velotel
04-09-2020, 02:48 AM
Bike riding and hiking okay within one kilometer of where you live. That's one bird K, or at least one bird who's in a hurry and heading straight to somewhere. That's the bit that saved me. Would have been screwed without that straight line quali. What I think about their rules and restrictions is irrelevant. Nothing I can say or do is going to change squat so just change my perspective.
Like, well, okay, just what does a circle around my house with a one K radius enclose. I'm not going to say it's actually not all that small because it is frigging miniscule! But since I just happen to live in a blink of a village on a narrow plateau halfway or so up a mountain and have lots of trails all around me, that circle turns out to be rather sweet.
So instead of riding, I started walking, revisting trails I walked and ran over fifteen, twenty plus years ago. Kind of ironic because for a few years now I've been thinking I'd like to start walking mountains again. Et voilà, here I am walking the trails on the plateau.
I used to ride them on my mountain bike way back when. And of course started wondering if I could ride my StonerBike on 'em. That's my name for the bike, because it rolls over stones so well. Otherwise it's a fat-tired road bike with a geometry tweaked for doing magic on dirt. Tires are fat but not as fat as my old mountain bike tires, nor as knobby. Low gearing too but not nearly as low as my old mountain bike gearing, which was also Campy. They called it OR, as in off-road. Only produced for a couple of years. Not many people even knew it existed. I loved it, or at least the transmission part. The brakes I tossed, untried. I was running WTB roller cams so why the heck would I want to downgrade my braking! Somewhat humorously I'm still not running Campy brakes with my Campy drive-train. Mini-Vs for fat tires.
The other morning decided to do a semi-major cleaning of my bike while it's brooding over the injustice thrown its way. Followed by drive train dialing and a short spin to check all is right. The short spin turned out to be a good 45 minutes. Up our driveway, onto the road, and instantly turn left to dive down a dirt track heading into the fields. Hadn't even put on my riding shoes, just pedaled off with my hiking shoes. Could be interesting.
First challenge, a hill steep enough, but short, that I wasn't sure my gearing would be good for it. Flashed it. Admittedly with some heavy breathing and an elevated heart rate at the top. Then a long, all but flat jaunt on a thin walking path across meadows with the valley floor some 750 meters below (ca. 2500 ft). Normally a steady loud hum of noise rising up out the valley but not now. Crazy quiet, hardly a car moving. Astounding.
A junction, go straight and keep goofing around in the fields or turn left down the hill to an at-times tight-rope single-track. Actually I was heading down before I'd even really posed the question. Kicks in steep and rocky with some small rock ledges that had me bouncing and hanging on. Fortunately not long. That track keeps plunging down the fall-line but there's also a sweet trail cutting off to the right that descends via two long traverses between a sharp switchback. Full-suspension modern mountain bikers would do the dive. Not me. Even back in the day with my mountain bike I took the traverses.
Fun track demanding technical precision and smooth commitment. I figure if this goes well, I'm in like Flynn, my bike, and myself for that matter, capable of going mountain biking. Hit the bottom grinning, Flynn's in. Now as I recall a lot of easy riding on a sort of shelf above huge vertical, fortunately in a forest so it's not like I'm balancing above the void.
Rolling easy and fast, following a generous, smooth single-track. Have to stop for a couple of fences with narrow, walk-through passages. Right after the second one is a tight, unforgiving angling descent on a steep hillside. Definitely not the place to crash. Rode it with my left foot tapping along like an outrigger. I don't remember how I rode it on my mountain bike, probably with both feet on the pedals but I'm way too old now to risk a crash so outrigger style it is.
Followed by a long section of super intense technical riding, balancing on a tightrope twisting through trees on more steep hillside with some wicked steep ramps where traction's marginal on dry, loose soil and clusters of roots bulging across the track. No time to think, just go, surfing a wave of mental momentum that carries me up the ramps.
The one about wipes me out but I make it. Barely but still I flashed it after all these years! I know, any young rider like my son would have done all that with a soft fluidity that would make it look easy. Maybe I did too back in the day. But that was then, now it's a massive accomplishment. In fact the next two times I rode it (equipped with a camera which is why I have shots of the trail) I didn't clean two sections I flashed up that first day! Wasn't until my fourth time that I cleaned them again. And won't be at all surprised if the next time or the time after I don't clean those hard spots. That's the way they are.
Hit the end of the trail, or at least the end for me. It keeps going but does this long descent into unridable, for me, terrain. Instead I head up afoot, cross a fence, push the bike up a
barely visible trail that I remember riding on my mountain bike. I also remember it was at the limit effort. So I walk, enjoying the views, relishing where I was.
Pop out on top, back where I'd been earlier, cruising the edge of the meadows. Follow my track back to where I dove down the hill but this time cross over into more meadows where I do a series of long, flowing arcs, free-styling down the prairie then turning and climbing back up a grassy hill, a dial-your-pain kind of climb. As in take whatever line I want, straight-up and steep or back and forth in long traverses. My perverse nature keeps me pushing the steepness factor.
Top out, fly down a smooth, grass slope and onto a paved access lane and up into the village and up to another single-track I've been riding pretty regularly for years. An out-and-back cruiser ride on a fun trail then a steepish climb up to the highest houses in the village followed by a relaxed coast down the street and back to the house. And always within a bird K of the house! I mean how cool is that. Only seven plus K (now almost 9 with an out-and-back addition I tacked on last night) but hugely entertaining with some serious intensity that pushes my limits. Lock-down, french style, not so bad in the end. Still sucks of course but....
