Meander

The last dirt ride of 2010!

Sunday, 05 December 2010

The weather on Sunday was too nice to not ride, so the few of us that were able to ride met out at the Ditch for a little exploration. I saw some new tracks when we were out there several weeks ago during the muddy weekend, so this was a good opportunity to do some exploring. For a while, I had been thinking that it would be nice to cut a gentle new fully-rideable switchback trail from the Ditch up to the plateau so we didn’t have to bust our nuts going up the cardiac climb. When I saw the lines in the rain, I figured someone had beat me to the punch.

We started the ride with an easy circuit of the side loop, then we went out along the Ditch to the end. There were surprisingly few people out on the trail considering the epically beautiful weather. We only saw two trail pedestrians coming down Government road and a dad and two sons in the side loop. Single-mindedly curious, I slid up into climbing position and started up the new trail. It was not an easy gradient, but it wasn’t like trying to ride up the fat guy sidecut like we tried last time. Maybe the menehunes had got it right this time… The trail climbed through the trees in uneven spurts, with straight uphill grinds and flat traverses. All the undergrowth that had been cut was machete’d off about 3cm above the ground, leaving abundant punji sticks of death. Several trees were cut off at about crotch level. Not sure what’s up with that. Maybe so your handlebars clear? Maybe so you slam your knees into the trunks after your handlebars clear? This is the same kind of workmanship we saw on some of the weird ground-level stunt trails around the inner loop terminus, so we’re dealing with the same cutting crew. I can’t really complain, since I’m not out there cutting new lines – I give these guys props for making stuff for us to ride on. Just hope they don’t go and give it a stupid name like “moonraker”…

After following the random line through the woods for a while, we passed two old date palm trees then ended up at a valley. At this point, the trail turned downhill. WTF?! Was this just a time-and-energy-consuming loop that started on the main trail, meandered through the woods like a drunk guy chasing an imaginary rabbit, and returned to the main trail? Jeff and I hiked up through the undergrowth a little and found the old doubletrack below the ironwood hill a short distance away. I didn’t want to end up going all the way back down to the Ditch and neither did Danny, so we pushed up to the road and rode up to the hill. Jeff led Sara and Dr. Paul down, half hoping the trail indeed went all the way back down, so Paul would then be forced to grind all the way up cardiac climb.

When Danny and I were resting at the big tree, Jeff appeared from the normal side, shortly followed by Paul and Sara from fat guy. They said the trail went part of the way down, then hooked into the fat guy sidecut, so they still had to push the loose, heinous drop-in sections at the top of fat guy. After a short rest, we dropped back down fat guy, then backtracked along the new trail down to the Ditch. Although it was easier going in the downhill direction, the unnecessary wandering was still annoying. Also, in actuality, considering how far down the trail descends on both ends to negotiate the valley crossing, most of the switchbacked ascent on the back half is pointless – the trail could cross the valley then contour straight over to the first switchback. I should get out there and cut some proper lines so I don’t have any reason to complain about someone else’s chuto-hanpa work.

Post ride food was “adventure night” at the Kailua pub – nobody could order anything they had previously ordered. The food worked out well, which was not a surprise, since the food is all pretty much good there. Barry should give it a try when he’s in town during the holidays!

Pictures here

D = 11.86 km (7.37-miles), Vavr = 11.4 km/h (7.1-mph), Vmax = 34.1 km/h (21.2-mph), T = 1-hour, 2-minutes (total ride time about two hours)