schnauzers.ws

Hauling the camper to the Arkansas River headwaters.  A bastion of recreational goodness in the heart of Colorado.  A mere three hours from the hot and smokey air of the Front Range to the sound of the rushing river and unique community that is Salida.  A very livable community at the base of several 14,000′ mountains.  I camped, I ate, I fished, I drank beer, but the best part of it all, was riding the Monarch Crest trail.

I guess my goal in going it alone, wasn’t to score any brownie points.  When I am alone, that usually means the horse blinders are on.  Not this time.  I got thrust into the limelight as soon as I registered for the campsite.  Do I give off some kind of computer geek aura?

“Do you want wireless access?”, the clerk said.

Sure.

“Do you know how to enter the password?”, she quipped again.

Sure.

“Do you know how to fix a computer, because I can’t get one of our seasonal retirees laptop to work”.

Huh? Now why do you think that? Let me see. Um, you have to push the button to turn the wireless card on.

Ding ding.  Score a karma point.  The first of a few, I hope.

Saturday morning I ponied up my $20 for the shuttle ride to Monarch Pass.  This was the sky that greeted me at the top.  A sight that would not change throughout the five hours and thirty two some odd miles of the ride.  I had thoughts of completing this in three, but who was I kidding?  Monarch Crest, Silver Creek, and the new to me, Rainbow Trail (it’s always been sketchy weather every other time I had gotten to that point before).

(continue reading…)

So there I was in sunny California, only it wasn’t so sunny this day. In fact, it was kind of misty as I watch the tri-Athlon people riding up and down the highway as I attempted to find some kind of truck trail. After driving forever at ten miles an hour, I was intent on not letting the series of unfortunate events effect my birthday. A little quick search of the iPad and I found another trail nearby. There all crapshoots, so why not pick one.

I landed at Whiting Ranch, smack dab in the middle of OC stip mall central. What could possible go wrong? I paid my three dollar parking extortion, though most seem to avoid it by parking in front of Starbucks.

A quick check of the back and the slod began. Lots of soft beach sand rapidly getting me nowhere until I got to the top. There I was greeted by many friendly mountain bikes who all seemed to be huffing and puffing about the long climb up. Maybe if was some kind of weight loss class, but they all seemed pretty tired. I inquired about a loop and the all had a look of death in their eyes. “Uh, you’ll have to climb all the way up that trail”. You mean the one that goes for about a mile at a 5% grade? “Yeah, that one.” UYh, OK, I’ll see you guys at the bottom.

So for each part of double track blech, there was a nice piece of singletrack. Bottom line is I enjoyed the ride, nice people, nice scenery, and plenty of cheap eats after.

Enjoy the video.

It took me a while to finish this video. This was a trail that many years ago scared the crap out of me. Funny how things change over time.