Before I get into this post, I wanted to properly draw your attention to the above map and ride data, which I included in my previous post about the Hardtrigger ride, but which did not show up on Google Reader. With my new cyclecomputer, Garmin provided some embedding code for a quick snapshot of my ride data and map, however, the code is not compatible in Reader. I've figured out a workaround and it should work for the future, but I was disappointed to discover that the data for my awesome ride did not go through to my Reader folks. Anyhoo, click on the image and it will take you to my Garmin site, where you can check out some interesting graphs and an interactive map, etc.
Now for today's post... Marsing Mini-Vacation
As I indicated in my previous post, Josh and I celebrated my 30th birthday in Marsing and riding bikes in the Owyhees. We actually drove up on Friday morning and stayed the night through Saturday.
Marsing is a fun little town, and has more going on than one might initially think. For example, despite its population not quite cresting 900 people, it has a number of places to procure a cup of coffee, a taco stand, an actual Mexican restaurant, a nicer restaurant, a diner, a biker bar, several thrift stores, a hardware store, a grocery store (equipped with hunting and fishing gear, of course!), a senior center, a smattering of religious establishments, a field office for the Bureau of Land Management, and even a motel.
Ahh... the motel. If you recall, Josh and I took a mini-vacation to Marsing a few years ago and found that the motel, coined the "Whitehouse Motel", was not what we had expected. Josh and I normally stay in one or two star accommodations, usually picking either the cheapest hotel or the second cheapest. In fact, no one could ever argue successfully that we are hotel snobs. Or even very picky, for that matter. Mainly because we prefer to spend our travel money on dining and other experiences of DOING things rather than on the hotel. Another reason for our selection of the cheapest hotels is because one can sometimes find a gem among crapholes. Take, for instance, the Whitehouse Motel in Marsing Idaho.
Arguably, the Whitehouse Motel bears a somewhat misleading name. For whatever grand structure the name "Whitehouse" conjures, the Whitehouse Motel is, quite simply, a doublewide trailer. Below are a few photos from the previous trip.
The Whitehouse Motel is, however, $36 a night, has plenty of hot water and has insanely comfortable beds. Also, the plywood roofing produces soothing sounds during a wind or rain storm, which we have experienced during both our stays there.
Unfortunately, the Whitehouse Motel is not as clean as I would prefer (and I have realistic cleanliness standards when it comes to my one star motel accommodations) and the water smells like sulfur. Really, really bad sulfur. And definitely not drinkable.
Other than that, it's a great (and only) place to stay in Marsing.
On Friday afternoon, Josh and I did a mountain bike ride over by the S. Jump Creek area of the Owyhees. It was just an out-and-back and wasn't anything to write home to Mom about. But it was a good warm-up for the next day's Hardtrigger 25 mile ride.
We set out with no expectations about the ride. Friday was very cloudy and windy, with severe storms going on in the Valley (that was the day there was a funnel cloud in Boise!!!), so Josh and I expected that we would have to cut a ride short. Of course, because my life is nothing if not ironic, we didn't apply sunscreen before the ride because it had been absolutely dark and cloudy all day. Then, not long into the ride, the sun poked out. And the previously cold weather turned to hot. And I had to take off my long sleeve jersey because I was baking, and proceeded to worry about being fried in the sun.
We rode for about an hour in the sun, and I did not get a sunburn.
It was, however, incredibly windy. So windy that I was literally blown off the trail several times.
There were also a lot of cows, a prelude to our Hardtrigger bovine experience. At some point, while we were climbing a section, we crossed paths with a very very pregnant cow who was so pregnant that she couldn't scamper away from us like the others and instead she had a massive diarrhea explosion in response to our presence.
We turned around shortly thereafter, in part because of the cows, but also because the road was difficult to ride with the deep hoof prints from the cows, because I was worried about being in the sun for so long without sunscreen, and because of the strong winds.
Behold my data and map! Click on it to see more.
After the bike ride, we got cleaned up and had dinner at the Sandbar, which is the slightly nicer restaurant in Marsing, down by the Snake River. We ate there on our previous trip, dining on delicious steaks. This time, I dunno, it was a little disappointing and I don't feel like dwelling on the experience.
Then we had a lovely stroll through the park along the river (where we had a few run-ins with some geese) and through some cute neighborhoods. We ended up at the biker bar where we shared a pitcher of Coors Light, downed some shots of tequila, chatted with the bartender (who took a shot with us), and played shuffleboard.
After a good night's sleep, we had eggs, toast, and hashbrowns at the diner next to the motel and then did our big Hardtrigger ride. After the ride, we rushed home to clean up in time to make a friend's wedding reception, where we mingled and had a lovely time.
My 30th birthday was on Saturday and Josh and I did a loop in the Owyhees on our mountain bikes. We went to the main Wilson Creek BLM public recreation area and parked in the second parking lot and headed west, meandering along the roads until we got to the Hardtrigger area. On a previous bike adventure to the Wilson Creek zone, after riding to a high vantage point, I looked across mountains and valleys and saw the Hardtrigger area, which looked like it would have promising mountain biking. Hence, on this ride we specifically sought to ride Hardtrigger.
And I found it mostly awesome. The climbs were strenuous and satisfying. The geography was stunning. Very stunning. I had to stop every-so-often to take some photos, and just admire the scenery. It was a beautiful area.
Not long after crossing a cattle guard into the Hardtrigger area, I rode around a corner and came face-to-face with a BIG, BLACK, and VERY MUSCULAR BULL. I dismounted and smiled, so as to not give away the fear I felt. I'm confident that the bull noted my smile as both non-threatening and friendly, as he slowly wandered off. Josh came around the corner and I told him of the bull. We then rode slowly on, riding side-by-side so Josh could defend me against my bovine foes.
Before entering the Hardtrigger area, we did not realize that it was rangeland and is currently being used for cattle grazing. We rode for several miles through the area and there were bovine creatures everywhere. It was mostly mamas and cute calves, lots and lots of mamas and cute calves, but there were a significant number of bulls and steers, with and without horns.
Being gored is an experience I hope to never have. And Josh feels the same.
As such, we rode through this area fairly cautiously. When we came upon mamas and calves on or very near the road, we would stop until they ran off... sometimes this would take a moment or two. There were several large soon-to-be mamas that we tried hard to not scare, and paid special attention to not anger the bulls.
Without even looking at the genitalia, I felt reasonably confident in identifying the bulls. At some point, we rode around a corner to find a bovine on the road, staring at us. Based on the overly muscular and solid-looking body and the cold, hard, and almost aggressive stare, I deduced it was a bull. When I cautioned Josh in his approach, he said "That's just a cow, I'm not afraid of a cow!" Then the bovine creature moved and the ginormous male genitalia, swaying to and fro, gave Josh reason to pause.
Eventually, we arrived at a juncture in which we had a way to leave the rangeland. While the plan was to explore the Hardtrigger area to its fullest, the sheer number of bovines and our cautious riding provided us with less fun in riding than we had desired. As such, we took the way out, and descended down Coyote Grade road.
The descent was so fun and delightfully fast. I was all smiles. Eventually, we turned on a road to head back towards the car. After consulting the map, Josh led us down a trail through a canyon. The trail was a little above my confidence level for riding, so I walked my bike for most of it. The canyon was beautiful.
On my previous post, I mentioned that Josh had given me an incredibly awesome cyclecomputer for my birthday. Check it out! Throughout the ride, I was able to monitor cadence, altitude, speed, temperature, etc., etc. and can later analyze my performance as well as have a map. I can keep track of my rides, can race against my best times, and can establish various training programs. So neat!
