Thursday Evening Croc of Climbing

Buncha ups and downs out in Halswell tonight. In from the carpark, meandering around all the new-path-fenced-off areas, up to the trees to the start of the trails.  Straight into Download, and up C2, chuffing alllllll the way up to Siberia and over, then back down the lot, across to the right following a family of big cattle beasties and dropped into Off the Cuff, up Upper Crust, down Murph's, back up the OG Croc -v stepper than I remembered it, down Spurious, back up C2 and down Mish Mash... Shitloads of other riders around and everyone seemed to be faster than me going up. 😩

Less than 10kms and only 289 climbed (tho I calculate 360m...), which seems a bit of a rip off, considering.  I gotta ride more.

Sunday, Uplifted Park and Kennedy's Victorious

With Higgs again, in training for the Paparoa in a month's time.  Up from home, through towards skidder and hung the right down the swoop-de-swoop, down road, across and into the 'new' entrance to the Park.  Plop blop down there and H was keen on Askins again, so in we bombed.  Pulled over a couple of times to either have a breather or let some grom past, then out down the bottom.  Onto the lift and whooshed to the top.  Down Summit Connector, and we pulled out onto the Summit Rd, riding up around and over to the top of Kennedy's.  

Fast bumpy run down this, H was glad we hadn't climbed it, which was my original plan.  Down through the croc zone, staying on the C2 side, we dived into Mish Mash, which had a few surprises - fun for me, less so for him.  Out the quarry park and onto the road, climbing, descending, climbing and descending the small humps around.  

Along the straight of Cashmere Rd H decided he didnt want to race into the park to beat the 4 oclock closing so he bailed with my bus card for the bus and I hauled arse up through into the Park again (took 10 minutes) and uplifted to the top again.  Summit Connector, down onto the lower Nun, bombing through this, a bit drier than it was last week, then at Kiwi climbed up the road and into top of Vic.  Nice jumpies then down rabbit into rockgarden, gums, over 19th, down road, into 235, fucky as muck in the usual spots, and then climbed back up to bottom of Dog Park and bombed down behind the houses, home.

Blustery 28.9 kms with 1223 m ascended. (two uplifts = ~800m, meaning just over 420 climbed myself).

Tuesday Afternoon End of Holidaze Halswell that Ends Well

Up and down a few times in Halswell.

A couple of girls in the carpark getting ready to ride and leaving before me that I proceeded to encounter multiple times throughout the ride.  Caught them up top of the dog park and I dropped straight into Download, then climbed up C2,  Dropped into Murph's, quite enjoying the flowy descent.  Around and into Upper Crust, a much better climb in my mind than C2.

At the top of this I caught up to the girls again, and headed up the Croc ahead of them, spotting them dropping behind me as I climbed.  Straight into the Low Rd, then through the gate and a drop over through Siberia (new lines...).  Stopped at the Kennedy's gate for a bit to wait for a runner to pass so I could have a much needed leak.  Then back up the 4wd track, to the gate, whereupon the girls were coming up Low Rd.

I dropped into descending trail.  I like how all the tracks are one-way now.  Makes for a better 'less conflict' ride.  Into the Croc proper, swoopy swoopy, and then into Deviation up slightly across then back and forth and whoopdedoo down to the junction.  Dropped into Spurious for a nice couple of technical hardware features, dropping all the way down to Upper Crust.  Clambering up here again, where I encountered a young guy on a 'leckie (grrrrr, lazy f'ck'n f'ck, grrmble).

I bombed down the top half of C2, testing the new bypass down in here, then, scattering a few walkers, dropped into Mish-Mash at a cracking pace, sliding in the dust, then getting confused a little by the drop-overs near the bottom, dropped, jumped, then left, and right, I hit Upload, steep wee grunter (from the top, spotting the two girls again in the valley below), then I climbed up the steep wee grunty corners in the start of the OG Crocodile and on up to the Coopers/Spurious/Deviation junction.

Here, the young 'leckie guy rolls through into Spurious so I follow and he drops over to Upper Crust to power lazily up, while I muddled about then headed up the entrance of C2 and out down through the dog park, finding the two girls at their car.

Effectively an hour's ride, with a surprisingly peasly little 287 m climbed in a subordinate 9.7 kms...

Sunday Solo Mucky Crock

Dropped H off to a birthday party and sleepover and headed to Halswell Quarry car park.

Headed up the valley and up onto C2, via the Download.  Clamber clamber up through the trees, through the cattle stop into instant cattleshit.  Avoiding the worst of it and then watching out for big cow-apples (and pancakes) on up Crocodile, ever climbing.  Top of the road, and into the Low Road, bit of mucky flat bits to avoid, bailing out to the road at the lying down squared-off lampost.  Up this last steep and over the gate into Siberia, finding a few wet puddles, but the rest of it nice.  Bombed through the bends and down the last bit to the bottom.  Decided here to try the new ziggy climb, Anne's Ascent or something, and gave up on it through sheer boredom after a few bends, bailing out to the main track and just powering up that instead of 20 times the distance going back and forth.

From the gate, headed down the singletrack, actually a really good run, until a jump that threw me off towards the bank, I just managed to pull it back under control before landing and landed awkwardly, kinda tweaking my back.  Carried on down and then into the Crock.  Stopped here for a moment, maybe a text?  Then got going again, on down, pulling up left to C2 and straight into Murph's, bombing down this, lots of fun, then tootled through the mucky bottomlands and climbed up Upload, then into the Crocodile climb, clambering up this to the top and taking the Bypass track to the bridge in the valleybottom, and left up Gorge Rd, meandering up the valley til I found a midlevel track leading back down valley.

Down this, joined into one of the switchbacks on the Crock, climbed up from here to C2 and headed Murph's again, enjoying it just as much if not more than the first.  At the mucky bottomlands again, I hung a right this time and around and up Upper Crust, which climbs from the jumps up through Murphs (near the top), topping out on C2.  Headed down this to the wee bridge, and followed (pushing bike on back wheel), a track up the valley there, to see what I would see.  Turned back from the top and rode and scooted down through the tech and long grass back to the trail.  Then I took the downhill track (Mish-Mash) that starts just there, and bombed that down into the valley again, basically at the end of Murphs.

Around the muckybottomlands again and back up C2, to the wee dh track again, down it but slightly different line out onto hairpin of C2, back onto it and out the bottom again, this time to ride out the old entrance, and back down to the car, done.

Only 11.5kms, with 323m climbed.