May 11, Another Rental House

We bought another rental house in North Bend.  3 bedroom, 1.5 bath, 2 car garage for $148,100 at the far end of Riverbend on a driveway that only 3 houses use for access.  We are the second house.  Thus, we have no cars driving by.  Behind us is the John Wayne rail trail.  And behind that are the houses on the river.  We joke that this is the most expensive house we have purchased.  We learned a lot in buying a foreclosure house from the bank.
We are probably losing our fitness, because we are working on the house everyday.  The house was updated for the 2008 sale of $324,000.  We will put two coats of paint on the outside.  All the bedrooms need painting.  Both bathrooms need painting.  At least the 3 windows on the front will be replaced.  Good news is that the kitchen has been updated with white Ikea cabinets and solid granite countertops.  This foreclosure even had two appliances, the stove and dishwasher.  We just have to buy a fridge and microwave.

We think we will move into it for at least June thru August and see what it is like to live off the mountain. 

May 1, Salt Lake City - City Creek Canyon to BST to Dry Creek Canyon

Had a lazy morning.  Thanks to priceline, we scored a large tower room on the tenth floor of the Little America hotel.  This was our second time at Little America and I really like it's vibe.  We started our 3 hour ride at 12 noon.  Climbed from the hotel up City Creek Canyon (major elevation gain), South on the BST Trail and out Dry Creek Canyon.  Great loop, but make sure your legs feel strong. From the highpoint, the trail traversed the Wasatch foothills towards the University Hospital.  The descent down Dry Creek was excellent!  We had perfect trail conditions, thanks to showers the night before.   14.7 miles, vertical around 2,500'.

Francine rides through the Balsamroot Flowers with downtown SLC in the distance (our starting point). 

Are you wondering why Francine is wearing a long sleeve shirt each day?  It is because she is allergic to Juniper bushes, which were alongside the trail on all our rides in Price/Moab/Fruita, and has a sweet rash on both arms.

April 30, Fruita - Kokopelli - Lion's to Troy Built

Renee and Bill had to get back to Denver, so we were solo today.  Packed up camp and started our ride at 10am.  Today was a short 9.5 mile loop, but the singletrack was fast, flowy and a blast.  We rode this loop in previous years and would repeat.  It is on the perimeter of the Kokopelli system, and sees less use.  Thus the trail is narrower.

Francine on Lion's Trail

Finished at noon, and headed to Salt Lake City to our sweet priceline rate room at the Little America.

April 29, Fruita - Zion Curtain

Strangely, the city of Fruita wants their streets back at noon on Sunday, so all the bike vendors have to pack up.  This means no demo bikes on Sunday.  Kind of wierd, as that makes the festival end on Saturday night, instead of Sunday.  Think of all the business the restaurants could do if we all had to go back into town to return our demo bikes.  Guess it has always been this way.

Since Bill and Renee had to ride their own hardtails today, we opted to try a trail we haven't ridden, Zion Curtain, as opposed to riding in Grand Junction at Lunch Loops, which is definitely more rocky.

15 mile loop with a bit of climbing and fun flowy and swoopy singletrack.  This ride had more elevation change than most of the Fruita rides.

Francine and Renee

Kevin and Francine

Bill and Renee wonder what happened to those cushy bikes
 they demoed the first two days.

Francine, hmmm, looks steep

April 28, Fruita - 18 Road Trails

Francine and Bill reserved demo bikes the night before from the manufacturers tents at the Fat Tire Festival.  Renee and Kevin had to fend for themselves Saturday morning, and the lines were long to demo bikes.  Can't believe all 4 of us walked away with a demo bike. 

Went to the 18 Road Trails, to a packed trailhead.  Because we decided to try the less used trails, we hardly saw anyone on the trails.  Went out Vegetarian to East Uppity (new) to Edge Cutoff to loop back on Corral trail.  Once finished with the little loop, we climbed Chutes & Ladders to another new trail, PBR.  Went down PBR and made our way to the parking lot, as Bill was supposed to return his bike around 12:30pm, and it was 1:30pm.  We could have ridden another loop, because no one returned their demo bikes until the end of the day.

Oh well.  Went to Hot Tomato Cafe for pizza and beer.

Again, no mileage computers, so we think we rode about 8-10 miles.

April 27, Fruita - Kokopelli Trails

Francine and Renee pedal up Mary's Trail

Thursday was our drive day to Fruita, Colorado to meet Bill & Renee.  They were coming in from Denver.  The wind picked up in the afternoon, beat up our brand new tent, and made the decision against riding real easy, as Kevin & I were still tired from the 55 plus miles we rode the previous two days.