This weekend, Josh and I explored the dirt roads to the west of Wilson Creek Road. We started from the first BLM parking lot and biked west parallel to some power lines. At some point, we crossed an intersection and rode along a poorly defined path in a northwesterly direction. From there, I couldn't begin to describe our route. We crossed many intersections and navigated many roads, from smooth and fast to rocky and challenging.
I stopped to admire the flowers on more than one occasion.
I felt very accomplished with my riding. As per my last posting, my legs have been feeling strong. I rode up and over all kinds of steep rocky sections that required additional effort, and rode down several rocky challenges. At some point, however, I came around a corner on a descent and noted an offcamber section of road with several rock obstacles. I slowed way down in order to decide which line to take. Should I veer to the side, more towards the offcamber section but away from the rocks, or go straight down the middle where it was less offcamber but had the rock obstacles??? I decided on the latter.
As I was removing myself from beneath my bicycle, I became aware of some intense pain in my right thigh, upon which I had fallen with all of my weight onto a pile of rocks. I also had a gouge in my hand from bracing my fall against another pile of rocks. And this minor flesh wound, which was the only thing to take a photo of. Several days later, the bruise on my thigh is BIG, BLACK, AND HARD, but thanks to ice packs, ibuprophren, and arnica not too painful anymore.
We continued riding for a while, my leg becoming increasingly stiff. At some point, we came upon an interesting sand formation. It appeared to be sand that had at some point clumped together after, say, a flood. There were also rocks and other particles clumped together with the sand. Over time, it appeared that wind and rain have eroded the sand into some cool and interesting shapes. In the above photo, I am massaging my hurt leg while considering the sand formation.
We cut the ride a bit short because of the pain in my leg, but even still, we had a few hours of riding under our belts and had explored an area to which we plan to return.
~ pseudo intergenerational hike: China Wall, Owyhees ~
For several months, I have been attempting to schedule an intergenerational hike between myself, some friends, and our parents. Scheduling is a beast and I have not been successful. Last week, Elizabeth's parents were in town and on Thursday evening we confirmed plans for a hike to China Wall in the Owyhees on Friday. I invited my Dad and got the day off work, and that was that. Those who have been anticipating the Official Intergenerational Hike need not fret, for this was a pseudo intergenerational hike, and the official version will become a reality come hell or high water.
The above photo, incidentally, I find hilarious. Elizabeth's Dad, Steve, took it and I nabbed it from Facebook - - as Steve and I are now FB friends.
The hike was excellent. In considering that there had been a somewhat significant amount of rain in Boise several days that week, I was very concerned that the trails out to China Wall would be muddy. I was also concerned that the weather would be crappy - - what with it expected to be cloudy with winds up to 22 mph that day. Instead, it was sunny, warm, mildly windy, and the trails were 100% dry.
I believe we did the hike in a little less than three hours, which includes our numerous stops to enjoy the scenery.
Ride: Salmon Creek, Owyhees Distance: 25 miles Max Speed 24 mph Ave. Speed 9 mph
Josh and I ventured out to the Owyhees on Saturday and did a Salmon Creek Ride. We came at it from the backside, via Upper Reynolds Creek Road. We parked at a turnoff on Upper Reynolds Creek Road and descended down into the valley on our bikes before hitting Salmon Creek Road and the Hardtrigger wild horse management area. It was nice and sunny that day and we both came away from the Owyhees with our first sunburns of the year.
This is the third time we've ridden Salmon Creek and we have yet to ride as far as we would like - - the first time it was ridiculously muddy and it was nearly impossible to ride with all of the sticky mud that had coated my wheels, and the second time I was getting over a bad case of bronchitis and wasn't up for a super long ride. This time we were able to ride about 12 miles in before encountering mud and snow on the trails. We pressed on for a while, but turned around once we realized that the mud and snow were only getting worse. At this point, the fun-to-exertion ratio was sufficiently out of proportion that it just wasn't worth the bother to continue.
It was otherwise a good ride - - some difficult climbs punctuated by flat recovery sections and fast descents. And the scenery was beautiful, as was the sunshine.
I will write that I was disappointed by the final descent along Upper Reynolds Creek Road. As indicated above, my max speed was 24mph, which was disappointingly slow due to the strong headwind that was holding me back on my final descent. It was sad.
One final noteworthy aspect of the ride was that we passed by some sort of military training exercise. While riding back along Upper Reynolds Creek Road, we passed by a tank, marching soldiers, and some sort of medical support carivan. The below photo is me passing by the marching soldiers.
On Saturday, Josh and I went out to the Wilson Creek area for a hike in the Owyhees. We started from the main trailhead and trekked along some various trails eastward, towards Reynolds Creek. We lost the trail a few times and had to bushwhack to our way to the next trail. The inversion over Boise had caused depression to accumulate, however, the clouds broke over the Owyhees and we were able to experience some glorious sunshine. The light was particularly stunning that day.
We hiked to the top of one of the buttes to take in the view and admire some interesting geology. There were odd boulders with distinctive striping. Later, we discussed how the Owyhees contain many fascinating geological features.
A few ridges later, we happened upon a trail that Josh hypothesized would lead us to the China Wall, a trail we have been trying to find. We hike and hiked, and just has we were coming up over a ridge, someone called out, "Hey, it's Josh and Jennifer." I was totally weirded out that someone would recognize us in the middle of the Owyhees. It was a group of friendly mountain bikers who were just coming out of the China Wall. We stopped and chatted and they suggested that we hike the China Wall and that we would be able to get back to the Wilson Creek Trailhead from there.
It was an awesome hike through the Reynolds Creek Canyon, along this rocky trail-bridge ("China Wall"). I was curious about the history behind this trail and I discovered that the trail is formally known as "China Ditch" and informally as the "China Wall," and that it was built by Chinese laborers who were diverting water from Reynolds Creek for irrigation purposes. The trail took us down to the bottom of the canyon, with what seemed like the cliffs of Mordor rising above us.
Eventually, we hiked out of the canyon, where we were faced with several trail options. We decided to follow the bike tracks from the group of riders we had chatted with, a plan that proved very wise. Tracking their tire prints allowed us to navigate back to the trailhead with great ease.
During the hike, we also decided that we would return the next day with our mountain bikes, and with Elizabeth.
The bike ride was awesome. We rode a few different trails to access the canyon area, most of which were in pretty good condition. The trails were rougher than the previous day due to horse travel; Josh and I felt bad because Elizabeth isn't accustomed to the rough trails in the Owyhees, but she seemed perfectly fine. One trail traversing the backside of a butte was particularly muddy and we had difficulty riding to the top. I worked up a sweat and got my heart racing because I was dead set on riding it - - meanwhile, Josh and Elizabeth were hiking behind me, having faced reality in a more timely fashion. Otherwise, the trails were dry.
Descending into and through the canyon afforded us an opportunity to practice some technical skills.
Riding along the wall was fun. More photos on my photoset
On Saturday, I went on a group ride along some of the Wilson Creek trails in the Owyhees. As my date, I brought Elizabeth. Also in attendance was Karen, Peggy, Dan, Paul, and another dude. Paul was our navigator and was able to show us some exceptionally awesome fun trails in the area.
We parked at the first parking lot on the right on Wilson Creek Road, before the cattle feed lot, and rode up a narrow dirt road that branched off from that parking lot. After just a brief stint on that road, we veered left onto a faint cow path, which was covered in thick sage brush and the skeletons of bramble weed bushes, both of which continually got caught in everyone's bikes.
