MTB Mrazek

As the weekend rolled closer, it was time to start contemplating the riding options....Duane and I had been trying to synch up for a ride for a while and schedules just did not cooperate - until Saturday.  The plan was to meet at Shevlin and then head up Mrazek until we hit snow.  It was good to ride the trail early and have it to ourselves.  Mrazek is usually much less busy than Phils and people tend to forget about that trail until later in the year when it hooks into the middle ridge trail system (once the snow melts up high).

We got to the intersection up higher and decided to take our chances until the snow shut us down at around 5,200 ft.  For the first time, I took the little connector trail that parallels the main trail above the higher junction.  It was really fun!  Short, but FUN!
As always the descent went by too quickly and once we got lower we started to run into people.  It was a little surprising to see that many people on Mrazek this early in the season but I suppose we were not the only ones taking advantage of the recent good streak of weather.

The early start also meant I had a chance to salvage the rest of the day for errands and chores.

MTB Ashland

While visiting friends in the old stomping grounds this past week, I managed to sneak in a couple of rides while there (palm to forehead).  I forget how good the mountain biking is in Ashland - probably because I was not into riding while living there....The long , steep climbs with some super fun descents make for short punchy rides.  My rides did not exceed 18 miles in length, but they made up for the 'shortness' by adding some elevation punch of over 3,000ft...most of which was all in the initial 5 miles of climbing.  In some ways. it is like Oakridge in that you climb up steep fire roads with little relief - it is a constant grind, but the pay off is pretty sweet too!

They were doing some logging in Ashland so a big chunk of the popular trails were shut down due to logging operations to thin out the area.  I stayed on the north side towards Wagonner / Ostrich Peak and still managed to get in some great riding.

As part of the logging operations, they were also doing some controlled burns which was a little weird since it was a big enough controlled burn to make a guy wonder whether it was in 'control'...it was a bit eerie being above the burn and seeing that bad boy going.  Fortunately I was on the other side of the trail system since that area was pretty well shut down due to the operations going on there...and understandably so!

Some pix of the riding:

Mt A in her glory -

 the trail completely disappeared at this logging area - weird....

 The goods!

 Great trail conditions - super tacky all the way up to around 5,000 ft.

Mt Mcloughlin off in the distance -

 Winding your way down singletrack off Hitt Road - connecting to the irrigation just above the park...all connected - very sweet!

Splittie Daydreamin' - Thielsen

I went down to Ashland mid-week to visit friends and could not help but stop on my way down and take a gander at Thielsen.  The skies were crystal clear and Thielsen was beaming.

The challenge is to time it such that the approach is feasible....mid winter and it would be a longgggg slog to the base through deep snow...it seems like a Spring approach would be ideal - you could perhaps hike part of the way in and then find the right slope/conditions to play on.  The longer daylight hours would be an added bennie in having a little more wiggle room relative to finding the right beta.

MTB Phils

The Spring days are motoring right along....unfortunately so is the lag in blogging!  Doh!  After the Mac Pass Saturday, I stayed more local on Sunday and tried to get a 'long'ish ride in.  I once again did the lower Phils big loop heading up Ben's to Road 300 and then up to Helipad via the road...then down Storm King to COD and back up Phils for a quick out/back to wrap it up before heading back home.

While returning via COD, I ran into a group of 3 riders who were stopped in the first tek section of the trail.  I stopped and as I mumbled the words 'Are you guys OK?', I saw why they were stopped.  One of the guys had fallen and subsequently broken his handlebars!  It was snapped like a dry twiggie!  It freaked me out a little because my nightmare has always been the potential snap of a carbon bar - that could be a really bad day!  The rider had endo'ed his bar had a direct hit with some rock which snapped the bar.  It was pretty crazy looking.  It was a clean break...so don't overtighten that carbon!!!!

Fortunately, the ride was uneventful for me....the days of long daylight hours are arriving, as is the days of longer rides!

Mac Pass Roadie

After slacking a little on the saddle time lately, it was time to try to make a concerted effort to get some ride time in during the weekend.  The weather was clearing and warming and the bike was begging to dish out some abuse.
I had heard that they had started to plow Mackenzie Pass beyond the gate where cars are not allowed access.  Someone told me last year that you could ride beyond the gate up to the pass until they officially opened the pass to cars.  For bikers it is downright dreeeeaaammmmyyyy....no cars on the road to compete with (or more importantly share the road with while fearing for being run over).
The big unknown was how far up they had plowed and just how much riding/climbing was possible.