Friday was our first morning to sleep in, have coffee, and relax in the warm morning sun, before leisurely heading out for a ride.  The Fruita Fat Tire Festival was on this weekend, so we stopped in town before we went to the trails.  We all were pleasantly surprised to demo bikes for an entire ride.  Renee & Bill took out the Ibis SLR.  Francine & Kevin took the Pivot 5.7.  They said we had to have them back by 5pm, so we took them to the Kokopelli Trails.

Rode up Marys, to Horsethief Bench and out Mary's.  We were going to do Steve's loop, but we didn't want to bring the bikes back right at 5pm, so after a couple miles out Mary's, we turned around and zipped back to the car.  The Ibis SLR climbed like it had turbo, and was also sweet on the downhills.  Both Francine & Renee thought the Pivot 5.7 (with almost 6 inches of travel) climbed like a slug, but was sweet on the downhills. 

Since demo bikes don't have mileage computers, we think we rode about 10 miles.

Bill on Horsethief Bench Trail

Kevin at our turn-around point on Mary's Trail

April 25, Moab - Porcupine Rim Shuttle Drop

On Tuesday, we gave up camping at Up The Creek Campground due to the heat and checked into the Ramada for two nights.  We were supposed to be able to sleep in, enjoy a lazy morning with coffee and breakfast, before heading out to the trails late morning.  Instead we have been waking up at 7am and heading straight to Love Muffin Cafe (5star rating) for breakfast each morning.

Utah is real low on snow, so the upper trails on Porpucine Rim were open for riding way earlier in the year than normal with the 90 degree heatwave in progress.  The shuttles were not making it to the top of the Hazard trail, but were dropping guests off at the bottom of the trail.  So, we caught the 9am shuttle with Chile Pepper Shuttle to the top of the Kokopelli section.  We rode up Hazard trail to 9500 feet, 2.6 miles.  Nice climbing on dirt.  Had a sweet descent to the bottom, down Kopopelli, UPS & LPS. 

Originally, we were going to bail out at the end of LPS and ride 10 miles out the gravel Sand Flats road to our hotel at the Ramada.  But some guys at our resting point said you still had to pedal on the 10 miles out.  We were only 13 miles into our ride, had a nice breeze and cloud cover, so we opted for the 5 mile jeep road to the Porcupine Rim Trail.  Unfortunately, about half way thru the 5 miles, we were regretting our decision due to the continuous rough and rocky road.  Everyone that came by us looked like they were enjoying the jeep road.  Hmm.

Porpucine Rim trail finally came, and we were quite happy to roll on dirt.  When we hit the pavement for the 6 mile ride back to the hotel, we faced a stiff head wind.  Luckily, they put in a paved bike trail along a portion of our ride on Hwy 128 back into town.  30.6 mile day.  We were pooped.

Lots of pictures, incredible day if you take out the fire road in the middle.

Francine & Kevin on road after shuttle drop off

Francine climbing Hazard Trail

Francine resting after steep portion of Hazard Trail

Kevin near top of Hazard Trail with the La Sals in the background
We are at 9,500' and the La Sals top out at 12,000'.  Our ride will drop
down to the Colorado River at  4,025' in about 25 miles.

Francine cruising down Hazard Trail

View out Castle Valley from UPS Trail

Kevin on slickrock on UPS

Francine walking steep slickrock section on UPS

Kevin at classic overlook picture on LPS

Francine with La Sals in background. Castle Valley below.

Porcupine Rim Trail

Porpucine Rim Trail

April 24, Moab - Magnificent 7 Shuttle drop

Had to hit another set of the new singletrack created in Moab.  We only rode 3 of the Magnificent 7 Trails.  Descended Bull Run to Arth's Corner to Little Canyon before we cut out on Gemini Bridges road out to the highway.  Since we were only at 13 miles, we crossed the highway to ride some more of the Brand trails we rode yesterday.  Rode out Lazy to Deadman's Ridge down to the paved bike path that rolls down into town.  Had a stiff headwind on the downhill, and we had to pedal. Thank goodness for the breeze on the finish as it was 92 degrees at 3pm. 26.5 miles.

April 23, Moab - Brand Trails

Moab has been adding single-track mountain biking since the last time we were there about 10 years ago.  Just last November and this April, they added new bike specific trails.  Had to get up early since temps were going to reach 94 degrees today.

Deadman's Ridge Trail

Kevin on Circle O trail

Kevin wanted slickrock trails.  Rockin-A was all slickrock, but bumpier than he wanted, even with our full suspension bikes.  Circle O was also more bumpy slickrock.  We were quite happy to hit dirt to finish the day.

Rode the new North 40 loop.  Then EZ to Deadman's Ridge to Longbranch to climb Bar B Singletrack to Rockin-A to Circle O and finished up on North 40.  17 miles and over 90 degrees at the car.

