Archive for the 'bike' Category

Sunday, 22 September 2013

The planning was long and drawn out for this ride. As the week progressed and the weather forecasts deteriorated, the committed participants steady dwindled down to Ckucke, Root, and myself. We were nonetheless enthusiastic, and with cool, breezy conditions, took on the leg-burning, lung-busting, constitution-breaking climb up Government Road and into tail end of Demon trail up to the melaleuca grove. There was a lot of weed growth along Demon toward the lowest extent. The dark places were damp and the water crossings were running slightly, but the general conditions were dry and grippy. There had been some hard rainsqualls early in the mornings for several days preceding the ride, but there were no issues with mud. There was, however, and issue with fallen guavas. With the hot conditions all summer, we may have encountered the second fruiting season. Ckucke was happy to find some ripe mountain apples. He was limited to grabbing what he could reach on the lower branches, but the trees were loaded with fruit higher up. Too bad there wasn’t any bamboo within easy distance. Continue reading ‘Past Blast’

OK, I give Les Stroud huge credit. A few weeks ago I took my car in for service so I was stuck in Kaimuki in the morning with no car. So I took my bike and went riding. Figured I’d have all day so I headed up St. Louis drive to Waahila Ridge State Park. With time to kill, I hauled all the action video gear up the hill. The idea had been floating around in my head for a while so I figured this would be a good chance to try it out some video shots. The only thing was I’m flying solo, so like Les Stroud, I am grip, gaffer, operator, p.a., stuntman, star. I have to set up the shot, then go back and get on the bike, ride and get the shot, stop, go back get the cameras, then set up the next shot and repeat. So from four hours of this, here is my final result, which by the way took just about as much time to edit!

Wtf, finally made it, 10:00, and I still don’t know where my mind went. A little sprinkle greeted me, breeze is weak but it’s not so hot in the shade up here. I hauled all this gear up here so I’ll try some Les Stroud and take some video of myself on the trails.

Even with tropical storm Flossie approaching, the forecast called for hot, sunny days this weekend, so even though it was clouded in on Sunday morning, we chanced a ride out at Royal Summit. It was ripping hot, but there was a good breeze going, so we didn’t die immediately from the heat. We did die later from the climbs, as we were instantly reminded why we usually tackle this area as a loop from the Wailuna side – the climbs at Royal Summit suck! My complete lack of conditioning became readily apparent as I dropped off the back. Definitely have to get more secret training time in before the next trail ride. We went up to the end of the doubletrack then snaked our way back down via the siding singletrack fun runs. There was a lot of daylight, so we sessioned a couple of sections until we ran out of juice and headed back out. We mistakenly went down into the airsoft area. We’ve done that before, and it sucked as much this time around. Continue reading ‘Sucking Wind at the Summit’