Friday Snout, Out and About; Snout wrong with it

Couple days at Waikawa, hauled the fatty out of the car and rode out the snout and about.  Rode the road from the bach, past the boat ramp, beach, down a cul-de-sac across a bridge past the marina and onto the Waikawa-Picton cycle path, peeling off up a zig zaggy climbing trail (Sue's?) up onto the ridge, then onto the Kanuka trail along the side, chasing a ferry for a bit, out all the way to the end of the Snout.  A few tourists in residence, I took in the view and got back on the bike.

Back from there, meeting a son then dad on their way down, back around Kanuka and then left into the horridly steep Lions Centennial trail (didn't remember it being so steep last time), climbing up onto the tops of the hills down and up and over and down.  Finished the fun by sliding into the GDS trail for a fun wee bomb down some rooty tech back to the cycle path, and back the way I'd come.

15 kms round trip, with 530 m climbed.  Not bad.

Rides Three: 27th, 30th and 2nd of the Nu Yeah

So, yeah, Picton for Xmas. After my ride (previous post) with fam and O, I did 3 more: 

first one a solo.  I headed down through town and explored up the trail I'd wanted to the first ride, Marina to Reservoir track, climbed up this to the reservoir, turned around back down, down the zig-zag track we'd previously climbed, quite good in places, so surprising amount of climbs too, turned around back up that, then down the way I'd climbed, and back to base.  Short and sweet - 8kms, 160m climbed.

Second one, a big family all started on out to do the Link Pathway.  Joy and Jerence headed out ages before us, as usual the 'other' teenagers took forever to organise themselves.  So, G, Ph, H, T, O and Soph and me all headed out, straight down across to the start and climbing.  Ph and Gryph never have been much of cyclists, so Ph was really struggling and before we even made the look out she'd bailed out.  The trail starts just after the look out properly, and is quite nice.  Descends and climbs around and drops into Shakespeare Bay then into some nice patches of bush all along.  Gryph bailed along here, threw a hissy and pissed off.  Then H was struggling and whinging, and we heard from Joy and they were only a km or so ahead so they waited for us where this section hits the road.  T and H decided to head back from here.  J and J decided to take the road to Ngakuta and get Anth to come get them, and O and S continued with me.  A good climb ensued and eventually we were up the top and sidling, descending, climbing, sidling through very nice trail and very nice country.  Hot too.  Fun descent down to Ngakuta where we found J and J.  Anth turned up shortly thereafter and the kids joined the oldies in getting a lift back, while I turned around and headed back the way we'd come, finally riding solo.  Great ride back, going a good pace and arriving back within minutes of the camper full of the others.  They actually couldnt believe I'd got back so quick.  A grand total of 24 kms (mmr was started late) and about 860 climbed (started mmr at 50m).

Then, on the 2nd of the year, O had hurt his back somehow, so Sophie and me headed out for a ride.  Rode down to Marina, up the Reservoir track along the Ridgeline, Western, then up Lion Centennial, quite a slog this direction, but not bad, nice views from the top, then down the switchbacks to Kanuka which was awesome in this direction, and back along Kanuka was also good in this direction, then along the ridge back towards the road, but dropping into Sues track thinking it would be mostly down, but finding a 3rd of the way into it it climbs back up across the hill, ugh, steep too.  Eventually down again and we're out on the Waikawa-Picton track, which then climbed again! quite a bit around and finally down across and down again to the Marina...  A fun 15.1 kms with 376 m climbed.

Wednesday Picking Up Picton.

Family and Lynne out for a ride before the rain was to start this morning. Rode into town, over the coathanger and around to the start of the trails.  I stopped along the marina to check Trailforks and they call got ahead of me so when I finally caught them up they were well on their way around the bottom of the hill on the trail heading for Waikawa, whereas I would have preferred to have led up the climb to the left, which they'd missed...  So, anyway, we ended up where the road heads up onto the Snout Ridge and the zig zag climbing track started so off up that we headed.  Was a nice climb with one or two downwards bits and plenty of switchbacks.  Right at T's level said she.  Lynne was struggling with her knees, while Otis just jetted ahead.  

Eventually we made the reservoir tank and from here headed up Ridgeline track.  Lynne took the road and H bailed out to the road halfway along.  At the end of the road (where it heads down again) T, H and Lynne bailed out, while O and me took Western track along to Kanuka, then continued along this, which was pretty good this direction, til we got to the zig zag climb (Lion's) up to the top.  Reasonable climb, good views at the top.  Into the Lion's Centennial down back towards town, not bad, some switchback sections that don't flow as well as they could.  You can never really get massive speed up anywhere, but nice riding, and nice environs.  Back down onto Western and not as good in this direction, more climbing grunts.  Out across to Ridgeline again, good in this direction too, then eventually we hit down Leicester Track, which is somewhere I may once have ridden in the vicinity, or bits thereof, a lonnnng time ago - tho maybe The Doctor track is more in keeping with that?  Anyway, lots of interesting corners, but still not enough flow.  And back along the Waikawa Picton track back to the Coathanger and back up through town.

A worthy 17 kms, with 380 m climbed.