After a while, we found ourselves on a piece of legitimate singletrack that took us through something of a canyon area. Here, the sage brush was very thick and overgrown along the trails. I received quite a good bit of exfoliation along my legs thanks to the branches scraping along my flesh. The trail itself was turn-ney and decently interesting. It had some abuse from cattle grazing, but was still very ridable.
Eventually, this trail took us back to Wilson Creek Road, where we had couple solid climbs before the next trailhead. Climbing, for me, can feel so good and satisfying. In the above photo is the beginning of the first climb up the mountain, and the group beginning to tackle it.
By the time everyone reached the summit, it was necessary to don windbreakers - - there was a chilly wind blowing and the sweat built up from the climb served to make everyone pretty freezing.
At the summit was a trailhead off to the left which we rode. There was a trail marker, I believe for TW300 or something. This trail was totally rock and roll to descend. It had plenty of roller coaster action, lots of fun turns, and some fun-but-challenging obstacles. There were a few steepies (see below) and some awesome rock steps. Overall it was so much fun and I am looking forward to returning to the area.
Afterwards, I took the group to Freddy's Taco Stand in Marsing. More photos on my photoset
Ride: Poison Creek Road, Owyhees Ride Time: 3 hours 7 minutes Total Distance: 29.4 miles Max Speed: 27.4 mph Average Speed: 9.4 mph
On Saturday, Josh and I decided to venture down to the Owyhees for a fun day of mountain biking. It's been quite a while since we last went that way; the most recent episodes were unsuccessful due to some terrible road/trail conditions. After the recent rain brought better trail conditions to the Boise foothills, I hypothesized that conditions in the Owyhees would have likewise improved. My logic proved correct.
We decided to ride Poison Creek Road because we wanted to maximize our chances of having a good, fun, and awesome ride. In exploring these Owyhee roads and trails, there can be a lot of hit or miss. Poison Creek Road, we have learned from experience, is a definite hit.
The wind was blowing strong on Saturday. For most of the climbs we had a tail wind, which made a lot of the climbing feel easy. There were a few hard climbs where we averaged 3 or 4 mph, but for most of the ride we were sailing along. All of this means, however, that the descent required more effort to keep the speed going. Gravity also helped and hindered us differently - - for instance, at one point on a mild grade slightly downward, I was pedaling with considerable effort alongside Josh who was coasting and even tapping his breaks to remain parallel to me. There was some awesome downhill moments, though because of the wind I only topped out at 27 mph - - Josh said he hit close to 40 mph. Gravity, hmph.
At the end of the ride, we went to Freddy's Taco stand in Marsing. This is our standard post-ride meal for when we're in that region of the Owyhees. The food is very affordable and incredibly delicious, made more delicious from the effort exerted on the ride. I got two beef tacos with rice and beans (for $5.50) and a strawberry soda - - YUM!!!
Josh and I did a bit of a mountain bike tour of the Fossil Creek ORV zone in the Owyhees this weekend. Fossil Creek is more Eastern Owyhees than where we usually explore, closer to Murphy off of Highway 78.
The Owyhees were particularly stunning out that way.
At about ten miles in, we came upon an old and abandoned corrals.
Apart from the stunning scenery and the opportunity to climb around on the corrals, the ride wasn't particularly awesome. We rode along this ATV style road which was mostly flatish and was rocky rugged. None of that is a deal breaker, but it just wasn't awesome. We had pretty much the same view of the Owyhees for most of the ride and rode along this mostly flat rocky road. During a mountain bike adventure, I personally like to feel like I'm going somewhere - - you know, taking in a variety of scenery and riding over a variety of terrain. I also found the 'downhill' rather disappointing, as it was slow and the rugged terrain made my hands hurt. Anyway, after the ride we went over to Given's hot springs for some hot water fun and then had dinner in Marsing.
Despite having a full-blown bronchial infection, as I promised myself I would, I went on a good ride yesterday. Josh and I did a 20 mile ride in the Salmon Creek area. If you remember, Josh and I had previously tried to ride Salmon Creek during an epic Wilson Creek adventure, but that route was way too muddy. On Saturday, it was a perfect day to ride Salmon Creek. It was warm, but not too warm, the trails were dry, and it was beautiful outside.
We parked the car outside of Reynolds and rode up Salmon Creek Road. Up until the intersection with the creek, the road is a normal dirt road, but at the creek it becomes more of an ORV road and goes up into the mountains. Next time we do this ride, the plan is to drive farther and park closer to the creek. Riding along the dirt road was fine, but it was so much more interesting, pretty, and fun once it branched off into the mountains.
Because of my bronchial infection, I had poor lung capacity and my energy was low, but I had a good time anyway. It was so glorious outside that my mood was automatically lifted. The wildflowers, in particular, were stunning and added a lot of color to the high mountain desert.
Much to my dismay, yesterday was the Barking Spider Race. Why I thought it was at the end of the month, I have no idea. But, because of my failure to accurately consult the calendar, I have no race report to share. Instead, I give you an epic bike ride.
On Saturday, Josh and I went out to the Wilson Creek area for a day of adventure. We parked at the main BLM parking lot and pedaled up Wilson Creek Road. Rather than taking the turnoff to the Wilson Creek 'trail', we continued along the road to summit Horse Race Ridge and then descended towards Salmon Creek. It was nine miles from the parking lot to Salmon Creek. Except for a couple brief descents, most of it was a moderate middle-gear climb. I don't know what sort of altitude we covered, but the drastic change in air temperature at the top of Horse Race Ridge suggested that we had climbed pretty high. Also, that we were not too far away from snow reinforced this hypothesis.
At the top of the Ridge, we took a moment to put on a jacket for the descent towards Salmon Creek. And wow, it was FREEZING! The temperature for the Valley was supposed to be around 61 degrees, but the Owyhees were significantly colder than that. Even while I was expending all kinds of energy to ride to the top of the Ridge, I felt a constant chill.
When we arrived at Salmon Creek, we were alarmed by the quantity of ice-cold mountain snow water. The plan was to cross Salmon Creek and ride along this sort of ORV road, but the water made us hesitate. If it had been warmer, there would have been no hesitation, but the chill in the air gave us second thoughts about the possibility of making contact with the frigid waters. Nevertheless, persevereres though we are, we managed to get ourselves across the creek without getting too wet. We did this by crossing at a more narrow spot which had a dense assortment of thorny bushes. As such, we both scratched our legs up quite a bit.
From there, we set out on Salmon Creek road. At first, the road was decently dry but it gradually got muddier and muddier. After a time, I began noticing that I was having difficulty getting my wheels to turn over. I dismounted and found that I had an incredible amount of mud between my wheels and the fork and that the mud was sticky enough that my wheel was essentially immobilized. I spent some time trying to get rid of the mud, but it had become clear to me that it was time to turn around. I had about ten pounds of mud clinging to my bike and the rear wheel wouldn't move. Josh even went to help me dislodge my wheel, and became noticeably frustrated. He said that he would try to ride my bike to get the wheel unstuck, and I said "Ok, I'll ride your bike down!"
Now, because Josh rides on skinnier tires than I, he was having none of these mud issues. By the time that I was mounting his bike, I had so much mud stuck to my shoes, that I was only barely able to clip into one of the pedals, balancing on the uneven mud of the other shoe. Adding to the ridiculousness of the situation was that Josh's bike is WAAAAY too big for me. I could barely reach the bottom of the pedal stroke without banging my coochie on the top tube, and as I was coasting down with the pedals in the parallel position, I could barely get my butt on the saddle. This is to say nothing about how my torso was completely stretched out reaching the handlebars, all the while balancing precariously with my muddy cleats. And it was actually fun!