I parked in town at the park and rolled out past the school and made my up the road.  There were not many cars prior to the gate (no through traffic) and as a result it made for a pleasant ride up.  Soon enough the angle pitched up and it was time to work.  As the grade increased, so did the work rate and soon enough we were at the aforementioned gate which was closed and blocking off the road.
A quick pedal around the gate and the climbing continued.  So far, so good....the road was mostly melted relative to snow and the higher I got, the snow started to stack on the side of the road.

The climb just continued to give but the scenery was amazing.  Unfortunately it was overcast and the views were somewhat limited but having a road like that to yourself is pretty dang sweet!  The snow banks continued to get higher and higher until I reached a point right by the observatory where the machines had not yet broken through.
Ride Summary:

The weather was a little less than ideal towards the top and I could see fresh snow about 1000 ft above me on the trees.  The wind picked up and a couple of menacing looking clouds hovered as they got blown in.  The descent was a little chilly and I took the sights in and rode carefully as there was some debris on the road in a couple of spots (not to mention the snow melt water trickling across the roads.

Soon enough, the temps started to warm back up as the altitude ticked away...all too soon it was back at the car.  I did not ride as long as initially planned (weather played a little role) but it was good to get a flavor of the climb and the status of the plow/road.

some pix:

Bend Bouldering - Widgi

The temps are warming up in Central Oregon and that means access to stone!  Last summer was spent trying to settle into the area and homestead which unfortunately left little time to get back into the climbing habit...Now that things have settled a little bit more relative to the routine, it is time to explore the bouldering opportunities in Bend.

We busted out to Widgi on Thursday to check out the area.  The temps were great, the road access was dry and it was game on.

There were some really nice lines but it might take additional exploring to find the cherry problems.

Some of the stone:

MTB Storm King Tack!

Saturday's fun included a ride from home to the Phil's trail system where it was time to explore and see how high the trails were riding before encountering snow.

I spent Friday evening prepping for Saturday's ride by trying to get my nutrition ready so there would be little to think about in the morning.  The recent local weather pattern was more stable (albeit colder) in the a.m. with more disturbance in the afternoon.  I figured the best plan of attack was to bundle up and get out early a.m. in order to avoid later in the day weather as well as the added bonus of fewer peeps on the trails.

As I started to get my nutrition together, the lonely bottle of ginger beer kept looking at me longingly so I obliged and made myself a few Moscow Mules to wrap up the week.  The big question was whether the goodies in the right of the photo would impact the goodies on the left the following day...after battling the good and evil influences on my shoulders, we compromised on a little imbibing to be followed by a fair amount of riding!

After a good night's rest, it was time to wake up and rally for the cold temps.....once layered it was time to hit the road and start spinning!  Yeehaa, it feels good to be back in ride mode!

The plan was to ride up to Helipad and catch Storm King to COD and back down to Phil's proper.  I am going to start calling this route the lower Phil's big loop since it goes up one side of the trail network on the Skyliner side and then traverses over to the east side on Century and catches the eastern most trail back into the Phil parking lot.

One of my favorite trails in the Phil's network might be Storm King...the Storm King elves have been busy as of late as the trail conditions were perfect!!! The elves must have put in a long evening of sweeping the trails so they were buttery smooth...not only that, but perfect tacky....

at the SK junction -

 enjoying Storm King.....

 can you tell where the  trail is?  Those trail elves did a nice job of sweeping it out....

Splittie Vid Stoke

Gotta' LOVE people who are out there chasing their passions!

Crater Lake Spliboarding - Garfield Ridge

The second day of backcountry play at Crater Lake was going to be a bit of a mystery to us since it had been raining non stop in the low lands since we returned from our Saturday's session of snowblast.  We decided to head up to  the ridge that gains access to Garfield Peak and then dig a pit towards the top and see what the snow conditions were.  Where it rained all day/night in the low country, that precip was in the shape of snow up at Crater Lake.  There was lots of new snow and it was time to figure out just how much and just what kind....short version...over a foot of fresh...and it was on the heavy side.

We zigged and zagged our way up the steep ridge and then found a good place to dig a pit.  We got our shovels out and started the due diligence...after digging a pit, we shaped a column to perform the compression test.  The first thing we noticed in the snow pack was that there was a warm rotten layer (big layer) about 14 inches down.  It appears like there was a warm up for a few days and then the new storm rolled in and dumped about a foot of new snow on that rotten layer.   That new snow must have insulated the lower/deeper layer which remained 'marbly'.   We figured that it did not get cold enough for that layer to re-freeze since it was still 'wet'.

