Doppler Ride

Saturday, 10 November 2007

The blue sky of yesterday afternoon continued into Saturday. Ckucke called me to say that Jeff had called him and said Atomman got rained on in Waimanalo on his road ride in the morning. Also citing Doppler radar information indicating continued rain in the area, Jeff, Sara, and Chris were opting out. I went outside and it was indeed overcast over the Pali area, even though a bright noontime sun hung in the cloud-spotted sky above Kaneohe. Ckucke and I agreed to give it a chance and hit the trails.

It was heavily overcast over Waimanalo, but it turned out to be a good decision to ride that day. The ground was dry but most importantly, not dusty. The heavy rains the weekend before had either washed loose material away or turned it to mud that solidified as it dried out during the week. There were no signs of recent rain, nor were there portents of rain to come. Ckucke pulled into the parking area, with JT carpooling. The three of us climbed up Government Road to the turnaround at the Demonstration Trail trailhead. A pair of off-road pedestrians, one with a baby-carrier chest-rig, came down from the turnaround. They had gone to the golf course along the continuation of Government Road. I continued along a ways, looking for the upper entrance of the ridge trail that intersects the upper traverse. We had seen it when we rode here the last time. I found something that looked like it could be it, but turned around and went back down the road to the switchback where JT and Ckucke were waiting.

We descended the road and dropped in at the upper traverse. Riding to the end, I briefly explored up the ridge trail. It appeared that it did lead up to where I thought it did, but it was grown-in and difficult going. We descended the lower extent of the ridge trail to the lower traverse and explored more to the right. It appeared that someone had been working there as evidenced by more orange ribbons and the removal of the big log that had blocked the way the last time I went that way. The trail eventually became indistinct and we turned around. We rode back along the lower traverse past the ridge trail junction and worked around the valley to the Government Road instead of doing the descent and difficult climb out of the valley bowl.

Climbing briefly up to the Ditch Trail, we rode out along it with the intent of going all the way to the second junction and backtracking along the inner loop. Near the first junction, JT had a “Chris episode” where he stopped and suddenly started stripping – He felt like a bee or something similar had found its way into his jersey. Reaching the second junction, we climbed up the heinous singletrack through the Formosan Koa forest. Entering the inner loop traverse after a bar break, we found a lot of deadfall and debris, indicating that the inner loop hadn’t been used in a while. The rock garden looked like pigs had been rooting around recently. Some of the new narrower sections through the saplings were indistinct from the debris. Rejoining the Ditch Trail, we returned to the Government Road and the parking area. Moments after we got back to the cars, a dude on a hardtail Trek came out of the trail. He asked us directions back to Kailua and we sent him on his way. He had only one water bottle and had done the entirety of Demonstration Trail! I had pounded a Camelbak bottle of Amino Vital before the ride, and downed a full bike bottle of Cytomax and nearly emptied the 2-liters in my hydration reservoir during our short ride.