Thursday night, Muckvicars round 2

Bit of a muckfest once again tonight.  Nelson picked me up as per- on Moorhouse and we jammed across to Worsley's Rd, parking up top along with several other cars all turned up about the same time as us.  A dude (who works on the tracks in there) came down as we were readying ourselves, no lights, getting pretty dark.  Sounded pretty bleak up there.

BFe sporting it's new gears and brakes, we headed off up, my new 'granny' not so bad, but making a bit of noise once the going got tough.  Headed into the forest just up round the first couple corners.  We decided here the the noise required the spacers in the BB swapped around a bit to get the front ring over a bit.  Nothing to be done but ride, or walk to rest it.  Trees all cut and cleared, rode on up through the middle guts and out to the top of the cliff, then on up the original, all cleared and cut nicely. 

At the top we turned and headed down Tommy's.  Pretty slick, but not too bad.  Half way down we tucked right and back up onto the 'original', out to the cliff top and into Waynes World.  A couple of tipped trees, lifted root balls, made the usual entry cues different and we nearly missed it.  Anyway, good descent all the way down to Fight Club.  Most of the top of this was good to go, too.  We stopped and re-routed a bypass of a wet gulch, but then further down it just got slicker and sicker, greasing and squirrelling all the way.  Then, where it used to get steep and gnarly, it got horrendous.  no grip. tires totally caked, and then water running down the track, rutting it.  We stopped, found a grubber conveniently perched behind a tree, and proceeded to cut a drain across the track.  This should dry it out and un-rut it, until the first riders took it out.  Bottom few corners, for me, were totally unrideable and i walked on out the bottom into the total quagmire, tweaking my shoulder somehow in the process.

Climbing access track was okay, buncha trees down across it just through the gate where it gets steeper, these had been cut and a way cleared.  Further up, near where the old exit was, the crack turned gulch has become some major tunnel erosion, just about creating a neat wee natural arch bridge.  more trees across the track above here too, a way cleared.

At the junction we decided to head down and out, meandering around a bit between old and new, down past the tank and it's all opened up in there again.  Then we decided to find the new track i'd heard about (possibly across the other side?). Found it, followed it up, and up, and up, and eventually found the top, and where to access it from next time.  Then rode it down.  Some of the jumps would be fine, except for the hip jump over the fence - but in the grease and slick, I bypassed pretty much all of them.  Got to the bottom and followed the trail (singletrack on farm track) out and ended up right at the car.  Nice.  Done by 8.15,

Brakes, when i used them as opposed to the mud just slowing me down, were very sensitive - gonna be serious stoppers.  Major difference to the oldies.  Gear system?  once the BB spacers are moved, the grinding should lessen.  The shifting was crisp and clear and the ratios weren't that bad!