Wednesday Night Pack Horsing Around

T dropped O to me at work, and we met Nelson below his place (after parking and changing above).  Over the hill and parked up on Gebbies. Nearly 2 years since last we rode it... and 3.5 years since O rode it aged 10...

Headed in on the road, bit of a cooool easterly blowing across.  Onto the singletrack and when it turned downwards, the overgrowth of gorse and blackberry annoyed O a bit.  Into the forest, and it was pretty dim, nice bomb down over all the roots, barbed-wire skimming along next to us near the bottom, then the clamber climb up to the stile.  Up the paddock, O doing well to keep up, over the top and over the next stile.  Quick bomb down and into the forest to meet Hazard tape blocking our way.  Detour painted arrows and markings we followed, back out of the forest and up a steep skidder track which Nelson rode all of, of course, and O and me walked and intermittently rode.  At the top, we met destruction.  The view across towards that wee bach that's in there was carnage, and machinery, and churned up ground and stacked logs...  We rode across towards the bach to find the old track, following it in part, then having to push up through slash to get to where we could see the trail heading into the forest again.  Rode up this til we passed through plastic tape again, and were at the steep switchback section.  On up to the fenceline from here was still nice trail (albeit steeeep).  Over the stile and the fun climbing tech with exposure began.  Nice cruise up through the dykes and on round to the hut.  Looked pretty full, of 'troubled' youth, maybe.  Said gudday to the ones that came out to stare at us, but they weren't exactly engaging...

Into the down, nice cruisey roll down, keeping on top of the technicalities.  Starting to get pretty dim, and was darker still under the trees.  We managed the descent, super fun, without lights, and took the new exit out of the forest avoiding the hackage beyond the tapes.  Out onto a smooth-as forestry road, which descended fast for a while, then climbed again.  At the top, instead of going down the way we'd climbed, we rolled over and down slashed ground to the old trail in the last of the trees (before the fence and still standing forest.  Lights on, and got rolling, only to be stopped by piles of slash that we clambered through to get to the douglas fir descent.  O's light crapped out within 5 mins, so he had to place him between us, and he struggled the rest of the way out.  Short descent to the road, climbed this, over the stile, bit of climb then down the paddock, quite dark now, O struggling a bit with the lack of seeing.  Over the stile, and down the side of the rootsy barbed wire descent, then climbing, pushing a lot, out of the trees, into the the last single to stile, road, O stayed on this, while Nelson and me hit down the wee singletrack below the road...

A pretty average 12.14 kms, with 472 m clambered.