When we got back to the creek, I decided it was not worth the effort to try and avoid getting wet, so I just walked across. ...Getting my feet completely wet. Josh merely rode across.
We rode back up to Horse Race Ridge and decided to try to make it up to the top of Wilson Peak. I had a few doubts about this plan because my shoes were full of ice cold water and my toes were going numb (and remember, there was a significant chill in the air). But we did it anyway. The whole time going up, my feet went through various stages of painful coldness. Finally, I decided that I would go no further. Josh continued to the top, where he captured some stunning photos of the landscape, while I sat on the ground and tried to get some feeling and warmth back in my feet. I took off my shoes and socks, which were both sopping with cold water, and put my gloves on my feet. I sat for a long time in a semi-lotus position, trying to warm my feet with my thigh fat, but this was not entirely effective because of how cold my entire body was. Eventually, I laid down, shut my eyes, and listened to the sound of the wind. When I heard Josh riding down on his bike, I lifted my leg and waved with the glove on my foot.
From there, it was about 12 miles of super fast downhill back to the car. I finally put some batteries in my cyclecomputer, so I was able to track our speed and distance. The first several miles, the road was pretty rugged in a way that reminded me of Rocky Canyon Road. Because my hands were so cold, the vibrations against the handlebars hurt them so much that I decided to grip my handlbars as hard as I could and ride like there's no tomorrow. Hey, beats the hell outta achy hands! During these miles down, I was concentrating on the road in front of me, but a few times I glanced at my computer and noted speeds nearing 30 miles an hour. Okay, pretty fast. That the road was so rugged, there was naturally more friction against the tires and so it wasn't really THAT fast. After a few miles, the road smoothened out and the reduced friction meant that I could ride a lot faster with a lot more comfort. I checked my speed a few times, but pretty much let it go. Josh sped past me at some point and I decided that, except for the fact that he weighs 50 pounds more than I (thereby having gravity on his side), there was no reason why I couldn't go just as fast. At this point, our top speed was 36.8 which I found to be very thrilling.
Total mileage was 23.22 for the trip, and we rode for just under 3 hours.
On Saturday, I rode the Wilson Creek loop with Josh and Eric. According to those with whom Josh has spoken about riding in the Owyhees, THE PLACE TO RIDE is the Wilson Creek loop. A few years ago, we tried to ride this famed loop, but we did not have proper directions about its route or access point, and we ended up riding this shitty (literally and figuratively) cow path that paralleled the creek. Yesterday, Josh and Eric consulted the trail reference guide Mountain Biking Idaho and we followed the directions for the (I believe) 13 mile ride.
We parked at the main parking lot and then rode up the gravel/dirt road for seven miles. Personally, this climb was my favorite part of the whole ride - - I was feeling particularly good and energetic, and the effort felt very satisfying. At first, the road was gravelly and rocky, which was somewhat taxing, but after a few miles it became this smooth red clay-like substance that I found quite pleasant to ride on. After seven miles, we encountered the trailhead (pictured above).
From there, we rode around this big mountain on a kind of ORV road. I entertained myself by taking a lot of photos while riding my bike, most of which were a tad blurry (shocking).
And after a while came upon a herd of wild horses.
And soon thereafter, we began the descent down 2,000 feet in 4 miles (approximatelyish). While I can see how Josh and Eric had a lot of fun on the downhill, I found it to be consistently beyond my skill level to really enjoy. On the positive side, I was able to ride a lot of stuff that was challenging and felt very accomplished about that. One the less than positive side, I got a bad blister on my foot from all of the hiking in my cycling shoes. The mountain biking guidebook wrote that the downhill "will challenge the best" and compared it to a "mini Moab".
Just for kicks, I filmed a five second movie of Josh descending. I recently had to get a new camera because I broke my old one, and I am still figuring out how to do this movie thing. The image quality is poor, but whatever, it's kinda fun to see.
After the descent, we had to ride along some quote/unquote "singletrack" (which was really a cow path) through a cow pasture to get back to the car. The smell of fresh manure was quite pungent and I became sick to my stomach. I believe the ride was 13 miles (I can't recall what Josh had read in the book) and it took us about 3 hours. It would have taken much less time had we not stopped to take in the stunning views as much and if SOMEONE (points at self) had not done so much hiking. That evening, the three of us ordered pizza and watched an espionage movie from the '70s. Good times.
I wonder if anyone is tired of these posts about mountain bike adventures in the Succor Creek area... I am certainly not tired of riding the area, nor am I tired of the stunning views.
On Saturday, Josh and I returned to the area for yet another Succor Creek exploration. This time, we rode along Camp Kettle Creek road in an Westerly direction. A few preliminary remarks are necessary... First, while driving along Succor Creek Road, we were slightly delayed after a somewhat traumatic and very noisy moment in which a wrench on the road punctured my car tire and Josh performed the quickest tire switch ever. It was kind of a bummer because I do not derive much joy from buying new car tires. Secondly, after mounting my bike, I discovered that my sit bones aren't in mountain biking shape. Despite riding the bike at the gym, apparently the rugged terrain of the Owyhees took its toll, and my sit bones were in a good deal of pain for the ride. Luckily, I was able to perch myself on my inner thigh fat, taking some pressure off the sit bones. Seriously, I've found my inner thigh fat to be quite useful in mountain biking. Thirdly, there was some sort of storm moving through the area, resulting in some spectacular cloud formation as well as VERY STRONG WIND. The whole ride going out, we had a ridiculously strong headwind.
So, the ride out was a bit difficult because of sit bone pain and the strong headwind. And the wind wasn't "bad" it just meant that we couldn't ride that fast. Otherwise, Camp Kettle Creek road is definitely a place that we will return. One interesting discovery was Devil's Gate (entrance pictured above) which was a creepy rocky cavern, made more creepy by the grave marking where someone had died.
Camp Kettle Creek road featured a combination of rocky and more technical riding as well as very fast and smooth riding. There was one hill that we had to hike our bikes, but otherwise it was very ridable. It seemed to be a road popular among motorcyclists and ATVs, which can make for some very fun mountain biking - - with the whoops and banked turns that dirt bikes make.
The ride back, with more downhill action AND the strong tailwind, was very fast and very fun. It was around 6:15 when we started riding back and the temperature had fallen somewhat, so my hands and feet were really cold.
I've been loading all of my Succor Creek photos into one photset, so there are more photos there.
On Friday, while I was taking my standard noontime walk over my lunch break, the gorgeous weather compelled me to call my work and ask to be released for the day. Glorious weather makes me so happy - - it was warm and beautiful and sunny. To be honest, I've been pretty depressed for a while and Friday's weather was glorious.
Having some extra free time, Josh and I decided to go back down to the Owyhees and try to have a more successful experience in the Succor Creek area. Which we did! I'd like to find a mapping tool to track our rides in the Owyhees, but until then, for this ride we took the first dirt road after the cattle guard along Succor Creek Road to the East.
The ride was a lot of fun! It had such variation in ups and downs, with a few hard climbs, and fast downhills. Plus, the landscape was stunning. We descended down into that canyon that we viewed from the previous ride, and crossed the creek (which had kind of a strong current). Unlike most Owyhees creek crossings, the water here was not stagnant and putrid from cow piss - - instead, it was cool and refreshing.
