After working at home all day I decided that I needed a little break, so I put on my riding shorts, grabbed my helmet and took off for a ride.
I rode up to Alco park and then crossed Alouette River into Golden Ears Park. I then headed back along some trails and crossed the river again at 24oth and home.
This ride took all of an hour with a pause for a quick photo.
Sweet double-track
Summer weather makes river crossings oh so refreshing.
I honestly cannot remember the last time I shuttled so when I was invited to shuttle Seymour today it took me no more than a nanosecond to say YES!
Curtis and I set off from home around 4:30 and headed to the shore with our bikes loaded in the back of his truck and arrived at Superstore by 5:15 and waited for the rest of our crew to show up.
Once the second truck and retrieval car arrived (Shaun, Greg, Jeff and J.P.) we loaded up a truck and blasted up to the top. 6 grown men in the cab of a Dodge 1500 is rather tight but doable.
The bikes in the shuttle truck
Seeing as Curtis was a CBC virgin, we decided we would ride CBC and then Lola / Cambodia. Below is a simple helmet-cam I took of CBC. The riders were Curtis, Shaun, Jeff, Greg, J.P. and me (Dean).
Mutilated E.13 bash ring
After CBC we hit a somewhat less traveled trail: Lola which leads into Cambodia. Below is a video compilation of Lola. Lots of Old School Shore.
I did another outback adventure into the UBC research forest. With my GPS in hand and a study of the maps of the area I made my way along a series of logging roads to Gwedoline Peak. On the way I passed a few lakes and took in the views that the area offers.
Placid Lake
Placid Lake
Looking south to Maple Ridge
When I reached the peak I was a little let down due to the fact that there were some clouds obscuring the view and some trees in the way of what should have been a spectacular view of the Fraser Valley. Regardless, I enjoyed the long ride out and back but would not recommend this ride unless you simply want a 15Km climb followed by a quick blast back home.
Indian Pipe (Monotropa uniflora)
I snapped a few photos of the area and took in a view of the Golden Ears I have never seen before. If there weren’t any clouds, the photo below would have been much better.
The Golden Ears in the clouds
Maybe I’ll just have to head there on another sunny day.
A 180 degree panorama taken atop Gwendoline Peak
Looking north up Pitt Lake
Looking down on Widgeon Creek
Posted in Uncategorized
This morning I was the first person to ride at The Woodlot. I was on my Legend and had a new camera with me to catch and share my ride.
I climbed/pushed to Cabin Trail with my ContourHD 1080 helmet camera attached to the goggle mount. I’ve tried many different camera and set-ups over the years and I figured I’d pick up the ContourHD given its current super low price.
ContourHD 1080 on Goggle mount
On the first section of trail, I had the camera filming at 1280×960 @30fps. The picture was okay but I doubt that I’ll use this setting again. I have uploaded the raw file to Vimeo with no editing at all. The results are below. (the rattling sound is the camera tether hitting the camera body)
Yellow Slime Mold (myxomycetes) on a stump
For the second lap, I decided to ride Lower Toadstool because its been quite some time since I last enjoyed this trail. I once again turn on the camera and filmed at 1280×960 @30fps.
My bike of choice today was my Rune and the location yet again was The Woodlot. Recently I received information about the logging that is going to take place and I wanted to see if any progress had been made.
At the bottom of the climb there was a sign posted on the side of the trail to inform the area users that logging and trail closures are on their way.
Trail Closure Notice
Further up the climb I took another picture of wall of rock. It keeps growing every week I ride. Unfortunately it’s going to get knocked down when the logging takes place in a month or so.
Stacked wall of rock
Not too far past the wall of rock there are a number of piles of gravel that are going to be used as the road base for the logging roads. This material is going to make the climb even easier than it is now up the main logging road. Another new thing I have noticed are road markers that mark the distances along the woodlot main road.
Piles of Gravel
At the powerlines I turned left to climb to the top and gain access to Krazy Karpenter. Karpenter is in decent shape given the amount of traffic it sees and the nasty wet year we have had. It never seems there is enough time to work on all the trails that I’d like to, but there is one stunt that Tim and I would like to finish some time soon and it involves a lot of ladders. Maybe by the end of the summer.
I then hit Upper Toadstool which is always a blast and then over to Giant Killer. Ryan has been hard at work dialing in the trail and recently he has put a lot of work into a slight re-route of a corner on beside the long log section. We had talked about his re-route since Christmas time of last year and I’d say it is one more work day away from completion.
Giant Killer ground re-route
I then hit Snakes and Ladders and then Shotgun to finish off my ride ride for the day. It was SMOKIN hot today and it felt great to ride in the summer heat.
Posted in Uncategorized
I decided to go for a bit of a pedal today. With my bike loaded on my car I headed to Golden Ears park and Alouette Mtn.
Alouette Mountain trails
My route took me up the Eric Dunning Trail and then along the Alouette Mountain Fire Access Trail to the second shortcut trail. Along the way I spotted a few not so well known off the map trails that I one day hope to explore.
Misty view from the lookout
On the fire access road between the two shortcut trails is this lookout. Over the years the view is getting smaller and smaller due to the trees growing and blocking the view. My guess is in 5 years some trees will need to be removed.
Once at the top, I started my descent which is about 20 minutes or so with next to no pedaling. It’s not a bad ride when a nice easy pedal is desired with a fun descent on a smaller bike.
This morning I met Mitch at The Woodlot to go for a ride and to give him an introduction to trail building. Mitch wants to help out on the trails, but he hasn’t ever done any trail work.
While I pedaled my Rune and he pushed his bike up, we were able to talk about some trail basics and other things bike related.
At the top of Cabin Trail we geared up and I began riding down to one of the last bomb hole sections that I plan on repairing on Cabin. I had Mitch collect most of the rock while I pieced everything together.
The repaired trail bomb hole. Note the glove for scale.
Within 20 minutes the hole was fixed and we began riding down. Once the trail leveled out and the pedaling began, Mitch’s chain snapped and needed repairing. Then when we rode down Snakes and Ladders, I had a flat. By this time Mitch had to leave so I rode Shotgun solo hoping that nothing else was going to break on me. I didn’t have a good feeling seeing a couple Turkey Vultures circle me in the clearing.
Circling Turkey Vulture
I’ve had many days without a mechanical, but all it felt like I did today was repair things.
If you look really carefully you can see and imprint across the cement that reads “UBC FRST 78″
Posted in Uncategorized
Posted in Uncategorized
I have wanted to get up to the Malcolm Knapp UBC Research forest for years. There are three different lookout points that I’d like to explore and today I did one of the three.
The forest in this area is as lush as they come so I paused to take a picture of one of the creeks.
I was running out of time when I took this last picture and I needed to turn my bike around and head home. It was pretty cool navigating to these view points and I can’t wait to make my way to some of the other higher viewpoints in the area.
Posted in Uncategorized