The compression test yielded alarming results...after three light whacks on top of the column with our shovels the column started to collapse at the first weak layer which was higher than we expected:  about 5 inches down.  It look like it was Sunday's snowpack on top of Saturdays windblown or rain pack.  We quickly concluded we would stay in the lower angles in the trees and avoid anything that looked like a an avie path/terrain.

We re-ran the tests on a second column and found the same results...we then also dug a bigger block to do the block test, and just weighting the block started to show the weakness.  It was pretty sobering.  In our minds we realized certain slopes would be red and we would stay away from those!

After filling in the hole we dug, we went into ride mode and found amazing snow and riding through the trees!  There was only 1 other person out exploring while we were out.  It turns out he was a park employee who lived at the base of the ridge...pretty good spot to work/live/play!

On our way down, Bob approached a series of rocks that he caught just in time before core shotting his board or catching about 20 feet of air....

All in all, it was an awesome weekend shared in the backcountry.  Each time we head out down there, we get a little smarter about the opportunities that the terrain offers, and more importantly we get a little more in tune with the conditions down there.

The snowpack is definitely sketch due to the windloads, amount of snowfall, and the weak layers.  This could be an issue if it does not get cold enough up there for that layer to freeze and bond.  The lesson served as an incentive to go back and bone up on wet slabs and avie literature....

As the show Hill Street Blues line goes 'Let's be careful out there!!'

Some pix:

Crater Lake Spliboarding - The Watchman

Hodgie and I managed to synch up this past weekend at his cabana and use their cabin as base camp for  some splitboarding around Crater Lake.  The plan was to check out the Watchman and then perhaps do another tour the following day of the Garfield ridge again.

We woke up to rain at the cabin and had our suspicions about the snow conditions up at Crater Lake.  As we drove up, the rain turned into snow.  As the rain turned into snow, the snow started to howl sideways and we knew we were in for a treat of a day when we got out of the car at the rim and got a rude awakening of gusts of snow flying into our faces.

Hodgie was breaking in his new splittie (Burton splittie that is) and there was no better place to break it in than the snow of Crater Lake.  We did not dilly dally too long in getting into tour mode for the approach to The Watchman.  The approach would follow the rim for about 3 miles until we hit the hill. The only problem was visibility was very limited (at worst it was about 25 yards and at best it was about 100 yards), so it was going to prove interesting to try to figure out when we were at the base of the Watchman.

The wintery snow wind mix continued as we followed the rim.  At times the wind would pelt us in the face with snow...getting sandblasted by snow...or in this case snowblasted.  These were not exactly the type of 'face shots' we were hoping for but we trudged along stubbornly as the wind howled even more stubbornly.

We stopped along the way a few times to see how the snow was accumulating due to the wind and we did some quickie tests to see how stable the snow was.  The area had received warm spring like weather over the past couple of weeks and this new snow was accumulating quickly on top of that warmed up snowpack.

The wind swirled, it was at our back...it was hammering us sideways....it changed to frontal shots...it was all over the place.  There were a couple of spots where we were sidehilling on scoured snow/ice...and other spots where we were breaking trail 3-5 inches deep.

We found our objective of the Watchman and started to ascend.  We were not 100% sure as we could not see the hill or the outline to determine whether we were in the right spot.  After some ascending we knew we were on the right path and forged to the top.  The higher we got towards the top of the hill on the rim, the harder the winds blew.  We made it to the lookout tower and took off our equipment and checkout out the windblown/ice popsicle that looked like it was in the shape of a lookout tower.  We took a couple pix, imagined where the lake was and pontificated about how amazing the views must be when not in the middle of a blizzard!

We changed into ride mode and headed back down the hill where we got in a few great turns on some good snow and then decided we wanted to boot up (as opposed to skin) a shortie hill that had a great aspect and better snow.  As we worked our way up in waste deep snow, we started to realize it was going to be a lot of work for about 3 turns...sometimes 3 turns is worth a lot of work so we continued....

Three turns later we were at the bottom of the hill again and transitioning into skin mode for our 3 mile trek back to the cars.  Our return trip was much like the trip to the Watchman...more snow blasting, more blustering winds, although this time there was a little more 'whine' to go with the weather.  The wind was blowing so hard that we could not find our tracks from our trip to the Watchman.  Fortunately the return was brainless as we just followed the contours of what we thought was the road and rim back to the parking lot.

It was a great day out.  Each day in an area gets you more local knowledge about terrain, conditions, snow type, etc...so it will be going into the information locker for future reference...

some pix of the fun: