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Summer of the N00bs

I guess it’s time I face the depressing certainty that the mountain biking season is pretty much dead. Sadly, all it took was a little snow to squelch my delusions of cycling grandeur. It seems appropriate during this time of mourning to discuss our pedaling happenings over the last 6 months so, like it or not, here it comes.

Jacob may not have been the most graceful biker I’ve ridden with on the Pipeline but he kept getting back on his seat mishap after mishap and that counts for a lot.

Jason and I have always extended an open invitation for any daring souls that wish to take a shot at mountain biking to come with us on our adventures anytime. In recent years I don’t think we’ve gotten any takers on that offer. As many of our friends have become pudgier, lazier, or more timid their desire to attempt an extreme sport has dwindled I suppose. That’s why we were surprised when several pals simultaneously indicated that they wanted to try their luck in the mountains with us this year. Adam, Jacob, and Abigail rode with us on multiple occasions over the summer and lived to tell the tale…although some of their skin did not.

Millcreek’s terminus overlooks Salt Lake Valley. It’s an excellent spot for gawking and for taking photos of the conquering variety.

We took Jacob to the Millcreek Pipeline for his first singletrack experience. We picked this trail because we thought it would adequately introduce him to mountain biking without killing him. Technically we were right; it didn’t kill him but it sure hurt him more than we were expecting. Jacob crashed his bike and toppled down steep declines, AKA cliffs, no less than three times while we were on the Pipeline. He got scraped up and shaken but that didn’t stop him from happily hitting the slopes again after each tumble. Way to not be a wimp Jacob!

Adam may not have been thrilled about going up Big Spring Hollow but going down suited him just fine.

Adam and Abigail came with us up Big Spring Hollow for their mountain biking premier. This trail, I’ll admit, is a bit grueling in the uphill direction but its downhill bliss makes up for any ascending anguish. Adam didn’t quite reach the top but he made a valiant effort despite his regular neglect of regular exercise. Abigail, on the other hand, loved this path and asked to go down again after our first descent. Jason and I were happy to oblige.

Abigail didn’t let her hybrid bike get her down.
Ridiculousness sometimes speaks for itself.

We also took all three of them to Lambert Park, one of our favorite singletrack biking spots. Lambert Park is pretty technical but, surprisingly, we didn’t end up having to use the first aid kit I brought on this outing like I thought we would. Abigail and I both had little accidents but neither required bandaging anything except our pride and Jacob, miraculously, broke with tradition by not finding a fine precipice to fall off. Nice going gang!

It’s obvious from this picture that I am an expert. In fact, I expertly hit a root and catapulted myself into a tree just minutes after this was taken.

Along with taking our buddies on some awesome terrain Jason and I hit a few of our favorites solo. The best of those rides, in my opinion, was one we took up American Fork Canyon near the end of September on the Great Western Trail. Fall was in full swing and the bright scenery was gorgeous. The aspens formed a bleached blanket over our heads with their gilded leaves as we rode along. Vibrant yellows and reds consumed the landscape like a surging tide. It was an intense mix of color and cardiovascular.

It’s impossible to overstate the beauty of an unbroken sky above a canopy of twinkling leaves.
Rubbernecking is glorious when you’re tunneling through boughs of golden leaves.

Hooray for biking and hooray for some pals that didn’t let the threat of exercise and injury intimidate them. I hope next year they will hit the peaks with us again and not retreat when the peaks hit back.

Rachel November 20, 2012 No Comments

Relaxing on Baby-heads

When some people need to relax they’ll veg in front of the TV. For others taking it easy might mean going for a drive or hitting the driving range. But for me and Jason nothing says unwinding like biking 15 miles through desert sandpits, gnarly bedrock, and bouncy baby-heads. Yes, for us becoming exhausted in Moab is as relaxing as it gets.

Scampering on your haunches was sometimes necessary while ascending to Castleton Tower.
Isn’t he cute?

Jason and I just made our biannual visit to Moab. We waited to take our fall trip this time until the madness of our party had waned. The weather in Moab in November can be a little touchy but on this occasion it was utter perfection. And by utter perfection I mean t-shirts and shorts and huge smiles.

The way to Castleton Tower wound over quite a few stony ledges.

We started our excursion off with a hike to the base of Castleton Tower, a 400-foot monolith also known as Castle Rock, in Castle Valley. Castleton Tower stands on a cone of boulders and gravel over 1000 feet high, the kind of terrain that appears impassable when you’re looking at it from the bottom. This difficult trail was obstructed often by chunks of stone and hard to follow at times. Ascending it required some creative clambering skills. But, honestly, that’s what made it fun. There’s nothing wrong with strenuous when it’s part of an adventure. We were so enthusiastic about this hike that not only did we make it up to and around the Tower but we also chose to detour on a sketchy path to check out The Rectory, another outcropping of rock that rises above the opposite side of the ridge. We were pretty tired by the time we got back to our car but we were also pretty satisfied with what we had experienced in way of scenery and exploration.

