THE Superbowl Ride

Sometimes all the elements of a great ride come together in one day, creating a sweet vibe that you can keep riding long after the bike has been hung up....Sunday was one of those rides.

After meeting up w/ Jay, Christian and JDG at the WaWa for early morning fuel and coffee, me and Crankee hit the road towards Harrisonburg, Jay hops in the back.... Once in town, we dodged what seemed like the area's entire Menonite population and their horse-drawn-carriages, to park at the ride meeting lot off Briery Branch (or whatever it's called).

We hit the road, but quickly found the impending climb would require at least one less layer of clothes. (the climb up to the top is about 3000') The cool thing about the climb is the road has virtually no traffic and allows a nice social atmosphere which helps to keep your mind off the pain of grind up....

....the easy part

I don't know if it was the WaWa energy drink, or breakfast, or pent-up stress or what, but I was feeling pretty unstoppable up the climb....I wasn't hammering it but found a nice steady groove....Originally I thought riding the SS might be complete torture, but I'm finding as long as you have the appropriate gear ratio (this one was 32x20), just about any ride is perfect on a single-speed.

Up on Flagpole we hung around to snack and savor the Dale's Pale Ales (THANKS JAY) and stick around for the group shot, then made our way back to the trail for the multiple choice quiz on the way down....
We chose option 3 which was supposed to give us a little more ride time rather than a 20min bomb down the mountain. The snow melt on the mountain (it reached at least 50 F) turned the roads and trails into something more like a flowing brown water cascade river in some areas....

getting muddy is FUN

I taste dirt

We rounded Meadow Knob and then found our way up to Oak Knob but somehow missed a turn that should have dropped us back into Hone Quarry.

The day was getting late and we were scrambling to guess our way back as the trails we chose put us into the backside of a cattle farm. After a very short debate, we all determined that the shortest distance between where we were, and where we needed to be, meant jumping the fence and free-riding across farm.

Once hopping numerous barbed wire fences and one gratuitious electric fence, we found pavement again and trekked back to the parking lot, only to find that our cars were the only ones left in the lot.....guess everybody else was ready to go watch some football or something....wusses.

Great friends, awesome weather, beautiful mountains and nearly zero mechanicals.....Awesome day in the GWNF.