The blue-tinted grey sky stretched cloudless above the sprawling loose canopy of the albizia tree expanding above me. The muffled clicks of the DT hub grew slower and slower, drawing to a halting stop with one final delayed tick, like the heartbeat of a dying organism. Around me, the disturbed grass and shrubs settled back to their resting state as the dust settled. The sun cast dancing beams of light through the thickly hazy air below the swaying treetop like something out of a renaissance biblical painting. Was I dead? Had I passed into the next world and was being drawn toward the light?
No.
Two roots just conspired me to break free from the tenuous state of uprightness and give way to the forces of entropy and gravity that incessantly acted to bring me to a crashing halt. Considering the basic act of cycling in general, no less trail riding, it is actually quite amazing how rarely we go down with the myriad of factors that are working against us. The first tiny root gave my front tire a little bump just in time to break the bend in my elbows just as I was preloading to pop the front tire over the second, significant root. As I mistimed the pump, the bike rolled far enough that the first little root gave a bump under my rear tire at the precise moment my front tire hit the big, second root. Net effect – OTB. As I got up from the crumpled archaeopteryx pose from beneath the Ellsworth, I thought it actually might have made a funny picture. Chris offered to pile my bike back on top of me and take a shot, but the moment was gone and it was time to move on.
It was two weeks ago and the weather was epic, though heavily voggy from the Southeasterlies that had been bringing the stale haze from the Big Island. The lack of trades had however kept the incoming moisture laden air away, resulting in clear nights and low temperatures. The overnight cool persisted under the tree cover as we began our climb up Government Road. Everyone had bailed on the ride but us, so it was almost a given that we would make the most of it and do the complete circuit. We passed a friendly trail pedestrian who told us that there were two other bikes and two other pedestrians ahead. We thanked her and continued up the trail. No matter how interesting the conversation, I was suffering trying to maintain my breathing to not die while climbing while talking to Chris. We passed the downhill-bound hikers around the entrance to the side loop, but saw no bikes. While we were taking a bar break at the top, two riders came out of the boulder gate. We talked to them briefly before they headed off to explore more. They had recently moved to Kailua and were exploring the trail network (I’m guessing Marine officer). They had a really good attitude about it – ride around, get lost, backtrack.
Entering the boulder gate, we immediately came across a new blowdown. A workaround had been cut to bypass the fallen tree. Of course, Chris went one way, and I another. Pushing through under the fallen tree, Chris emerged covered in pokey “cow catcher” plants. We dropped through the perpetually slippery rock and red clay road cut and turned off onto the singletrack, climbing steeply to the top of the ridgeline. We kept a fast pace, even after all the sweeping descents, grinding up all the heinous, never-ending climbs until our lungs were bursting and legs were on fire. After reaching the road and climbing back up to Kalanianaole, we headed back to Waimanalo. We ended up just taking the highway back and not cutting through Norfolk. At the time, I wasn’t sure we would have adequate daylight nor muscle glycogen to complete the added distance. In retrospect, we probably had just enough time, as we ended up completing the circuit in two hours. The legs might not have made it though.
A few pictures here
D = 15.42 km (9.58-miles), Vavr = 12.2 km/h (7.6-mph), Vmax = 42.5 km/h (26.4-mph), T = 1-hour, 16-minutes (actual trail time about 2-hours)
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