Tuesday spectacular evening, Capt Thom Godley Taylors.

finally got out of the house and over to pick up Nelson. We were supposed to meet the boys in Sumner at 6.15, but was only just collecting Nelson then, so rang and told them to leave without us and we'd see them if we caught them. Got out to Sumner after 6.30, hit Captain Thomas, rocking up it, me blowing near the top, fighting to not puke. Still, made it up before 7. The boys were waiting (hadnt been there long) for us at top, and we continued the rest of the ride with them...

exhausted, blew the first rocky bits of godley trail, but rocked the rest of it. excellent descending to first col, me tight on Nelson's tail, not giving him any leeway, and Pete fast catching me and sitting on mine, clatter clatter. put a bit more distance between us on the descent into Breeze Col tho. then down Anaconda, Pete first, then nelson, then me, and andrew steve and tony following. managed to keep ahead of Andrew and even managed to gain on nelson nearer the bottom... still not used to that final corner, and still not used to 'the tail' down to the end.

tried a new zigzag from carpark up to first road hairpin, not good. showed nelson the Sumnervale track, which we're still to explore, and had an excellent flight down through Nicholson Park and down scarborough. back to DotCom just after 8 or so

Sunny Easterly Sunday Arvo

My parents dropped in, so i grabbed a lift up to their place sunday afternoon 4.30-5ish. biked from there, up through Vic Park, dropped down to Old Dyers Pass Rd Trail, and on the big corner, decided to explore down a 4wd track that heads west. fun wee hoof down that to the end where lies a mattress, a dead bmx and a dead scooter, as well as someone's illegal dump zone... grannied back up out of it back onto the main track (the trees in that wee valley are plenty open now, so some sneaky trails in there might be the go...). on up old dyers, bit of air in the back tire, 5 or so riders coming down, to kiwi, then up road to top of Worsley's, over marleys and down Flying Nun, nice wee new side line been build off just at the top of where it becomes 4wd track half way down, then on below the road fun fun fun. crossed pass below Kiwi, headed up summit rd to upper thomson's, then round summit trail, into the cold cold easterly. bumped into James (angrywadder) just before the Lava Flow, stopped and chatted a bit, then continued round and bombed it down to Rapaki, then bombed it down there. home 6.30-45ish i guess, battling the wind all up Wilson's Nursery and Stanmore Rds...

thursnite rapaki witch vernon old skool...

shortish ride last night. nice to finally get out with the lads again. Nelson andrew tony wayne steve and me left steve's bout 6.15. nelson on his single. cruised up rapaki. bumped into James (angrywad ) on rapaki, and at the top was jeff and roly. nelson and me and them hoofed it round witch hill single and back, then chased steve et al up vernon singletrack. met up with them at the road crossing. huge group of riders were riding at same time, saw them on rapaki a couple times and at the top and along single and where steve etal were waiting. we took off ahead of them, and hung a right down old skool. somehow wayne missed the turnoff and continued, which made andrew go look for him, he didnt find him. meanwhile, i'd bombed down oldskool to the first gate, stopped to see if others were following, they never showed. was about to head back up when i heard a funny voice behind me, which turned out to be my phone (otis saying "doctor foster went to gloucester in the pouring rain, stepped into a puddle right up to his muddle and never went there again")... steve. so, i rode back up to him and nelson. then we decided wayne could find his own way down, and we bombed it. nice trip down the rocky bits, then singletrack beautiful flow. one gorse bush got me bad in the knuckles, yowch! tony flatted near the bottom, then while we were waiting with him Wayne showed up, had realised well round the traverse, and turned back and come down Old Skool... rode home as dark was falling, flashies on.