The crest on which Castleton Tower stands provides a narrow division between two craggy lowlands.
The cracked barren valleys below The Rectory and lofty towers adjacent to it fashioned a strange rocky feast.

Our second day in Moab was spent biking the Kokopelli Trail to a place called Yellow Jacket Canyon. We had never ridden this path before so I was as intrigued by the prospects of its new terrain as Jason was by its name. I guess our intrigue got the better of us. We hit this 14.4-mile loop expecting it to be relatively easy in comparison to other Moab trails we have ridden but, although the route was wide enough for off-road vehicles, it was rather rough in places. Sand was the villain of the first third of this expedition. If you’ve never tried going up miles of steep hills on a bike while deep sand attempts to consume your tires you’ve never known frustraustion. Yeah, that’s what happens when frustration and exhaustion get together and produce deformed spawn. We were literally making our way at about 1-2 miles an hour for a while there. At that glorious speed we would have made it back to our car at about never. Luckily, downhill stone eventually replaced uphill sand and we cruised over the deformed bedrock quickly. Quickly, in this case, means we hit speeds up to about 13 MPH but mostly stayed around 6 MPH, which I realize doesn’t exactly fit the standard definition of that word. But hey, after creeping along practically slower than a grandpa with a walker that seemed pretty fast. Lots of bumpy stone and a series of baby-head infested hills later we emerged back onto the highway and from there we were soon back to our car. By the way, for those of you unfamiliar with biking lingo baby-heads are rocks the size of a baby’s head that can make wrecking practically effortless.

The Castleton Tower is one of the most popular rock climbing spots in the world. We gawked at several scaling extremists as we navigated through the boulders below.
Yellow Jacket’s bedrock made for some fun riding.
The view from the top of Yellow Jacket Canyon wasn’t super impressive but it was nice.

Our final call on the Yellow Jacket Canyon section of the Kokopelli Trail? This trail was definitely not as pretty as others we’ve done in the area but the solitude was nice. We only saw one couple on a 4wheeler the whole day. The path was more of a technical treat than we were expecting but the sand sucked unimaginably hard. We’re glad we tried it out but I don’t think it’s going to be top on our list of redos.

The Flat Iron Mesa road went through some scenic spots like this sandstone-encircled grassland.
The scene from the top of Flat Iron Mesa was pretty kicking. Hatch Wash Canyon and Kane Springs Canyon merged below us in a panorama of colorful precipices.

On our final day in Moab we biked Flat Iron Mesa. This trail has a reputation for being an easy family-friendly kind of ride. But that reputation, in our opinion, is not deserved. I don’t know of any children that would willingly conquer Flat Iron’s endless hills. The level of complaining you’d get from the kiddos would make getting them to take the garbage out seem like a delight. No, Flat Iron Mesa wasn’t the easygoing ride we were expecting but I guess since we didn’t ride it for its easygoingness we can’t really grumble about its lack thereof. We were interested in this route because of the enthralling possibilities for sidetracking. Many enticing wilder trails shoot off from Flat Iron making it a great starting place for countless adventures. We took one of these options to an overlook above Kane Springs Canyon. The view from this lofty perch was mesmerizing but the 3.5 mile spur we had to ride to get to it made the rest of the desert look like downtown Manhattan. I don’t think anyone else had ridden this trail in months, maybe years. It was so overgrown in places that deciphering where to stick our bikes was like solving a Sherlock Holmes mystery. When all was said and done, Flat Iron Mesa, with our additional excursion to the end of the known universe, was a 17.5 mile journey that took over 4 hours and finished off any energy reserves we might have had. Fun? Yes. Family-friendly? No.

Jason is literally standing in the middle of the trail we took to the Kane Springs Canyon overlook in this picture. Having trouble seeing it? So did we.
From far above Kane Springs Canyon the vistas were beautiful. At least there was that pot of gold at the end of our eroded rainbow.

Our trip to Moab was predictably fantastic. We’ve never returned from our favorite vacation spot dissatisfied. We biked 32 miles of tricky terrain and hiked to the top of rocky ridges. Now that’s restful! Before you shake your head too much at our choice of relaxation though I should add that there’s not much to do in Moab once the sun goes down and these days the sun goes down pretty early. After dark Jason and I mostly just read books, watched TV, and typed posts. We’d never make time for hours of that at home. So, see, our idea of taking it easy isn’t too far off from yours. We just prefer to ride across the desert before we settle in to read a good book.