Oh, in the below photo, I am reminded of why I am a very bad girlfriend. You will note that Josh is not wearing a helmet. We drove all the way out there for Josh to realize that he forgot something very important. Of course, when he exclaimed that he forgot his helmet, he acted as though it was HIS decision about whether to ride anyway. I, on the other hand, contemplated the matter and seriously considered driving the hour and half back to Boise just to get the helmet...but by my calculation, we wouldn't have enough time to return and get some riding in before the sun set. Plus, that would be an awful lot of driving. Plus, I reasoned that Josh is very skilled on the bike and that I have not known him to ever crash. So I made him promise to be careful.
It was a very awesome ride. And I believe about three hours.
Afterwards, we went to a restaurant along the highway for dinner. We were going to have dinner in Homedale, but there is apparently no other place to eat in Homedale besides the drive-in we've been to a million times... shocking. We then decided to take a detour and go to the motorcycle bar in Marsing (which serves food). Unfortunately, when we arrived there was no place directly out front to park the car and we didn't have a lock for our bikes, and we weren't about to park our car at the back of a busy motorcycle bar with two nice mountain bikes available for the taking. So we continued down the highway, where we located the Orchard House restaurant near the vinyard that had parking places out front, where we could watch the bikes from inside. The restaurant proved to be a bit on the fancy side, but we both really really enjoyed our prime rib dinner. Yum!
Josh and I finally made it out to the Owyhees this weekend, crossing the border into Oregon and riding around the Succor Creek area. Accurate maps of the Owyhees are a limitation to planning the perfect bike ride - - in our experience, nothing beats continued exploration to find the good places to ride. There are so many dirt roads branching all over, most of which go nowhere, that riding in the Owyhees can be quite the adventure.
After departing from the car, we rode up the road for a while until we came upon an 'open mine'. Our attempts to circumnavigate the mine were unsuccessful, and we returned from whence we came. We then rode down the other direction, hitting the main rocky road for a bit, and then veering off on another road. Here we had some good riding moments. At some point, we came upon a guy shooting a rifle and we rode away from him, up a butte where we encountered another deadend in the road. We took in the view before riding back down, where the guy shooting his gun gave us a recommendation about where to ride. He directed us down a bit of singletrack that would have been cool if it had not been made virtually unridable by cattle grazing and rocks. We turned around yet again.
We rode around for a bit before setting off along another road to explore. Here, we encountered a big group of people shooting guns, and I was startled by how LOUD the guns were. Despite all the gunfire, this road proved to have some good riding opportunities, affording us some satisfying climbs and really fun downhills.
In total, it was about a two hour adventure. On the way back, we stopped at a drive-in in Homedale for some food. I had a very very delicious hamburger with grilled onions on sourdough, which may have tasted particularly wonderful after our riding adventure.
As someone who has no sense of direction, I frequently find myself wondering where in the world I am located. Normally, however, I am in the presence of someone who is aware of our location, and so I find little cause for concern. This weekend was a different situation.
Josh and I have been on an Owyhees kick, as evidenced by the fact that all of my recent posts contain a reference of an Owyhees adventure. This past Saturday, we treked out to somewhere in the Owyhees for a bike ride. The first little misadventure occured while we were trying to get to where we would begin the ride and we found ourselves on a scary person's private property. The signage in the Owyhees needs a great deal of improvement, to put it mildly. Also to put it mildly, I was concerned that the luncatic hermit living in an isolated part of the Owyhees was going to shoot us dead and prop our decapitated heads onto poles as a warning to other trespassers. You may infer from my writing of this post that we came out of that encounter only a little ruffled, thank the little baby jesus. Following the encounter with crazy-man, I found myself driving my car over terrain poorly suited to my vehicle's schematics. Yet again, I was more than a little ruffled. But we managed to get our persons safe and sound to a spot at which to commence our ride.
As I said, signage in the Owyhees could use a bit of improvement. Josh and I are both decently observant people, yet both of us failed to notice this sign at the start of our ride. Though, if we had noticed it, we might not have been quite as awe-struck when we came upon this...
A herd of wild horses. In my Public Land Policy class, we've briefly discussed wild horse management policy, so I am somewhat familiar with it, but to my knowledge, I've never before seen wild horses. And on this ride, we came upon a few herds and it was quite remarkable. For the duration of the ride, I was singing to myself the U2 song about wild horses.
When we encountered them, we weren't sure the best response. One, we had no idea how they would react to us - - we've got experience running into stock animals like sheep and cattle, but no wild horses. So we kept our distance and allowed them to retreat, then slowly rode past until there was a good distance between us.
There were a lot of interesting relics and geological features along the ride. Above, some kind of headstone. There was also a particularly nifty volcanic rock section (no photo, unfortunately). It was sometime after we rode away from this headstone that we grew increasingly uncertain about our location. We stopped several times for Josh to consult the map.
We rode and rode. Eventually, we did two sets of steep descents and hike-a-bike ascents. And at the bottom of the second descent, Josh and I had paused to discuss something of great import, when we were silenced by the rather startling sound of all the air in one of Josh's tires suddently whooshing out.
That was disconcerting and sad-making.
We then hiked the bikes up a really steep hill and I got comfortable while Josh worked on fixing the tire. This took some time. Josh also took the opportunity to consult the map for the umpteenth time. From our vantage point, we were able to see two canyons and were wondering which canyons they were, as that information could have helped Josh to ascertain our location. After a while, a dude on an ATV sputtered by and was able to tell us that one of the canyons was Jump Creek. We asked the dude for advice on which way we should go, as we were at an intersection in which one road went down and another went up. We both felt uncertain about his advice, and decided to backtrack back to the car. Josh later consulted additional maps, including Google Earth, and realized that the dude had given us very bad directions and that if we had taken his advice, we would have been poorly off.
Once the tire was fixed, we had to re-hike-a-bike back up the steep hills we had just traversed and set off back from whence we had came.
For me, it was a spectacular ride. I was feeling really good and had a blast. I had also put my cyclecomputer on the bike, so I can say for certain that we rode 31 miles, our average speed was 8.6 mph, and our max speed was 27 mph. Not too shabby. It was about 3.5 hours of riding, but we had lots of stops, so we were out for at least an additional hour. For the drive back, we decided to take a different road so as to avoid driving by crazy-private-property man, and we discovered a much better route to access that part of the Owyhees.
This past weekend proved to be a most excellent three-day weekend. Clearly, three day weekends are far superior to two day weekends.
I'll begin by highlighting Saturday evening's fun, a BBQ chez Amy. In spite of the good company (Amy, Elizabeth, Leah, David, Josh, and Eric), the good atmosphere (the backyard lawn), the good food (chorizos, potato salad, fruit salad, roasted veggies), and the beverages (beer), no one had a very good time. In fact, it was so terrible, that we have decided never to have a BBQ ever again. What made the experience pretty much unbearable was this puppy-dog who was running around trying to swindle everyone's beer. Note, that below photo was a shot from the gods - - it appears as though David was giving the puppy beer, when in fact the puppy was the perpetrator, having suddenly lunged at the beer bottle. Through the course of the evening, so much beer was spilled as a result of puppy (and subsequently licked up by puppy) that we surmised he had become rather tipsy. Photos of the horrendous evening are available here.
