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HARRIS PARK DAY TRIP & BBQ
June 20 (Sunday) the Flyers went over to Harris Park near Milton-Freewater, Oregon to do some mountain biking in the Blue Mountains. After we were done riding, we were going to have a free BBQ (food supplied by the Flyers). I got a ride with Brent "BulletBoy" Strecker and early Sunday morning we loaded up our bikes and all the BBQ stuff. On the way over, it looked like it would be a near perfect day for mountain biking. Temperatures were in the high 70's to low 80's and it was mostly sunny. Brent and I pulled up to the trailhead around 9:15 ... nobody was there. I had told everybody that we were going to meet at 9am so I was kind of surprised.
No way that we weren't going to go riding, even if nobody else showed up. "BulletBoy" and I were just about to saddle up and hit the trail when Marc "Spud" Umphrey slid to a stop and nervously began to assemble his bike. We told him to take his time cause we weren't in any kind of hurry, but "Spud" was still nervously scurrying around like a crab that had Chef Emrile reaching into the tank to grab him.
"Spud" got everything together and we rode off up the dirt road to our chosen target for the day. I went to college in Walla Walla and spent a lot of time riding around the South Fork trail. Today we were going to head up the Table Springs Trail (Bear Creek) till we got to the wrecked plane at the saddle. I hadn't been riding here since I left school in 1992 so there were some new trail features. Upstream from the trailhead there used to be three bridges (the first one partially torn up) that crossed the Walla Walla River. All three have been taken out by the BLM and there is a new connector trail around the first bridge.
Barely 2 minutes into the ride, "Spud" and I demonstrated our exquisitely fine-tuned technical riding skills by clipping out on the wrong side as we stalled out on the first steep pitch. (Slow motion tip-over into the dirt with slightly ashamed looks on our faces) "BulletBoy" loudly remarked that he wasn't sure he wanted to ride with us. After we got that out of our system, we continued on up the trail. The Forest Service has been out doing some trail construction around some of the lower spots in the trail as it runs alongside the river. They've still got quite a bit of work to do but when all is done the trail should be drier earlier in the year. There wasn't too much water to cross as we worked our way up the trail but I managed to put a dirt streak up my backside. "BulletBoy" thought it was funny. We got to the intersection of the Table Springs Trail and started our climbing for the day. Did I happen to mention that this was my first time to take my new F900 into the mountains? Well, I must say that it's a sweet climbing bike. I took it pretty easy since I knew from previous experience that we had a fairly lengthy climb ahead of us. The creek crossings weren't too bad since we haven't had much rain and the snow had melted off from the Blues. The trail surface was in really good shape and the three of us managed to climb most of the technical spots along the trail. None of us cleared everything but we had fun trying. The wildflowers were blooming alongside the trail and we got buzz bombed by butterflies every so often. When we stopped to catch our breath, "BulletBoy" kept remarking how much he liked the quiet of the woods. We were the only three people on that section of trail.
We finally made it to the saddle and after taking a short rest to eat some food and take our pictures with the planewreck (anyone know where the warplane wreck is supposed to be located?) we saddled up for the plunge back towards the river. I let "Spud" and "BulletBoy" lead cause I'm not that fast and I'm still getting used to the F900. Down the trail we flew with big grins on our faces. The reward of the downhill is really worth the climb. Too quickly, we were back on the South Fork Trail and headed back towards a well deserved BBQ feed. On the way up, we had all three religiously tried to keep as much mud off the bikes as possible but that was all thrown to the wind now. I hit all the puddles that I had tried to avoid on the way up ... straight down the middle. Too tired to care and it was kind of fun anyway! Just before you get back to the trailhead, there's a short steep climb that I managed to impress my two riding partners by being the only one to climb it. What they didn't know was that I used up every remaining watt of energy on that one little climb.
"Spud" has a friend who owns a vacation home near Harris Park and he said that we could do our cooking at his friend's house. Situated right along the river with a tree shaded porch, it was a perfect setting for a BBQ. "BulletBoy" and I tried out his new lawnchairs (the 'recliner' is soooooo comfy!) and stuffed ourselves with the chips/salsa dip/burgers/soda/homemade cookies. It was a great way to end the day. Hopefully we'll be able to do something similar again this summer and more of you will be able to make the trip.