April 21, Moab - Klondike Bluffs

We camped at Green River State Park campground after our hotel night in Price.  It was about a 30 minute drive to Klondike Bluffs, which is about 15 miles North of Moab.  Rode Dino-Flow to Baby Steps South, the two new singletrack sections, to UFO,  up Little Salty then down Baby Steps North and back out Dino-Flow to the car.  15 miles.

Really enjoyed the new singletrack up high.  Our main descent down Baby Steps N was too quick, and we wish we had done Mega steps. But we were pretty hot and tired when we hit that junction.  Dinoflow was pretty dusty.
15 mile ride.

Francine on UFO

Francine on North 40

April 20, Price Ut. - "Luke's trail" and more

Francine has had Price Ut. on her punch list for several years.  We did a tight twisty 15 miles of singletrack.  Trails were so tight, it was hard to relax.  We enjoyed the ride, but wouldn't recommend Price as a Mt. Biking destination.

Rode Luke's Trail to Alan's Alley to IMBA Between to Top of Luke's.  Went left on Mead's Rim to Floating Rocks to Lollipop Loop to Shamrock & Roll.  Back on Floating Rocks, Mead's Rim, down IMBA Between to Smokin' Joes to Knot Petes Rim to the car.  15 miles.

Francine on Smokin' Joes

April 19, Salt Lake City - Red Corner Canyon

Heading to Moab, we stopped at REI in Salt Lake City for a new camping tent.  Asking around for a quick bike ride, the staff recommended we head to Red Corner Canyon out of Draper Utah.  Did about eight miles.  Some of the trails were closed due to rain, but still a nice place to break up our long drive.  8.6 miles.

High on Ghost Trail

Francine cruising down Ghost Trail

Kevin at turn-around point on BST (Bonneville Shoreline Trail)

April, 9, 10 Whistler

Greg, Marcel, Kevin, Francine, Rick, Jerry

Annual Rick trip with the boys and Francine.  No new snow, but still good skiing.

April 3, Cowiche Canyon - Yakima, Wa.

Good dirt.  With a forecast for rain in the backyard we headed East in search of nicer weather.  Found Cowiche Canyon to be in primo condition.  Dirt was super tacky, just dry enough to avoid rutting the trail.  Lots of little flowers already in bloom.  Cranked out 13 miles of trail then headed to subway.

April 1, Mt. Snoqualmie - Slot - Phantom

Seth, at the top of the Slot Couloir

Got out of bed for an early start with Seth.  Seth said he was glad that I showed up at 6:30.  Since it was April 1, he was a little concerned about it being an April Fools prank.  I told him it would have been a much earlier start, if I wasn't planning on showing up!   Seth (the Trakmaster 1000)  laid in a sweet skin track up the edge of the Phantom slidepath.  All tracks from the previous week had been erased by fresh snow and a bit of wind action.   We made good time up to the Slot entrance.  The slot couloir looked pretty blown out, but we were hopeful further down conditions would improve.  Unfortunately it remained pretty firm all the way down, with a 4" slab layer that occasionally cut loose.  It was a lot of firm turns.  Always interesting, just not the best ski.  The front side, more than made up for the slot.  We enjoyed fluffy turns all the way down to the waterfall, which was easily negotiated with our huge snowpack.  Nice day - a little under four hours for the tour.  Still had time for lift served at Alpy!

Steep.

Frontside freshies

March 24, Repeat - North Slope Chair Peak

It was so good Friday, that we went back for more.

Crispin leads up the ridgeline towards Chair Peak.
  We came over the thumb tack notch to mix it up, and took a couple of short laps just beyond where Crispin is standing.  Our final lap we started at the ridge notch visible, just right of Chair Peak on the right side of the photo.  A little more wind affected, but nice fall line turns.

Silas plans his powder line.

Crispin dropping in off the ridgetop

Charlie spoons nicely

Nice - Crispin

Charlie

Silas

Charlie and Silas show off the "wild" rear tail rocker

Great day - did a couple short laps down to the Snow Lake cliff band, then climbed to the upper ridge notch for 1,900 feet of wind smoothed turns to Snow Lake.  Silas managed to break his custom Kam Leang built skis about 200 feet above the lake.  Luckily he was able to limp home.

March 24, Repeat - North Slope Chair Peak

It was so good Friday, that we went back for more.

March 23, North Slope of Chair Peak

Possibly the best conditions I have ever had on what is normally a stellar run. 1900 vertical feet from Chair's NW ridge down to Snow Lake. Whew, it was nice. Hooked up with Greg Louie and Collin Darrah to chase after Crispin and Silas, who had an hour lead on us. Never caught them, but sure appreciated the skin track.

Greg and Collin tour across the north slope of Chair Peak

Kevin

Greg

Collin

Greg

Kevin

Collin

Collin