Saturday was also the day when Josh and I had yet another adventure in the Owyhees. Unfortunately, it's been a while since we were down there - - but we decided to do a refined version of the Sage Creek Loop that we did in June. We've been out there enough that we're really getting to know our way around. This was the first time in the Sage Creek zone when we didn't have to spend time figuring out where we were going and back-tracking because we went the wrong way. We did a perfect loop that I approximate was 2.5 hours. Ultimately, I bet Josh and I could make some money by developing a mountain biking Owyhees book - - Josh was even talking about opening a bike shop in Marsing (maybe not the best idea in today's economy). Anyway, the loop took us over lots of ups and downs, some unridable ups that we had to hike-a-bike, and some pretty challengingly technical downhills that I felt very accomplished after riding successfully. I've developed a lot more confidence on the more technical downhills - - the Owyhees are great for that. The Boise foothills, all groomed and smooth, are wonderful but can hold a person back from developing confidence on not-groomed and not-smooth trails. I love the Owyhees - - so much potential adventure. Photos from this ride may be viewed here.
I've been getting a good amount of riding in, which adds to my feeling good on the bike. On Sunday, Josh and I rode Sidewinder, which is a nice fun quickie ride. Funny story about that ride... I had been having a bit of trouble with the shifting on my bike. On the ride in the Owyhees, the front gears were very malaligned - - Josh did a complete gear adjustment on the trail, but they wouldn't function properly. I took the bike into the shop to have the mechanics fix it. Got the bike back on Sunday and Josh and I rode Sidewinder. The front gears were working, but the back gears were not. Josh spent more time trail-side trying to adjust them, to no avail. We rode anyway. As I was grunting up one of the climbs, the chain broke. Josh was the mechanical hero, as he was able to fix the chain with his semi-broken chain tool and we were able to finish the ride. That night, we hung out at the bike shop drinking beers, Josh fixing my bike for good, and me knitting.
Another fun adventure was had this weekend in the Owyhees. Josh and I met up at the insanely early hour of eight o'clock on Saturday morning, procured some coffee beverages, and headed to the southwest. As of this writing, we have become expert Owyhee-ophiles. This ride was to take us along some of the dirt roads that we have ridden on previous occasions. This time, however, we stuck to the lower roads that veered in the general westerly direction and made a loop out to Sage Creek. This is the same area as can be found the Wilson, Poison, and Jump Creek trails/roads. While Wilson Creek appears to be the most popular of these for mountain bikers, as Josh articulated, Wilson Creek is overrated because "it's just a bunch of cow pies."
And so we set off! The temperature was predicted to be HOT that day and I was greatly pleased with the thick clouds blocking the direct sunshine for the majority of our ride. Indeed, everything worked out perfectly, weatherwise. Only until the very end of the ride did I begin to feel a little on the overheated side of things, but there was sufficient wind to help cool me off. As we rode along the roads, we were frequently confronted with the decision of WHICH ROAD TO TAKE, as the number of possible routes seemed infinite. At some point, when we were confronted with that decision, we noted a structure in the direction of a particular road veering to our left. This structure aided our decision-making process, as we had to check it out.
Exploration is such fun! We never came to a firm conclusion on what the structure was, but we had a number of hypotheses. Suffice it to say that this structure was in the middle of nowhere, abandoned, in ruins, and had been picked over by both animals, humans, and firearms. In addition, there was a ravine-thing just behind this structure, into which a number of appliances had been thrown (refrigerators, televisions, etc.) and shot at by guns. Strange. I also located a very large pile of rusted tin cans which really appalled the environmentalist in me.
From there, we continued along our merry way. We stopped to gaze over a mini-canyon and enjoy a nutritional supplement, at which point, we made friends with two black cattle. These friends of ours trotted along the side of the road in front of us for some time. Soon after we left them in the dust, the clouds above us began emitting condensed H2O, which was a lovely sensation in the increasing heat. We paused a few times so that Josh could consider the map and ensure our proper location, which I appreciated.
At another point, we came upon a batch of water which we were obliged to cross. As I was in the lead, I attempted to charge straight through it, but met with resistance at both the depth of the water and the squishiness of the mud beneath my tires. I might mention that stagnant water in an area where cattle are allowed to graze freely tends to be rather pungent and I felt somewhat soiled after immersing part of my person in it. In addition, a great quantity of mud and rocks found their way into my shoes, which I failed to appreciate.
I'm not certain the distance that we covered, but it was a good three hour adventure (with lots of pausing). After the ride, we drove to Homedale for some lunch.
The Barking Spider race was this weekend. Despite not training as much as I had wanted to, I did pretty well. My race time was 58 minutes, which I felt really good about, especially if you consider that my time was a mere six minutes behind the time of the man who won. Out of about 50 beginners, I came in 9th and was the first female to cross the finish. The results of the race are posted here. Below is a photo of me crossing the finish line, taking first place in my category.
I had actually become quite nervous about the race. I didn't sleep at all the night before and I had lost all of my appetite the morning of the race. The grumbly in my tumbly was unbearable. And then, right when I gathered at the starting line, it was 30 seconds to go, and I suddenly had a very strong urge to pee! Once the race was on and I was riding my bike, trying to navigate myself around all of the mofos in my way, everything felt really good. Below is a photo of me right after we started the race (I'm on the right in the blue jersey, white helmet).
My first strategy once the race started was to quickly get ahead of as many people (aka, "mofos") as I could. Somehow, I wasn't paying attention when I gathered at the starting line, and I ended up way in the back, and I wanted to make sure that I could pass the mofos while I had a good opportunity. Otherwise, I was concerned that some parts of the race would not be conducive to passing the mofos. Below is a photo of me in the process of passing a mofo (behind me, all of the mofos I had managed to pass right at the outset).
Perhaps by now it should be obvious that some kind of competitive beast managed to possess me for the duration of the race, despite my assurances that I am not a competitive person. A strange experience, I must say.
So, the course has lots of ups and downs - - and I tended to shine on the climbs, where everyone else seemed to really slow down. At every hill, there would be a long line of bikers huffing and puffing their way up - - and for me, I found that to be a grand opportunity to pass the lot of them. On the one hand, I have a strength to weight ratio working in my favor, on the other hand, I'm just a good climber. Over the years, Josh has taught me a lot of techniques for climbing that I gathered many of the other racers did not have - - such as, on an extended climb, recovering during the least strenuous point of the pedal stroke.
Of course, as gravity is working in my favor on the climbs, it works against me on the downhills. I passed and repassed a few of the same people over and over. On a number of occasions, there would be a downhill right after I passed someone (say, a dude who weighs 50 pounds more than I) and he would zoom past me going down, and then I would pass him a minute later going up. Eventually, a form of comradery was established and a very brief humorous salutation was exchanged.
About halfway through the course, there was an extended climb with a decently strong headwind, and a very long line of bikers. It was during this climb that I located a dude who was going at a good pace, and so I tucked myself behind him and drafted off of him so that I could get a nice recovery in. He was passing a lot of people, and I was right behind him, passing them. Many of the people that we passed, by this point, were racers in the sport class (who had started a few minutes before us beginners) that we had caught up to. After a while, I passed the dude I was drafting off of, and then he passed me on the downhill, and I believe that he was one of the 8 dudes to finish before me.
When I went through the finish line, I was very excited to learn of my standing in the race. I had a bit of a spectator grouping - - Josh, Elizabeth, and Laura were on hand to watch my first race! We partook of several celebratory beers after I finished and it was a lot of fun. We waited several hours until the awards ceremony, where I scored a water bottle and a huge jersey for a team that I'm not on (how dumb is that?@? - - I'm not going to wear a jersey that's way too big for me for a local team that I don't ride with). Afterwards, we made our way to a Mexican restaurant in Kuna and had enchiladas. Anyway, here's the link to my flickr deal - - you'll note the photo of the nasty sunburn I got on my calves...didn't think to apply sunscreen there.