PFMTBC Inc, WELLINGTON, 2007. junglevision

Mark Hubby, Tony Andrew Steve Pete Nelson and me flew up friday, 12.15 - van, covered trailer, motel downtown with mt vic just up the road. so, put bikes together and headed up Vic. found our way to the top, got a tip from some local riders and started to explore down round singletracks. if you got to know these they'd be a fun wee blast but searching our way round we will have missed out on lots of nice stuff, plus, it'd be raining all week so the tracks were all mucky mucky and rooty slippery...

Saturday, Drove to Makara. Tucked into Koru (gentle and nice), bit of a play in the skills area, then up Sally Ally (cruisy), Missing Link (cool), where i started to hear my pedal doing the crunchy thing. continued grinding up Aratihi eventually stopping nearing the top to decide that it was poked and i's gonna have to give up on it. so, walked up to the top of the peak, howling wind, and we tookoff down the 4wd track to the lower Ridgeline trail, and into Swigg (towards the end of Andrew crashed right behind me (i heard a swish, whump) garking his knee) and starfish (upon which Hubby dismounted right in front of me, garking his shin on this wooden bridge), and me not really enjoying myself much cos of the pedal concern. headed for town to get the fix for the pedal. Mudcycles, no rebuild kit. On ya Bike, no rebuild kit. Penny's... yep. so, got to work trying to get the outer bearing race from the pedal. it proved impossible so i gave the rebuild kit back and got me some Shimanos. much better. So, that afternoon we went back to Makara, and rode to the top of Sally Alley, then up the 4wd track to the peak, then down Aratihi to Leaping Lizard and all the way down that out to the end. Wicked descent, sketchy, techy, rocky. through the stream at the end, and back up the road to the car.

Sunday. parked-up in the Karori Sanctuary carpark. headed down to creek and began walking up the switchback trail to the fenceline, up the fence track to scoutden, then up to top of wrights hill. riding and walking. riding at the top. a chance meeting with a guy Nick who i somehow knew (we'd ridden somewhere sometime) convinced us we needed to do Deliverance and Salvation. so, down deliverance, proving too techy for some, relished by others, then lovely pedal back up salvation, and back to the fenceline track. i was the only one to ride up the grunty steep to the top, then me and nelson got talking to some other locals who suggested Carparts. the others had continued on ahead and didnt bother to wait, so missed out on what i would say is one of the best little sections of singletrack around. starting from the windturbine carpark, it goes not that far below the road for a while... twisty, fun. then crossed the road and back onto the fenceline track, which diverged at that point and had a jumpy section next to it all the way down, then a couple of weird downs and ups and then into a little singletrack section which ended up on the concreted switchbacky stepped in places walking trakc back down to the carpark.
later on, Mark, Nelson and me, went back to the sanctuary carpark, and rode/walked up again. over and down Salvation, back up it, and back down to sanctuary... nuts. down salvation was fantastic. slogging back up it wasnt so bad, down the top section to the scout den was cool, and so was the fenceline, but once it enters the tight ass trees again, yowch, i just lost my flow and had to dab around nearly every hairpin. then one last little climb to the van.

Monday, we headed back to Makara. barely anything left in the legs. rode round to and up Salvation (again) just cos it is so nice, to carpark, then back down we went (mark took Deliverance), awesome descent, pete filming it, then back into the park, huffed up Koru, messed about in skills, on up sally alley, Tony Andrew Steve and Pete all deciding to bail and just do the lower ridgeline etc etc down (then on into town on their bikes), Nelson Mark Hubby and me continuing to missing link, then up 4wd road, into a gale, then down aratihi, upper leaping lizard, Nikau, upon which i crashed, let it go a bit trying to go faster and just lost the frontwheel and over i went onto some rocks, jumped straight back on, hammered, and on up to missinglink. bit of a break there and a local guy (on a Switchback!) showed up. ended up seeing him over and over again, whenever he caught us up stopped, wondering which way to go, kinda..., anyway, up missinglink back to sally alley, blasted down it to the swigg/starfish intersection, down to magic carpet ride, then down livewires and back to van. hussin' it down livewires nearly caught me out too, i was so exhausted i was starting to make mistakes, and i was just about over the bars into a tree, dunno how i saved it... cleaned the stream crossing tho.

