Sunday, January 27

[JTyre]

Please let me know if you are riding tomorrow, and if you have any timing issues, dietary restrictions, and/or route suggestions.

If there are no takers, I'll be attending church and confessing last week's sins. Could be fun too.

[Rolf]

Can I get a Hell Yeah!?

Hell Yeah!!

[LouiseF]

Praise it!

[schouten]

I am in. I had grand plans to research and post a route to the trails in sooke. Any interest?

[Rolf]

I’m keen for new territory and adventure, Ron—especially where the innovation and creativity comes from the brain of another.

But I like to ride from home and wrap around 11. Would that still compute? Or would we have to drive to a meetup or something?

[schouten]

I'm out and about but will try to propose something that meets those parameters when I get home. Perhaps an earlier start will help.

[schouten]

My preference is to avoid car travel as well (don't want to deprive my wife of the car). It looks like a moderate pace could get us to Saseenos in 1.5 hours (maybe less). That means 3 hrs of commuting, plus trail riding time, which pushes us to at least 4 hours in the saddle. Given an 11:00am end time and coffee, we could potentially make this happen by leaving at 6:00am or 6:30am. Seems a but ambitions though. I'm open to other suggestions for sure.

Up Lochside and then snaking down through Hartland and Thetis with a 6:30am start could be good too. Might even be able to hit the Mckenzie Bight Trail.

Thoughts?

[LouiseF]

Ugh, Ron. If you get us starting at 6 am, you're buying coffee (and a chai latte). Sunday IS a day of rest.

So, will these trails be worth the 3 hrs of commuting time? Not sure what you have in mind but I expect that Rolf is using All Trails and Skitch as we speak to post some brilliantly sketched out trail plan. But aren't you the computer guy? Your suggestion is surprisingly lacking in technology. It's like I wrote it. I am okay with such plan though.

Riding Testament (never done it) and exploring those trails off Willis Point once it goes up (then down) from Ross Durance would be cool too. There is a trail off Durrance Road (not the one we climb to the highlands - the one off Wallace). We could explore that way and we could always come back through the dump, entering on Regional Trail at the McKenzie Bight parking lot. Lots of good, honest climbing and we could re-enact the Fondo and come down via Torpedo

And by Mckenzie Bight do you mean the straight up and down trail, or the rather pleasant one off Mark Lane?

We could meet at the Switch at 7 and still get an extra hour on our usual riding time. But I am willing to be like a salmon and go with the flow

[JTyre]

Switch Bridge at 7 am would work well for me. (I'm out tonight to some indeterminate time but likely late.) I've been curious about McKenzie Bight. For sure it's a down and then an up, but there is some business at the bottom off to the right that could be fun. I used to run there.

[Rolf]

I mapped out this one a while back. It incorporates some of the babble supra.

See you Switch at 7.

[schouten]

Rolf, that looks great. Shall we meet at 6:30 at OBH? Perhaps we can tack on the McKenzie Bight trail once we hit the northern tip of your route? According to Trail Forks it is a green trail with 192m of elevation.

We should have ample time to meet Louise at the switch bridge for 7:00am.

[LouiseF]

Okay. See you at the switch at 7.

I knew Rolf would come through with a visual and little babble (I'm feeling the irony here though).....we can continue negotiations at 0 700.

[Rolf]

Shall we meet at 6:30 at OBH?

How about 6:40 at Fort & Richmond? 20 mins should be enough..

In any event: Switch at 7.

[schouten]

Sold!

[tenmile]

Hope it was a good ride. I'm still without my CX bike as I await a replacement derailleur hanger. I think they dispatched it via canoe from China.

[schouten]

Great ride today. I'm completely tuckered out. Two beer recovery in effect.

[Rolf]

Another gooder! Despite some foam-rolling this afternoon, I feel like I've been trussed up and kicked off the back of a speeding pickup truck. It was beautiful but a bit gruelling behind Partridge Hills.

In 2:40 of moving time between leaving from and returning to Switch Bridge, we rode 42.7K, climbed about 800m, and only hit 8.1K of road*. Yes, 34.6K of gorgeous trails!

We also met a kindly dwarf in the woods who tried to pass off his Cram as Lembas—but it was still pretty damn tasty:



"Eat little at a time, and only at need. For these things are given to serve you when all else fails. The cakes will keep sweet for many many days, if they are unbroken and left in their leaf-wrappings, as we have brought them. One will keep a traveler on his feet for a day of long labour, even if he be one of the tall Men of Minas Tirith."
—The Fellowship of the Ring, "Farewell to Lorien"

*... nearly half of which was climbing the lovely goat trail that is Ross-Durrance!

[schouten]

Cram - I have been educated now.

[Greg F]

"Eat little at a time, and only at need. For these things are given to serve you when all else fails. The cakes will keep sweet for many many days, if they are unbroken and left in their leaf-wrappings, as we have brought them. One will keep a traveler on his feet for a day of long labour, even if he be one of the tall Men of Minas Tirith."
—The Fellowship of the Ring, "Farewell to Lorien"

And when those run out, you can always resort to:

[Rolf]

LOTR gifs have like a whole chapter of the innernet to themselves. I like this one a lot (though I'd add "...and women"):



Also: I'm not riding cross tomorrow, only Wednesday.