Oct. 10, Dad Turns 80, Weekend in Suncadia

The family all hooked up at Suncadia to celebrate Dad hitting a milestone.  Eighty and still going strong.  We split up and headed out mountain biking the first day, with the hard chargers making it up to the top of Cle Elum ridge.  Day 2 saw the motivated runners do a 5k run, the Big Dirty Run.   Great weekend with all the family.  

The Family

 

Day 1 bike ride to top of Cle Elum Ridge

Ridge-top views, almost

Len and Jack

Leonard

 

Day 2 Activity, the Big Dirty Run, Hillary leads the family

Len and Kris

Jen

Jim getting his feet a little muddy to start the 5k race.

 

Oct. 3, Cashmere Dual Sport Ride by Coyote Offroad

Rolled out of bed, far too early this morning.  Alarm was set for 4:30am.  Had to be in Cashmere Wa. at 7am to make the riders meeting for the first annual Cashmere dual sport ride put on by Coyote Offroad.  My neigbor Scott and I made the drive to experience some of the "off the radar" trails around Cashmere.   Ride was 64 miles of mixed forest road and singletrack that took us out to Plain Wa., where we topped off our fuel tanks.  The ride back on more trails and smooth dirt roads brought our total mileage up to 110 miles for the day.  Whew, big ride, big day.   Good time.

Sept. 28 Virginia Ridge

We did a nice ride yesterday up at Sun Mountain.  We checked out a new trail called Woodpecker that starts up off Thompson Pass.  Great addition to their trail network.  Today we hooked up with the "Geezer" crew, who have a locals weekly ride for the old guys.   Doug Curtlo had offered to lead the group out into his backyard and do some trails on Virginia Ridge.   This area is pretty far off the radar and you won't find any maps for it.   We climbed up road then hit some barely used trails up on top of the ridge that offered outstanding views.   Doug linked together the trails and led us on a fun descent back to his back door.  Great way to finish our trip in Winthrop.



Doug points out his house on the valley floor to Don

Francine

Steve on his fat bike and Curt?

Dennis, Doug's neigbour

Sept. 26, Buck Mt. Winthrop, Wa.

Drove out to Winthrop the see Don Hecker's new house in Winthrop.  Started our weekend with a ride that is always fun, the Buck Mountain loop.  Trail was a little loose but still a good time, and the views were great.

Don with Mt. Gardner in the background

Francine with Val right behind.

Val

Francine

Sept 24, Sasse Ridge Trail

Not sure why, but have not made it away from Snoqualmie Pass for much dirt bike riding.   Finally carved out enough time to hook up with Scott and drive down to Lake Cle Elum.   Rode up the ridge connecting some old roads and trails, then hit the Sasse Ridge Trail.  Great views from the top of the trail before we descended back down into the Teanaway.   Buzzed around on the user built trails and had a fun time.  Trails were in great shape, but could use some moisture to knock down the dust.

Sept. 19, Tokul

Met up at my brother's house to do a quick pre Husky game ride.   Managed to get a good crew.  Kelly, Scott, Francine, Ross, Greg and Kevin.  This was Greg's second time on a mountain bike this month, and the second time in maybe twenty years.  The goal was ride up Tokul East, catch the Golden Spike trail over to West Tokul and get home without doing too much damage to Greg.   I think Kelly may have hit the ground the hardest, so day turned out pretty good.  Roots were slippery, but the dirt was tacky and good fun was had by all.

Greg and Francine in the clearcut

Scott, Kelly, and Ross

Random Shots

I was running through the few shots that are on my cell phone and thought I would throw a few up.

Scott,small pond up behind Hyak, Sept 16

Shot from back in June - Jack "slim" Weber gets ready to raft the White Salmon

Jim, Kevin, and Ziggy at Mirror Lake

My KTM in the backyard

Bonus Shot

Sept. 1-4, Whistler Bike Park

Headed up to Whistler for three days of lift served biking on the mountain and one day riding in the valley.  Boys trip with Jason, Steve, and Scott.

Last run of the first day.        Kevin looking wet on  A-Line

Jason and Steve

Olympic moment

Scott

Kevin

Scott and Kevin take a coffee break in village

Scott - fresh snow in the distance

Cumberland BC - second time

We still had many more trails to ride in Cumberland.  Today is our last day on Vancouver Island.  Tuesday will be spent driving, riding a ferry, and driving home to the Pass.

Kevin chills out at top of small climb on Missing Link

2 & A Juice, Missing Link (nice bench at a lookout), up road past Cumberland Reservoir, to hike-a-bike up Miner's trail to the a lake and the start of Bucket of Blood.  We should have continued up the road a bit to another doubletrack climb that switchbacked more (instead of going straight up) to the top of Bucket of Blood.  Rode this to newly worked Bear Buns to Sykes Bridge.  We were here a few days ago.

Cross bridge and up shaded double track on the right to climb on Climax Trail to the Trent Main logging road.  Left at the first intersection up the road to the start of Trent Canyon Trail.  Took that fun trail all the way to the end at the road.  Lost some downhill on the road to a left.  Took a right on a double track that hooked us into the middle of Blue Collar.  Rode that romping descent to the intersection with Short Line and went left and climbed to the intersection of Teapot.  Bombed down that to That Dam Trail to the Allen Lake Reservoir.  Circled around on some unmarked trails in a clear-cut; Sunset Strip to Shaker to Entrails and the intersection of Rugburn, where we ran into a local, Scott.  He offered to let us follow him back to town on single track trails.  So, we retraced our steps on Entrails, Shaker and  Sunset Strip to hit Short and Curly, which was in the trees, not clearcut yet.  Rode recently reopened Spanker thru the clearcut.  Onto a trail that Scott built, which was more flowy, with wider banked corners to Spanker and another fun descent on Space Nugget.

Great day.  27.3 kilometers.  Was sure nice not to have to pull out a map on the last 5 kilometers following Scott.  Unfortunately, this area is ripe for planned logging.  We saw the boundary flags all over the new Climax and Trent Canyon trails.

Kevin on technical section on Bear Buns

Lumpy section on Bear Buns

Francine on Sykes Bridge

Ramp on Trent River Canyon

Steep section on Trent River Canyon