South Fork Trail to Cub Saddle and back: 14.6 miles
Total Elevation Gain: 2000 ft (1400 in last 2.3 miles)
Grin Factor: Massive
IMBA STUFF
Overall, IMBA has enjoyed another busy month. Here are a few highlights and some issues of interest:
- A nice article that summarizes IMBA's recent accomplishments appeared in the July '99 edition of Mountain Bike.
- Jen and Tim (Trail Care Crew #1) spent five productive days in New Jersey and New York. From this trip JORBA (Jersey Off-Road Bicycle Association) has developed, and channels of communication have opened with the New York-New Jersey Trails Conference, the metro New York hiking association.
- The new IMBA summer club advocacy intern, Matt Holter, has arrived and started work. Matt is from Minnesota and attends Cornell College in Iowa. He's a mountain bike racer. Matt is going to work to improve communication with our clubs. He'll track club contacts, volunteer hours and trail miles constructed and/or reopened. (By the way, IMBA now has more than 300 active member clubs.)
- RockShox Club Assistance Grants and RockShox Tool Grants. We strongly encourage all of you to get clubs in your area to apply for these. As it stands now, we have more grants available than applicants. The application deadline for the next round of Club Assistance Grants (which award $250 to clubs participating in trail work) is August 27, 1999. The tool grant applications are due September 27, 1999.
- Clif Bar protocol: All of you have been doing a great job spreading the word to clubs in your area regarding Clif Bar orders. Just a quick refresher: IMBA affiliated clubs can order Clif Bars for trail work days. They need to contact Dan with the following info: Club name, Shipping address (no P.O. Boxes), phone number, scheduled work day(s), number of workers anticipated. We need a lead-time of at least 4 weeks.
- Just wanted to give everyone a quick snapshot about what the IMBA staff in Boulder is doing. Last weekend was a typical weekend for us:
- Jon Alegranti, our Mountain Bike Patrol Coordinator, was in West Virginia, representing IMBA and leading an IMBA-benefit raffle at the 24 Hours of Canaan.
- Heather McRoberts(and others) raced in Gunnison, Colorado. We had one of the IMBA Subarus there.
- IMBA staff members (including Jen, Pete and Scott) worked on the Boulder National Trails Day project Saturday at Betasso Preserve just west of town.
- Jan and Mike Riter led an IMBA Trailbuilding School near Chicago over the weekend.
- Joey Klein and Kathy Summers, TCC No. 2, were working in Texas.
- Scott Gwozdz was down at Golden Gate Canyon State Park, checking out the sites for the upcoming IMBA Trailbuilding School, June 18-20.
- Rod and Jon represented IMBA at the second IMBA Epic in State College, Pennsylvania. The first Epic (held in Fruita, Colorado, in late April) generated great press and strengthened our relationships with RockShox and Patagonia. The Pennsylvania Epic went great. Thirty-three participants. Intermittent heavy rain. Greg Herbold (famous racer) and Maurice Tierney (Dirt Rag publisher) attended. Great chemistry.
- Board member Jim Hasenauer was in Annapolis, Maryland, attending the Land & Water Conservation Fund conference. He also rode the IMBA Epic.
STRANGE DAYS by by Todd Domini
[Ed Note: I asked for newsletter submissions on the Flyers Club email list and received this from a non-member. I thought I’d pass it along as it’s a really good story.]
3 weeks ago I'm reading the internet under the SoCal mtb web page and it has a 28 mile fire road out and singletrack ride back. The ride boasted beautiful views and a winding singletrack back thru a canyon. I called a couple riding partners: Mica and Dean. Mica had just bought a new bike and was riding clipless pedals for the first time. We tell the wives that we will be back around noon and we started at 8am.
