Saturday Family Slumnit Pico-tour

Family ride on Saturday. I was on the Troll. Paul on his roadie and T and H on their ebikes .. up from home, along Summit Rd to Sumner. Ice creams had, then home. I had a few mechanical issues - brake started rubbing, didnt have tools, borrowed one to adjust.  Then rear wheel slipped in dropouts and at Derek's I found out the thread in the nut was stripped...

Other than the breakage, a rather grand 38 km with 985 m climbed...

Tuesday Night Pleasantries and flats

Parked on Parkridge and we rode up Britten.  I felt full and hot and gasped for air.  Didn't help that Nelson was way faster, and we were talking a bunch...  Around the front and up to the cutting, across the road, over the fence and zig and zag through long grass up to some rocks overlooking Lyttelton where we watched a cruise ship depart as well as I layered off.  Riding again, couple more zigs and we were up to top of Mt Pleasant.  Nelson adjusted his brakes.  

Into the down, and the weed-eaten detritus was strewn all over the trail, hiding all the rocks.  Sketch.  I followed, then Nelson got gazumped by the same rock as another time, and I took the lead through the tussocks.  Nice flow.  Then into Greenwood.  Through the ruins, and into the rocks, I's tight on his tail then oh, flat, front tyre got lower and lower stopped and started to fix.  My glue was shit.  First patch came off.  After I'd put the tube back in.  Ugh.  Nelson's glue was new.  Got rolling again and had a good blast down Greenwood, except for him blowing it just after the Gulch.  Good rest of the way down.  Bony as fuck.

Up the Summit Rd.  Steady pace, nothing to report.  Stayed on the road, and into Britten.  Hmmm, my front's not feeling great.  I led on the stretch across the face (from the hairpin) and down the final rocks, by which time my bike was steering itself fatbike stylez, so reneged on riding Kenton's track down and riding back up to cars.  Bailed to cars.  

Verifiable 12.77 kms, with 544 m climbed

On the way home I picked up H's ebike from Joy's and as I couldn't fit both on the rack I chucked mine in the back of the car.  Halfway home the patch obviously gave it up, and a high pitched whistle filled the car for a few minutes.

Saturday Morning Out and Back

Bike service completed over last couple weeks, suspension, shifter cable (and derailleur).

Warm and sunny, up what felt early, had a coffee (no breakfast) and headed out, up through Vic, up through the usuals to the top, and popped around for the jumps then back up Worm and onto the Traverse for the slog across.  Lots of oncomers, most of whom I pulled over for (me being solo, them in groups, and giving me a rest before stuff).  Onto Vernon blast down around popped through cRapaki top and tech-climbed into Witch.  Feeling good right through.  Rest at highpoint (to let some walkers get further ahead), then caught them up just before the end.  Up the road, climb climb.  Chat to a couple of ladies at the top of Castle, then dived in.  Fun blast, lots of speed, bike feeling very good.  Hit the climb and cleaned nicely over to Bridle Path and it was time for the slog back.

Longish climb back up to Castle, then too many walkers on the Tors so I bombed down the road and onto the singletrack just above it in the next section.  Ugh, bad choice.  Totally overgrown, no view of trail in long grass, so hard to follow, balance, slow riding tech on unexpected rocks, and no speed to carry through any whoop-de-dos.  Out the end, into Witch, climbing to a nice rest, then bombing around to cRapaki top again.  Into the Vernon climb, and second hairpin there's 3 ebikes parked, one of the dudes lying on the ground with a very deformed ankle.  Ouch, I said.  On up and around, tiresome, but clean.  Over and down, across the road and straight into the Traverse for a good hoon back around here.  Into Vic, straight across into the jump, jump, seesaw, first bit of brakefree then out to the rabbit paddock, rocks, gums, zig and zag, a plant of some sort whipping me across my eyes (unprotected) and drawing a little blood.  On down, quite a few more low branches and angled trees though all this.  Out to 19th on the lower, then below road briefly to the corners.  Coast to carpark, into 235, lovely blast down here all the way to bottom and then road to driveway home.

Just shy of 20 kms, and just shy of 740 m climbed  

Saturday Paraparallelogrammetry

Evening before, T and me rode fatty and skinny down to the Excellent St Walkway for a look in the evening, and back... walked up the steps and back.

Last full day in the bay so I headed out for a solo at Para para... Parked, and rode up the road and into the DOC / Fairyland gravel road.  Gate open for a change.  I explored the first ridge detour, then continued on up to the highpoint seat (past my descender),

 then back down the road and into the descender.  Bombed down this, great run, 

then explored a few little side bits, then started around the pond, explored and downward trail (to private, turned back), and into the zig zag, but took a low line track which skirted all the way around the pond, then back into the zigzag up up up to the road, then up the road to the top entrance of this and down down down, then through the back track above the quarry, around the back and down, then down the main drag trails out with the final nasty wee peaky climb out to the road.  Bomb down this, then flat gravel back out to the car.

Fun wee 11.7 kms, with a valid 387 m climbed.

Golden Aorere-tunities.

Rode up the steep-arse street behind the Old Courthouse Cafe, across in front of the historic cemetery then down Excellent Street onto the main road for a bit then Plain Road. Gravel haul to the gold fields entrance then up to the farm, down through this then into the relentless climb into the goldfields.  Up for a long time, in vely slow low granny most of the time.  One or two really small downs, but always more up up up to the high point.  This was followed by a massively fast downhill through bush, then some short steep climbs and descents, then next high point, photo taken (same as last year)

Followed by lots of descent, through all sorts of terrain, gnarly babyhead rock gardens and slushy gravel and sand and all sorts.  fun.  Turn off to Druggans Dam, more ups, and downs, mucky bits, stream crossings and this climb.  