Rachel November 13, 2012 No Comments

Arise and Run

It’s common knowledge that Jason and I are a little crazy so it shouldn’t surprise anyone that we signed up to run two 5Ks on the same Saturday. While our decision to do what some would categorize as “sort of stupid” shouldn’t astonish any of you, the outcome of that borderline stupidity may shock everyone a little. I’m still a little flabbergasted myself.

When we found out a few weeks ago that one of Jason’s coworkers was organizing a race to help pay for the expensive specialized school his autistic child, Easton, attends we were onboard even though this 5K fell on the same day as another race we had already signed up for. I guess either our hearts are bigger than our brains or we are just idiots beyond reason.

Abigail and I were proud of our medals. We may not have outpaced too many people to get them but we outpaced enough.

Easton’s 5K was a small event with a little less than 100 runners involved but it was well organized. Some of our fellow R.A.C.ers, Jeremy Rowley and Abigail, tackled it with us and Jeremy brought his 10 year old boy Milo too. It was Milo’s first race ever and for a little kid that doesn’t exercise regularly I thought he did great. Sure, Jeremy had to give him a piggyback ride at one point and Milo totally collapsed in the grass right after he crossed the finish line, but he didn’t give up so good job Milo!

I didn’t push myself too much while moving along this course. I knew my next race was just hours away so beating some land speed records wasn’t part of my agenda. That’s why I was shocked when I found out that I had actually won 3rd place out of all the women. Abigail, who was about 30 seconds ahead of me, took 1st. I think she was equally surprised. I’m still not exactly sure how we pulled it off but somehow I’m now no longer a total loser.

Milo only made it a few feet past the finish before he crashed in the grass. He was feeling sickly after his uncustomary exercise.

Jason and I had signed up for our second 5K of the day, the Night of the Running Dead, months ago. We participated in this event, which is a nice mix of horror and health, last year. You can either run it as a zombie or a human. Humans get a 2 minute head start and then the zombies are let loose on them. Pretty awesome, right? Jason and I again opted to represent the undead. Zombies are trendy and disgusting so kind of wonderful in our book.

Last year’s undead race had some organizational challenges. It took place in the middle of a toasty afternoon plus the route, with its morphing loops, was anyone’s guess. But we liked the creepy concept so we wanted to give this run one more shot. Unfortunately, all of the friends that joined us last year weren’t as forgiving. The fear of resurrecting the combination of sweltering temperatures and confusion that made them feel like they really were the living dead in need of brains kept them from registering. Jason and I had faith though that the past would not be revived and we were right. We thought this year’s race was fabulous and I believe the thousands of other participants would agree with us.

We didn’t use latex to putrefy ourselves this year because last time our sweat pooled underneath those patches transforming us into even fouler creatures than we had anticipated. But I think we still fit the part without it.

The run started at 9:00 PM, 9:02 if you were a zombie. It could have been freezing by that time in the evening but instead it was perfect. What a pleasant night for an apocalypse. Before the start we were shown news clips of the infection that led to the reanimation revolution. The clips ended with a report that the president had ordered the bombing of Salt Lake City due to its raging zombie infestation and then all of a sudden fireworks exploded representing that airstrike. It was rather cool.

More entertainment was in store for us after we headed on our way. Our route went through some residential areas and many of those residents came outside to watch the hordes of corpses sprint past. Some of them even brought out their lawn chairs like the throngs of scampering carcasses were part of a glitzy parade. It made me chuckle. We were also greeted along our path by some professional zombies ranging from the wandering to the menacing. They added another element of spookiness and fun.

Jason found his golden brain quite satisfying.

I thought I might be sluggish and all tuckered out during this race seeing as it was my second one of the day but the refreshing evening air and the power of my vile disguise propelled me forward. I guess I really am a creature of the night. I kept a faster pace than I had at Easton’s and finished 15th in my age category. Since my group included all 19-34 year olds I was satisfied with that placement. Jason, on the other hand, was fixated on achieving the type of satisfaction that only comes from a full belly. He finished 1st in his age group and was awarded a golden brain. He was pretty excited about his win; I didn’t know the reanimated could be so animated.

Doing two races in one day was a nutty plan but it certainly wasn’t our first ill-conceived scheme and I hope it won’t be our last. Besides Jason’s calves being practically useless the next day and my ankle being a little stiff and swollen we weren’t really any worse for wear though and since we both took home a medal maybe double events should be the new Sabin standard…or perhaps not.

Rachel October 25, 2012 No Comments
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