Saturday Climby Solo.

Got my jobs done (painting deck, vege shop and bikeride with Otis - Tagalong Spencerpark loop) so was allowed out for an afternoon ride. Drove across and parked bottom of Rapaki/Vernon Tce. Realised as soon as i set off that my (new) rear tire was a bit low in the air department and that i'd left my pump at home...(d'oh!), and how heavy and hard work the Nevegal is to push along... still, climbed farm track, middle ring to first gate, then granny 2nd/3rd rest of way. hit the road, turned right, up to top of Huntsbury track - spotted a guy on a white bike, white rims, white fork, looked like a Cycleway sign on the hillside, asked him if i could borrow his pump, put more air in my back tire... then i got onto Vernon singletrack, back towards Rapaki. Blitzed it, new tires gripping nice, me getting some good flow on and going really fast on the fast bits. past all the riders stopped at top of rapaki, on round the witch hill singletrack, up road to Castle Rock, beautiful flow on down to Bridle Path where i stopped for a OneSquareMeal bar. while sitting there, 4 supermotard style big bikes came FLYING round the summit road, one pulling a huge wheely as they passed the top of Bridle, nice.

Headed back up Castle Rock track, cleaning all but a small spin out just near the top, then onwards down summit road back to Witch Hill, past rapaki and all the bikers stopped there, up vernon single track, deciding to bail to the road at top of Farm Track, road to Huntsbury, round summit traverse to Old Skool Bowenvale descent, blitzed and cleaned all, tires gripping a beaut. then onto the newly made section at the bottom, which will (when finished) be pretty cool. then back round bottom of hill to car. beautiful day too.
Sunday, Otis and me tagalonged to Andrew's place and back... quite a number of kms for a wee fella, and he did really well. howling norwester, heavy headwind home.

bottled

too wet to hit the hills, cos of heaps of rain over previous 12 hours, so a quick spin round bottle lake last night with nelson, on the singlespeeds.
pretty un eventful spin. The odd small rabbit about. from main entrance we turned right, took the southern loop, then in after the landfill, up the middle all the way up to Spencerpark, then back to main carpark. surf was noisy, popped out to beach for a look. trails were wet, and any new teddington chip layed was soggy... all in all, not too bad a spin. cold in the open low bits, mild in the trees...

Moony Thursday Sunny Sunday

Thursday night, drove over to Nelson's, we hit the road, him on the single, me on the newly transformed 18 geared bike. was good cos i kept up with him all the way up rapaki. wicked full moon, no lights required. then we stuck to the road round to where the single crosses it, then we thought we'd mix it up a bit and headed up into Scotts Reserve. MINT singletrack to be had, with a gentle climb into the macrocarpas then a techy wee descent to the first wee saddle. then into the next section of reserve (all crater rim 'walk'way), walked up the first switchbacks then rode onwards, more techy descending. fun. then onto the summit trail round below Sugarloaf, then down through gums, top of cool runnings, too greasy to ride first section past the wooden dropjump, then down and through and out funstyle. me leading all the way cos my bike handles better than nelson's singlespeed.

Sunday. daylight savings morning. rode to Tony's for a 9.30 meet. matt arrived by car, steve and wayne arrived by bike. toodled off to Worsley's. good ride up, middle ring the whole way to the body bag. watched some 4x4s go up the bodybag, then tackled it ourselves. i blew it right near the top, but then managed to get going again and cleaned it out... then over marleys, to kiwi, fanging it, then up thomsons, round summit, lotsa oncoming traffic, then down old skool bowenvale, cleaned all the offpiste lines, but blew the second to last rocksection, got re-started and cleaned up the rest. nice. then swung by Steve's and grabbed a nevegal for the front, which i'll match with the new Maxxis Advantage i'm getting this week for new rubber side down.