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Tuesday, October 2

Faster Mustache Retreat '18: Day 2

Day Two.  I had semi-bold aspirations based on trail suggestions from a local friends and hazy Tour de Burg memories.  Cars would be involved.  I envisioned a true two-way shuttle, but after taking attendance and discovering divergent interests, a new plan was hatched.  Kürdt would drive the men up in the truck and leave us to Deathstar and Hone Ridge/Heartbreak so he could do a road ride (injured reserve) and Stephanie (also injured reserve) would take the women even further up the mountain to the top of Reddish Knob for a shorter yet still incredible ride down Timber and Wolf and then Steph could go hiking.

Lee and I didn't fit in the truck. 

He got a seat in the Volvo, I became human luggage.

Sorting out the shit before the ladies went on up to the top.

I wasn't on their ride (obvs) but later on that evening they shared their super stoke about their adventures (and the addition of Dog Graveyard/Tillman West audible) before riding back to the lodge.

So our ride...

We feel our way to the top of Deathstar.  I only know that it's memorable... for something.  I thought it was listed as "black" on Trailforks for gnar gnar, but it was apparently thusly based on face-melting speeds and absolute steepness.  At one point, Lee and Colin are stopped at a hairpin turn blocked by a downed tree... and I approach them with much speed.  A liberal squeeze of the brakes and I do not slow down the amount that reflected my squeezings.  I fly right into the back of Lee's bike.  Meh.  That's never happened to me before.

I forget to ever pull out my phone to grab some pictures until we're all the way at the bottom.

I woulda never captured the steepness anyways.

Gravel and plenty of creek crossings and then a long climb up the pavement back to where we started earlier that day.  Out the dirt road and over to Hone Quarry.

So, obviously... my TdB memory was vague on this one as well.   Incredible views from the ridge, occasional chunky bits...




and loads of overgrowth and briers and kick-in-the-dick surprise climbs.



But eventually we top out and it's all good from there.





Well... except for the bear cub Lee rides up on while going down Heartbreak.  He's excited to finally see a bear in the woods.  The bear was excited to finally see a Lee in the woods.

Anyways, fumble fart through all the rock piles on Heartbreak and then make our way back towards the lodge...

And I bring up being sad about missing out on Dog Graveyard/Tillman the day before, and we decide to ride up one more thing to ride down one more thing before calling it a day.

"NEVER KNEW HE WAS A DOG NEVER CARED"

Rolling back into the happy place...




Doing what I do, taking care of all business for letting myself go full-pleasure.  Washing my bike before even taking off my helmet.

Steph hiked... eleven miles?  Ummm...  unnnh... ouch.


The ladies seemed stoked to get something like a billion feet of descending with only having to climb something like 1,300 feet for the day.

I'd suggested that Kürdt ride from the lodge to the top of Reddish... and he looked at the ride... mmmmmmm... ummmm... and then he just did it.  Said he'd never gone that fast down something on a road bike

BTW: His bike is an old steel frame built the same year that I was born ('69).

So more hang outs, food, beer, regaling... and then I look around and there's only about four idiots still up and I mention that mebbe we stop being dumb and go to bed like the non-idiots did hours ago.

So we do.

Shuttle/Reddish Ride images: Courtney

Deathstar/Hone Ridge images: Dicky

Arrival/Hangout images: Nik

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Dicky, subject change. Gear ratio for SSWC??
I’ve got 32x19, don’t know how much climbing and haven’t factured in beer.
Cheers

dicky said...

I was just gonna go with 32X19... but that's not saying I won't pack my 18 and 20.

That's mot saying I will either tho.