Jen's Spring Break - Day 1

Today was day one of my self-imposed Spring Break. I miss the days of school where you got days off for no apparent reason, so I asked for today off and got a three day weekend out of it. The weather looks promising all weekend, so I started my "break" off with a mountain bike ride at Carvin's Cove. I honestly can't remember the last time I rode my bike out there, so it was great to get back out there. I met up with Anais at 10am, and we headed out in the 42°F morning. It has probably been 5 or 6 months since I had seen my professor friend, so it was great to spend time catching up on things.

We had no plan in mind, so we just made up our ride as we went along. Started off on Songbird which was a mucky, muddy mess at the beginning. It improved greatly once we got up the trail aways. As would be the theme for the day, the water was running strong, the streams were up and the mud was plentiful. There was standing water in several places. After Songbird, we elected to skip Arrowhead as it tends to be a tad tedious when wet. So we went across Little Bell and Schoolhouse. Schoolhouse's water crossings were highly entertaining as they were as deep as I've seen them since I've been riding. I even walked one of them. Waterproof boots are great (best investment for biking stuff). After Schoolhouse we rode the fireroad back to Little Bell then really had to figure out what to do.

I had thought we could get to Tuckaway for and up and back, but time was running short for Anais. We were thwarted at the big crossing near the 4-way intersection. The water was up and we had already gotten wet enough that we weren't thrilled about having to cross it. We decided to turnback and reride the mud that we had just come through to get to this point.

Ended up going up 1000' to the Connector for a very fun ride back to the parking lot. Anais didn't think she had ridden the Connector before, so that was good that she can now say she's been there, done that. After bidding her fairwell in the parking lot, I decided that I hadn't quite ridden enough, so I ate a granola bar and headed down Hoe trail. It was as expected muddy, and when I got to the log, I really wanted to ride it, but my tires were gummed up pretty good so I didn't want to risk falling. I put the bike at the top of the log and rode off of it instead. HA!

I rode for a bit on Hoe trail and arrived at the intersection with Buck. I decided to not go up Buck anymore, but to the right to see where the trail went. I seemed to remember Brian B or Warren one telling me that it goes back to BS road, and it sure did. It is a rather nice, smooth, zippy trail too. I enjoyed exploring this part and found another light, social trail off to one side (I'll investigate it one day). Once back to the road, I was tired and decided to call it a day.


I had fun and this was only Day 1. Tomorrow, I plan to ride on Mill Mountain, but it will be later in the day with a 430 or 5p start time. YAY Spring!


Today's stats: 14.75 miles, 2:39:49 (some of this time was stationary while chatting, picture taking or decision making.)