before whitsundays...cleaned the bridlepath...

didnt get a chance to post this before heading off to the Whitsundays... nice break there, cept no riding to be had. only saw one good bike there the whole ten days, it was a S.Cruz superlight i think, obviously a tourist's. all the other bikes i saw were crappy warehouse type bikes - repco's, blade's etc cheap rubbish...

anyway, back on the 19th of May, i had to get Joy's jeep back after borrowing it previously, so, from her place, i rode up bridle path road, up a side track next to the gun club, which joined the Morgan's Valley track, under the gondola, then up the Bridle Path. my first time ever to actually clean it entirely. i stopped for a few rests, but i rode the whole thing. unbelieveable. then, i rode up the singletrack to Castle Rock,

from there headed above the road and down around to the left for a start, then up around to the right, above Cass Bay up to the Tors, on walking tracks, with a few steps, and mostly rideable. i didnt feel bad riding these because a) there was no one else on them, and b) if you saw the damage cattle have done to the trail, there's nothing a mountainbike is gonna do thats worse than that... startled some climbers hanging about below the tors as i descended very slowly lots of steps, a lot of which were unrideable, but with some practice might be.

then, poached the usual craterrim ahem walkway to witch hill, then onto legal summit trail to top of rapaki, and bombed down rapaki.
nice ride all up, nearly all singletrack off road. nice..

oh, i'd fixed my pedal before hand too. and i got my pedal back from whworralls for the singlespeed too.

Third time to Taylors in a week...

Quick ride last night. round to Pete's. matt, him and me drove out to Taylors, met up with Steve and Tony. grunted up Anaconda, out the trail below the road, i flew it, the wheel eater's been taken care of (in 5 days). then headed up the hill to the 'secret' trail. 2/3rds way up, my right hand pedal blew off. and the lock nut had unwound and the bearing was toasted, due to lateral load, blown into lots of little shards and bits... item #4 reasons not to have Crankbrothers pedals... anyway. fished the locknut out of the endcap, slid the pedal back on, did up the locknut and was able to pedal carefully, exerting pressure to keep the pedal pushed in towards the crank as much as possible. anyway, continued down 'secret' trail back to Breeze col. Steve and tony had ridden back round the lower singletrack rather than over the 'secret' trail, and due to pete, matt and my pedal delay, the others had ridden up some of the rest of the main trail, and were coming down towards us as we arrived. Steve had run over a rabbit. Tony's light was a very very dim orange... it was practically out by the time he got to us, and from then on he had to follow Steve down. so, not a huge ride at all. Fricking pedals... i'm untrusting of them all now. i'm always gonna be afraid that my mallets are gonna snap a spindle, and now this eggbeater issue. next one to go will be the left hand eggbeater spindle again, i bet.

Capt Thomas - Godley squared, Thursday AND Saturday

Thursday night, 6.30ish- Nelson picked me up and we vanned out to Slumner. Rode up Capt Thomas, cleaning way more than usual. Spotted some riders ahead, by the lights, nearly on them by Evans. Once there, they were down on the road, and we stopped for rest at top of Thomas. waited til they rolled off. gave them a bit of space and then headed out Godley after them. caught the first of them just past the first techy rocky section, and took the rest of them before the top of that first climbing section, before where it opens up. never saw them again. bombed the trails, which were in excellent condition and most fun. the descent to the first saddle was hairy, with contrast very difficult, due to rock, dirt and dust all being the same colour. good next climb and then a wicked blitz down to breeze col. next up, headed round singletrack below the road, to the godley carpark. first time we'd ridden that trail that direction for a long time, was sweet, cept for a hunka tunnel erosion that's blown out, i just spotted it in time, popped it, but nelson blazed through it. then up the hill back towards Breeze but left out to the walktrack. nearly all downhill, beautifully carved into the hill, cliffs below, view into lyttelton, awesome. back to breeze, then down Anaconda, flying, and then right, and around walk track to Boulder Bay and back, then back up out of taylors, down nicholson, to van.

Saturday, 9ish, round to petes, out to sumner again. parked up and stopped for coffee @ dotcom, cos tony'd forgotten his helmet and had gone from steve's to get it, meanwhile steve rode out and had time for a coffee too. once tony arrived we all hit capt thomas. tony had chain issues, ie, it broke. they repaired it, i tuned it or it would have broken again, and off we went. cleaned heaps again. then out godley, cleaned neeaarrlly all of the first techy section. blitzed the rest. bombed it all awesomely. running short on time cos of initial slowdowns, so headed straight down Anaconda. over scarborough, nicholson, popped some sweet air on the garage lips down from the lowest scarborough hairpin. back to dotcom, more coffeeeee...

d'oh, Happy birthday SWTCHBCKR

This blog is 2 years old as of the 5th of May. happy birthday my blog...

Thursday single, Sunday solo.

Thursday Night got out on the single, it'd been wet all week and i didnt have much time, so i just spun across town and blasted up rapaki, up summit road and down farm track. good spin. greasy and slow and careful down farmtrack. went off piste on lower section, followed some grassy sheep trails through the tussocks which was cool, but then found myself on a sheep highway, which was a rut and really really greasy, nearly lost the front end, saved it, kept going...

Sunday morning, on my own, with soundtrack of New Flesh, Distance, little bits of Pavement, Prefuse73 and Kitsune Maison, cruised across town, up Worsley's, over marleys to kiwi, back up road and down new Gov's Bay trail, not all the way down tho, back up it, which i walked a bit of, then back down to kiwi, up thomsons, down through vic, gums, all of Cool Runnings, usual out and down and through. home. excellent. beautiful warm day, tryed out my new NZo top with the trike. cooool.

mucky tuesday, broken pedal AGAIN

'sbeen wet most of the week. had to remain horizontal on sunday due to a world of beers on saturday,

so nelson picked me up last night in his truck, with singlespeeds we ventured to Bottle Lake, light spit from the sky... about 5 minutes in my fricking left hand pedal (mallet) BROKE AGAIN! so i limped back and we headed back to my place where i grabbed the geared switchback and changed shoes. he saw matt heading for the forest when we were driving home, and when we got back there, there was Pete and Graeme and Matt, so we had some more riding buddies... i stuck the geared machine into the 32:16 and stuck to it the whole way. little bit of chain suck, cos it was well mucky out there.

we rode right, to top of hill lookout thing, then back down that round the backside of the landfill, then back in to the pond/lake thing, then back on the normal trails round out to Spencerpark, and back through to Waitikiri. nelson had an amazing near crash just before s'park, he did an entire 180 no brakes no carnage... sounded like front wheel lost it, back wheel lost it more and spun right round in front of him... wicked tire marks on the trail. anyway, mucky and fun, cept for the fricking pedal... will change cleats on my old spec. shoes and put the old spd's on the singley