Then over and down to the Dam.  Rest in shade and then onto Water Race trail, in and out back and forth then past the caves and bombing down down down the trail, narrow, some bits super tech, some bits fast and rolly, down through the farm, out the gate and along the last section of road along to Devil's Boots still hauling ass.  Found family and friends post-swim hangin' in the camper. I grabbed a towel and wandered through to the river for a quick cooling swim of my own then it was bike on car and homeward bound.

Quite a butty 24 kms, with an acceptable 552 m climbed.

Odin's Day Redwood Mountain Master Beach Loop There and Back

Straight out of bed and onto the bikes, T and me rode into the wind down the beach to Milnthorpe Redwood track.  Parked the bikes and walked a loop nice loop, in the Redwood Trail, onto the Around the Mountain trail, left onto the Old Master trail, which took out through the middle of the swamp and out to the beach.  Walked up the beach back to the bikes and had a nice tail wind home.  

Nearly 7 kms, most of which was on the bikes.

Chooseday Fatster Beach Cruise

Good workout along the beach to Milnethorpe's redwood track. MMR only on for the return. (Forgot to turn it on till halfway along beach so thought better to record one-way (2.7 km, doubled to 5.42 km)

Rameka Tumeke

T and Phee dropped H and me at the high point (~5km in) on the Canaan Rd and we rode downhill from there, thru the Gathering site and onto Rollercoaster. He was a wreck because of a bad night's sleep in Mot and so hated any climbing. I enjoyed the chuff and grunt tho, through the groovy forest to the Harwood's Hole carpark and then the real climb began which he also hated.  We were overtaken by a young fella we'd seen who's parents had dropped him at Harwood's carpark, he was krankin'.  Then while we had a break at the entrance of the forest a couple of guys we'd passed in the car on the way in got to us.

Into the forest and lovely rooty trail that is the Rameka. Nice and dry (as it gets) with cornflakes all the way.  Was the driest I've ever seen it, but still had wet bits.  Creek crossings were all a bit more rideable than in the past.  Roots weren't slippery, which was good.  Fatty behaved wickedly, and Hugo certainly enjoyed it a lot more once we got to where it started heading down more.  

Speed hit here and we bombed.  A couple of new lines zigs and zags where it used to be the rutted guts.  We took another new easy one in the forest too, which was pretty cool.  Avoided where Wayno got the Dozer moniker.  Also seemed different in the gully before the rocky ledge, which also seemed more rideable with less walk on the worst rocky section.  The view from there.  

From here it was much longer than I remembered, bombing through to the official end of the trail.  Then into the Packtrack, which had more in it that I remembered too.  This was super fun.  And the tomo was further than I remembered too.  Missed the lowest section of the packtrack, taking the connector over the hill.  this has fast swoopy switchbacks and a couple of overhanging thistles were interesting.  One we both ducked for, it was at head height and would have really hurt.  The second got me good, right on the nipple.  Felt like it'd ripped it off.

Into Great Expectations, and we had a blast rolling down this, all the way.  Amazing where the water has sluiced one of the streams, cleared he vege completely.  Lot of fun back and forthing in here, into the conifer, into the regen, into the conifer, then regen the rest of the way.  Nice new bridge over the Rameka Stream and then into the Klicks.  These were fun.  both sections, then we popped out on the road lower down and there was T and Phee.  The went up the road to turn around and we got to do a couple more sectoins lower down, before meeting them again.

A muchly enjoyable 19.5 kms travelled, only 207 m gained, but a total of 950 descended.

Hot Friday Local

Back in town after no riding in the Bay due to the brakes being done on the Troll.  (have bought some xts for Troll tho!)   

Headed up from home, trying to stay in a bit of shade as much as possible, up the usuals through Vic, hot af up the grunter, then up through Thompson and Thomson.  Roll down through the Kiwi and up the Slummit Rd, up Worsley's Rd and into the Nun.  Stopped in the shade of the pine near the start to cool off a bit, then headed to the top.  Into it, and went to take that gnarly left hand line for the rocky corner, but damn thing was so overgrown eI had to go back onto the mainline.  It's had a bit of work done through it, so isnt quite as bony as it was.  Usual ways across the muppet highway and on down.  I spotted someone riding / walking up it a little lower down (below the road) and so stopped at a high point to wait for them.  First one up was a kid, "my brother had a crash"  I offered to ring for help etc but they were planning on walking all the way back up to the lift to take it down.  He was only a bit dusty and looked like his arm was well scraped up, but nothing broken.  I continued, bomb bomb bomb, up onto road again, and across the Kiwi and up summit to top of Vic.

Into Vic, down, around the nice jumpies, pop and pop, then haul up and over seesaw.  Hard right and nice gentle pedal up to top of Pedalfine where I rested in the shade of the trees and breeze.  Got going again, dropping down through the usual, and hauling left round.  First corner had a branch across it, so stopped and cleared that, then rolled on down, man it's loose, un-ridden and lots of leaf litter.  Onto the 4wd track, along and dropped into Razza's for a fun wee swoop down, then clambering back up, gasping, through Skidder for some water, and over to the left onto the continuation of the gums out to the 19th, then below the road down and off up, then onto the road, then into 235.  Good swoop through here, and grass cleared that was well overgrown last time.  Nice in the forest, bombing round the corners and leaping the jumps, then through the oaks and hung a right up to road, up road, dogcarpark and down the back of the houses, home. 

Nice wee loopy, 10kms, only 375m

Bike into the shop tomorrow, and Fatbike coming away with me to Collingwood.