Like, well, okay, just what does a circle around my house with a one K radius enclose. I'm not going to say it's actually not all that small because it is frigging miniscule! But since I just happen to live in a blink of a village on a narrow plateau halfway or so up a mountain and have lots of trails all around me, that circle turns out to be rather sweet.
So instead of riding, I started walking, revisting trails I walked and ran over fifteen, twenty plus years ago. Kind of ironic because for a few years now I've been thinking I'd like to start walking mountains again. Et voilà, here I am walking the trails on the plateau.
I used to ride them on my mountain bike way back when. And of course started wondering if I could ride my StonerBike on 'em. That's my name for the bike, because it rolls over stones so well. Otherwise it's a fat-tired road bike with a geometry tweaked for doing magic on dirt. Tires are fat but not as fat as my old mountain bike tires, nor as knobby. Low gearing too but not nearly as low as my old mountain bike gearing, which was also Campy. They called it OR, as in off-road. Only produced for a couple of years. Not many people even knew it existed. I loved it, or at least the transmission part. The brakes I tossed, untried. I was running WTB roller cams so why the heck would I want to downgrade my braking! Somewhat humorously I'm still not running Campy brakes with my Campy drive-train. Mini-Vs for fat tires.
The other morning decided to do a semi-major cleaning of my bike while it's brooding over the injustice thrown its way. Followed by drive train dialing and a short spin to check all is right. The short spin turned out to be a good 45 minutes. Up our driveway, onto the road, and instantly turn left to dive down a dirt track heading into the fields. Hadn't even put on my riding shoes, just pedaled off with my hiking shoes. Could be interesting.
First challenge, a hill steep enough, but short, that I wasn't sure my gearing would be good for it. Flashed it. Admittedly with some heavy breathing and an elevated heart rate at the top. Then a long, all but flat jaunt on a thin walking path across meadows with the valley floor some 750 meters below (ca. 2500 ft). Normally a steady loud hum of noise rising up out the valley but not now. Crazy quiet, hardly a car moving. Astounding.
A junction, go straight and keep goofing around in the fields or turn left down the hill to an at-times tight-rope single-track. Actually I was heading down before I'd even really posed the question. Kicks in steep and rocky with some small rock ledges that had me bouncing and hanging on. Fortunately not long. That track keeps plunging down the fall-line but there's also a sweet trail cutting off to the right that descends via two long traverses between a sharp switchback. Full-suspension modern mountain bikers would do the dive. Not me. Even back in the day with my mountain bike I took the traverses.
Fun track demanding technical precision and smooth commitment. I figure if this goes well, I'm in like Flynn, my bike, and myself for that matter, capable of going mountain biking. Hit the bottom grinning, Flynn's in. Now as I recall a lot of easy riding on a sort of shelf above huge vertical, fortunately in a forest so it's not like I'm balancing above the void.
Rolling easy and fast, following a generous, smooth single-track. Have to stop for a couple of fences with narrow, walk-through passages. Right after the second one is a tight, unforgiving angling descent on a steep hillside. Definitely not the place to crash. Rode it with my left foot tapping along like an outrigger. I don't remember how I rode it on my mountain bike, probably with both feet on the pedals but I'm way too old now to risk a crash so outrigger style it is.
Followed by a long section of super intense technical riding, balancing on a tightrope twisting through trees on more steep hillside with some wicked steep ramps where traction's marginal on dry, loose soil and clusters of roots bulging across the track. No time to think, just go, surfing a wave of mental momentum that carries me up the ramps.
The one about wipes me out but I make it. Barely but still I flashed it after all these years! I know, any young rider like my son would have done all that with a soft fluidity that would make it look easy. Maybe I did too back in the day. But that was then, now it's a massive accomplishment. In fact the next two times I rode it (equipped with a camera which is why I have shots of the trail) I didn't clean two sections I flashed up that first day! Wasn't until my fourth time that I cleaned them again. And won't be at all surprised if the next time or the time after I don't clean those hard spots. That's the way they are.
Hit the end of the trail, or at least the end for me. It keeps going but does this long descent into unridable, for me, terrain. Instead I head up afoot, cross a fence, push the bike up a
barely visible trail that I remember riding on my mountain bike. I also remember it was at the limit effort. So I walk, enjoying the views, relishing where I was.
Pop out on top, back where I'd been earlier, cruising the edge of the meadows. Follow my track back to where I dove down the hill but this time cross over into more meadows where I do a series of long, flowing arcs, free-styling down the prairie then turning and climbing back up a grassy hill, a dial-your-pain kind of climb. As in take whatever line I want, straight-up and steep or back and forth in long traverses. My perverse nature keeps me pushing the steepness factor.
Top out, fly down a smooth, grass slope and onto a paved access lane and up into the village and up to another single-track I've been riding pretty regularly for years. An out-and-back cruiser ride on a fun trail then a steepish climb up to the highest houses in the village followed by a relaxed coast down the street and back to the house. And always within a bird K of the house! I mean how cool is that. Only seven plus K (now almost 9 with an out-and-back addition I tacked on last night) but hugely entertaining with some serious intensity that pushes my limits. Lock-down, french style, not so bad in the end. Still sucks of course but....