In anticipation of my upcoming mountain bike race, I took advantage of the warm weather this weekend and practiced riding the race course three times - - on Friday and Sunday with Josh, and Saturday with another female mountain biker. While I am not exactly in top riding form, what with all of the not-biking I've been doing, I managed to greatly impress myself this weekend - - primarily in the way of taking in a deep breath and riding those sections of the course that caused me to hesitate out of fear. Those shots above depict exactly that - - sections that I had to work up some guts to ride. Naturally, the photos don't do justice to the actual trail conditions - - I felt as though I was surmounting one ginormous challenge after another.
The first two photos are essentially the same. They show me riding a part of the trail that was very sandy, somewhat steepish, with a tight downhill swooping turn to the left. I took in a number of deep breaths in an attempt to get the guts to ride this - - what I continue to learn after successfully riding obstacles that make me hesitate is that most of the time these obstacles look worse on the approach than they actually are. I hiked myself back up to the top of this part of the trail several times to try and try again - - and as I was finally riding down the length of the trail, I had to scream because I was so excited that the trail was FUN and not horrid and scary. Imagine that! Something that appeared terrifying was loads of FUN!
The third photo depicts me overcoming one of my biggest fears - - drop offs. This particular one begins with a little uphill jaunt over some boulders and then a few step-steps down, all the while with the trail sloping towards the drop off. I successfully took in deep breaths and rode it three times, having fun each time, feeling very accomplished - - though, the deep breath was still very necessary even on the third time.
The fourth photo probably doesn't look like anything. And it's not, really. It's simply the epitome of a scary-looking approach that turns into no big deal to ride. What it was, was a steepish downhill with a sloping trail with lots of loose stuff on the top. But what it really was, was a really fun section leading into a superfast awesome fun downhill.
Anyway, the full course is 10.5 miles and I felt pretty good riding all of it this weekend. I've still got a few more weekends to practice before the race. Speaking of the race, I have absolutely no idea what to expect out of myself. My athletic competition history is virtually none. Though, in middle school, I was on a volleyball team - - we didn't win a single game, so I have a lot of experience being a good loser. Actually, what I gleaned from that experience was to not take athletic competition seriously. So this race, I'm doing it as a goal for myself - - but I have no idea what my attitude will be during the race. Anyway, this year I'm hoping to jump up to the next skill level of biking, and I feel that so far I've done a splendid job of that.
I admit it... the restroom situation at my new office makes me uncomfortable. It, the restroom, is located in the middle of the suite, and because of the thinness of the walls, the hollowness of the doors, and the acoustics of the suite, it is possible to discern EVERYTHING that takes place in the restroom. Which makes me feel a little uncomfortable. Early this morning, I completed a thorough exploration of the first and the second floor, which yielded no restroom alternatives. Later today, I will wander the third floor which may afford a more acceptable restroom opportunity. Although, I have heard odd things about the third floor. In particular, some people have claimed that occasionally there are nude senior citizens on the third floor, and that, too, makes me a bit uncomfortable.
In other news, this weekend it was GLORIOUS. On Saturday, Josh and I were determined to squeeze in a mountain bike ride between the time that he got off work and our scheduled dinner/movie date with Elizabeth and Edvin. Initially, we were going to do some version of Hulls, but the thick cloud of gnats made cycling nearly impossible. All was well on the beginning of the trail, but as we got deeper into the mini-canyon, the gnats formed a thick wall, and riding through the wall brought numerous gnats into our eyes, our noses, our mouths, and all throughout our clothing items. To be honest, I have never experienced such a thing before. So, we turned around and decided to ride Shane's instead.
We made good time up to the top of the trail, at which time the sun began to set. I was a bit nervous about riding in the dark - - an activity which Josh does with some regularity, but which makes me feel a bit nervous. My first night ride! And it was awesome. Once the sun began to set, it got dark fast. But there was enough light pollution from Boise that I was able to discern the direction of the trail, albeit not the features of the terrain. It helped that I've ridden this trail so many times that I have it virtually memorized, but I was keeping my body relaxed on the bike in case I hit an unanticipated bump or rock. Ultimately, I think that I may have been riding faster than normal, what with being unable to see the terrain, I just let the bike go and I put my trust in my skills and the wheels. It was loads of fun.
Then on Sunday, Josh and I went out to the Owyhees and rode some of the area across from Barking Spider. Please see the above photos. The ride was great fun, and would have been even greater fun if the trails had been a bit more hardpacked. From the second and third photos above, it is evident that the trails were highly sandy (Josh even fell off his bike because of the sand!). We ended up hiking our bikes for a substantial amount of time and distance...through valleys, up and over mountains...I was getting a bit cranky about all of the sandiness. But when it was fun, it was a blast! I rode down some things that would have usually make me rather afraid, but I've got a new-found confidence and lack of fear with my new bicycle. It's so great, no longer being afraid.
Is it true that when one does an extra-ordinary amount of difficult physical activity, that one is the most sore two days later??? I guess I'm not so much "sore" per se, but rather that one of my quadriceps is seizing up into these painful cramps. I hypothesize that it is acting up because of an unusual quantity of bicycle riding I engaged in this weekend. After all, on Friday I did a 17 mile ride, and the next day, I rode 25 miles, both on the mountain bike.
The second of these long rides was to the old ghost town of Silver City. After 12.5 miles of riding uphill and getting overheated enough to stick my head into a creek to cool down, I was happy to arrive at the dusty gates of Silver City. Josh and I had driven to the end of the pavement and then ridden bikes the rest of the way (12.5 miles rest of the way). The ride was not as difficult as I had expected. Not nearly as steep and the road was in much better condition than I expected it to be. The road, however, was hardpack with a thin layer of loose sand, and I had a near-wipeout-miss. The ride was made difficult by the heavy backpack that I was carrying. I hate carrying things on my back and I actively seek to avoid it under most circumstances. However, it was necessary for me to carry extra water, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and some other supplies, and I had no other means to carry them except for aforementioned backpack. But, oh man!, it was so heavy and it felt like it weighed an extra 30 pounds and was dragging me down, cramping up my shoulders and back.
Silver City itself wasn't quite what I had expected. As a ghost town, I had imagined abandoned buildings and tumbleweeds rolling through the streets. I also wasn't expecting to see as many people as there were. Not only are the buildings in use, some people actually live there, but most of the buildings are being renovated and restored. There were also a lot of people there, it was a popular place! Most everyone was driving an SUV or ATV and we had several people exclaim to us, "Did you ride your bikes the whole way up that road?!!!"
As some point, we were down by the creek that runs through the middle of town, underneath a large wooden building, when a dude in an ATV came by and offered to let us see the inside of the building. As we were on the wrong side of the creek from the front door, he allowed us to sit on the hood of his ATV (me, holding on for dear life!) while he took us across the creek. Inside the building, we discovered a veddy veddy old Mason Lodge. There were all kinds of odd things here and there, peeling wallpaper, and dusty cult trinkets. Probably the most interesting find was an old globe that (you know, because it was old) had different nation states than what we know today.
Silver City is in a valley in the mountains. After we had ridden ten miles up and up and up the mountains, we had about 2.5 miles to descend into the town. On the return trip, my legs were cursing me for making them continue to work. I kept telling them, my legs, that they didn't have much more work to do, that it was almost over, but they were having none of it, being all cranky and pissy with me. After that climb, there was a good long downhill which I took the opportunity to practice braking techniques. At the very end, there was another climb right before the spot where we had parked the car. I must have gotten some sort of adrenaline rush on the downhill, because I suddenly had more energy than I had on the rest of the ride and it was probably the funnest part of the whole ride for me. It was one of the steeper grades, yet I was easily going twice as fast than my average pace up the rest of the climbs.