The first 12 miles was a steady climb cresting a small mountain divide than we found our singletrack at the 13 mile mark. The trail was alot of fun in the beginning, fast downhill and somewhat technical in some places due to the partial rock slides that had partially covered the trail. We descended about 4 miles and lost the trail, it was gone! So instead of just turning around and walking/riding out we decide to search for this trail. After crossing a creek and bush whacking we find the trail and continue on our merry way. We continue down for another mile and lose the trail again, so we hike our bikes again and find the trail again. By now we're thinking that we're in too far to turn around we might as well press on in hopes that the trail gets better. For the rest of the day we are playing this game called "hike a bike" in an old river bed crossing a creek numerous times, our pace had slowed way down to about a mile and a half an hour due to the big rocks and hiking up the sides of the old river bed and in many places bush whacking thru the thick vegetation. Mica flatted and it was a very welcomed stop to fix it, I had asked what time it was and Mica told me it was 1 pm, I said things are about to get ugly its in the upper 80's and we're all running short on water and we're an hour late now and the trucks are nowhere in sight, the girls are probably a little worried by now. 2 pm rolls around we're all out of water I sucked down a Camelback and a water bottle, Dean had the same, and Mica, well, Mica is Mica he only had 2 water bottles (poor bastard). 2:45 rolls around and Dean decides to go up ahead and find help for Mica because Mica is falling way behind complaining of head aches and is spending alot of time in the creek to keep cool. It's now 3:30 Mica stops and says I can't go any farther I'm totally bonked out so I decide to give one of my pep talks, "You're in the middle of f#$%ing nowhere, what, you're just going to give up now?" So I tell him I'm going to go up this trail if you want, wait here and I will find some help. I go up this trail its a pretty good climb but, the trail was good. I finally was able to get back on the bike and actually ride! I got out of the canyon and back to the truck around 4:15 and Dean wasn't there but, his truck was still there!? I still had no water because the trucks were locked. A jeeper had pulled in and I asked them if they had any water and they did. Then the Forest Rangers pulled in and they said, "We're looking for 3 guys that may be dehydrated trying to climb out of this canyon with mountain bikes." I said well, I'm probably one of them, and I was planning on going back down to give my friend some water he's at the bottom of the trail still." They said they would do it and about 15 minutes later Mica had finally made it on his own. I asked the forest rangers, "Where is our other friend?" They said, "We got the phone call from a person at a farmhouse on the creek, and that's all we know." I'm thinking there is no way that Dean came out on the trail that we did and rode his bike down to a farm house knowing that he would have to ride back up to his truck when he could have just drove to begin with. Mica and I drove around trying to find the farm house so we could give him a ride back up the 3 mile mountain pass, I know none of us were in any condition to want to do that after our little 9 hour dehydrated trek.
Finally we find Dean getting in his truck and we compare notes we told him that we found the trail and had to ride up the mountain pass to the trucks. He had told us that he didn't find the trail and he hiked straight down the creek and found a little farm house.
Here comes, "Strange Days." When he got to the farm house he thought to himself I've been here before. He knocks on the door. An older gal opens the door and looks at him strangely as if she had seen him before. Dean looks at her and says "We have to quit meeting like this." She says, "I hope nobody is hurt this time."
Dean ended up hiking to the same farm house that he had to hike to 5 years ago. 5 years ago on a dark night Dean was a passenger in a Cherokee Warrior (small 4 passenger airplane) the inexperienced pilot departed (probably over weight) and tried to outclimb Mendenhall peak the little plane lost lift and crashed into the mountain. Dean was the only person in the plane that could walk away he had struggled, stumbled in the dark to a small farm house and called for help he ended up saving the other 3 people's lives. The other people had various injuries from broken back to broken legs, the only reason that he was able to walk away is probably because he was in the back, the people in the front probably literally cushioned him, and he was extremely lucky. Meanwhile, the girls had also called the forest department and were in the middle of talking to the police department to get a search and rescue copter out to look for us, this was luck also one wife was on the phone and got a beep on her phone and hoping that it was one of us she put the police on hold and it was one of our other friends calling in to tell her that he had found us.
If you liked this story wait until you hear my story from Moab and Leadville, CO from our first mountain ultra.
Check out back issues of the Mudnews newsletter in the Mudnews Archives. See you all out in the mud! - GrrRiz