dusty, amazing scenery, insanely fun!
Home to a roast turkey and more wine.
Monday I would have been happy to not ride and just chill, but off we went for a 2hr ride through xc ski mountain trails, to what turned out to be a super fun ride. No big climbs, just flowy, rolling, fast hills. What a way to finish off the weekend.
Loading the car up mid afternoon to tackle the long weekend traffic back across the border!
Definitely a place to make a yearly trip of - so many trails out there.