Incidentally, I've got a computer hooked up to my computer, so I do know for a fact the distance and speed at which I was riding. My fastest speed on that downhill was 28 mph, which felt pretty fast to me. On the ride the previous evening, the mere 17 miles on the Boise front, my fastest speed was 32 mph, which I was peddling down Bogus Basin Road in an effort to catch up to some downhill riders we had chatted with up on the trail. I thought it would be super funny if I zoomed up to them and said, "Hey guys, how's it hanging?" while passing them. Unfortunately, right as we caught up to them, one of the dudes crashed on the pavement in a spectacular tour de force and I had the opportunity to see his muscle tissue poking out from under his knee and an arm with a lot of missing skin. Somehow, his friends kept on riding, so Josh and I kept the dude company until his friends had the sense to come to his aid. I felt a little bad for how happy I was that it wasn't me who had crashed, 'cause I bet it sucks to be him, but hey, at least empathy doesn't imply that you physically experience the same trauma and pain as another. Empathetically, I felt for his pain, but I certainly didn't feel his pain.
Oh, but to return to the title of this post, Cramping Quads, I'd like to direct your feelings of empathy towards my quadriceps which are crampy and seizing up with tightness. Boo!
This past Saturday, Josh and I drove out to the Owyhees for a mountain biking adventure. He had been obsessing over the Poison Creek area on Google Earth for several weeks, certain that he was seeing what could be some excellent mountain biking opportunities. One aspect of the Owyhees is that they are relatively unmarked...which is to say, there are random roads and trails branching out everywhere, but there are very few signs, and it's best to wander the area with a detailed map and a good sense of direction. A few weeks ago, when we had a mini-vacation in Marsing and went on an ill-fated bike ride in the Owyhees, we were trying to ride a certain direction which Josh felt would take us on an excellent adventure. Unfortunately, on that ride, we had no map, we routinely encountered dead-ended roads, routinely found ourselves on roads which were not easily ridable, and became caught in a severe wind and rain storm. Since then, Josh has gone over the area on Google Earth numerous times and has procured a detailed map of the area, so we were much better prepared on Saturday for a second try.
We parked the car at the same location as we had the last time, off a dirt road that branched several times over, with the only identifying feature (as far as I can tell) being an abandoned and collapsed stone house. After mounting our trusty hardtail steeds, we proceeded to peddle up a random road to our left which was not one of the random roads on which we had peddled before. This took us up and up and up, a climb that I felt was more difficult than it should have been, only because of the immediacy of the climb (usually, I have a few minutes of riding before such a climb). Throughout the climb upwards, the sky remained cloudy and foreboding, the wind was cold, but the weather never warned of impending doom. Instead, there was a strange optimism in the air...as though things might clear up.
At some point, we encountered a flock of sheep and their respective sheep dogs and shepards. As I was threading my way through the gaggle of sheep on the road, I made a mental note that sheep are not the most intelligent of all creatures. We rode slowly through, an effort to avoid inadvertently herding them (re: not the most intelligent of creatures), and tried to act calm while riding by the sheep dogs. Sheep dogs...a far cry sharper than the school of sheep they monitored. I was a tad perturbed by the presence of the sheep, as they existed along the stretch of road which was the first downhill portion. At the time, I was wanting a good fun adrenaline downhill zoom, which was thwarted by the big balls of would-be yarn.
At some other point, we came to a lookout area where we stopped to ingest some granola bars and rest. The view was particularly stunning. I should mention, right about here, that the batteries in my camera were dangerously low...and what was I doing? I was taking photos of cute flowers and not saving my batteries for possible amazingness. After resting and reenergizing, we continued on our way with an increase in both downhill opportunities and amazing view opportunities. The road became less "maintained" at certain points - - the downhills were severely rutted (by which I mean that there were ruts several inches wide and several inches deep) and the ground became loose and rocky. We had to stop several times just to take in the beauty of the Owyhees. We stopped at a certain particularly stunning point which overlooked Jump Creek Canyon. I took a single photo of the canyon and then became preoccupied trying to photograph a certain flower, and then my camera turned itself off. From this point, the sun came out, the day became glorious (by which I underscore several times), and the views of Jump Creek canyon became ever more stunning. I will refer all of my readers to Josh's flickr account, which I linked a few posts ago, for some incredible photos of our journey. You may access my meager photos by clicking on the cow at the beginning of this post.
As we continued peddling along, Josh routinely consulting his map to ensure that we would not get lost, we found ourselves on some singletrack that was to take us to the beginning of Jump Creek. The trail took us along the ridge and, I'm beginning to be a broke record, it was an awesome experience. Just before the bottom, the trail became unridable and we had to walk our bikes down a rather steep, loose ground, and rocky trail. Yea, hiking in cycling cleats is not the most comfortable or ideal way to travel. At the bottom, we proceeded to wander into Jump Creek canyon all the way to the waterfall. During that trip, we had to hike our bikes most of the way, carefully crossed the creek by navigatign the wobbly stepping stones in our cleats (yikes!) and then had a lovely experience at the waterfall. However, we agreed that Jump Creek Canyon is more spectacular from above than from within.
After making our way out of the canyon, we had just a few miles of washboard gravelly road to return to the car. At this point, I was wishing that I had some rear suspension, as the washboard gravelly road was rather unpleasant to ride on after having ridden for three hours. By the end of the ride, we were both hungry, so we drove into Marsing for some food. We stopped at the White House drive in (next to the trailer park that we had stayed in a few weeks before) and had some affordable yummy food.
Taking advantage of the break in the clouds over the Owyhees, while all of Ada and Canyon Counties were grey, I drove out to the Barking Spider racecourse on Saturday with Josh. The weather was perfect and I got my first sunburn of the year. We were all alone except for some people on dirt bikes...a lot of people on dirt bikes...making a lot of noise with said dirt bikes and kicking up a lot of dirt. From the parking lot, we rode North with a tail wind around the initial part of the course. As I rode around the other side of the first loop, the tail wind turned into a strong head wind, and I performed my first major downshift. The initial part of the course was relatively flat with some gravelly "woop-dees". After crossing a cattle guard, we rode over some inclines, encountered some sandy pits, and I had a skills lab on a few "roller coaster" dealies. This initial part of the course formed a loop which brought us back to the parking lot, at which point we crossed over onto the other side and rode up a steady mild incline with a strong-to-very-strong headwind. We rode up to a point at the top and had a bio and photo break.Then we began the decent. This took us down some rocky steepes, some "woop-dees", some incredibly delightful side-sweep dealies (for which I have failed to remember the term), some sandy pits (in which I lodged my front tire and flipped over my bicycle in slow motion and sustained a deep tissue bruise), some roller coasters, and some canyon-sorts of things.We arrived back at the car after riding this 9-mile course and ate some lunch. Then we headed out once again and rode a variation of the initial loop, followed with an adventure into a section of the trails that neither of us had ever explored. These trails were nice because the wind wasn't as strong. Additionally, the downhill was so much fun that I could have died. I handed Josh the camera and have these amazing photos of me riding. I now have my first sunburn of the year, on my wrists, marking precisely the location of my gloves. It was such a fun adventure and I'm feeling inarticulate in trying to describe it. With the weather no longer being in the winter vein, I have identified the goal of going on adventures, hopefully weekly.
