Droughts and Forest Fires

Posted on August 23, 2004 by Smoke

Oh wait, that was last year.

Now it looks a little more like this.

On the ride today was Bill from San Fran up for his first North Shore experience. We also ran into the crew from the Bike Doctor in Missoula, who I’ve spoken with onthe phone numerous times but never actually met. I love serendipity.

This is what the Shore is supposed to look like.

All creepy and dark, with blurrry pics because its too dismal to focus.

I didn’t get the names of everyone, but this is a nice shot of the Gerbil Cage Extension.

Here’s Bill sliding around one of the huge trees on CBC.

Bill again.

Aww hell, they’re all Bill now. Top of Pangor.

Look, he’s riding logs!

..oh wait, no he’s not.

A last shot of the Pangor Swamp…

…and I’m spent.

Last Day….

Posted on August 21, 2004 by Smoke

…and the beatdown continues. An early start boded well today, especially as the dry weather looked to be coming to an end. There were intermittent raindrops all the way down, but no rain until the last few hundred meters.

as we were riding Seymour, could there be any other choice?

Calvin on CBC.

Eric on the edge of the Gerbil Cage Extension. Check out his tires.

Classic shot of the exit from the Zig-Zag line. I think that’s Gary on the log.

Here’s O’Dea about to end his day. He fell off the log and freakishly caught his ankle on the way in. I think its broken, but he refuses to go to a doctor.

Bug him for me until he goes, will ya?

Anyway, if you’ve noticed that he’s been absent from most of the shots, its because he’s been riding too close to me for the camera to come out in time. Especially in the last few days, John really rode strong this trip. He won’t believe me, but he greatly improved over the last year.

Here he’s toughing it out across the Millenium Log.

FunBobby tries to ride the wall.

Gary on Dirty Diapers.

Trask with Dirty Diapers.

FunBobby with clean shorts.

Calvin negotiates a bridge while King looks on.

Then on to Neds. Trask continues to flex off of everything.

Eric noses in. He stuck it though.

…and that’s it. Some more drinking and carrying on, plus an early departure the next day, but that was it for riding.

All in all, a very busy month.

And it’s still not over yet…….

Cypress Hill Beatdown

Posted on August 20, 2004 by Smoke

Yeah, Cypress.

It was just going to be one fo those days. As it turned out, it was the last of the dry days as well.

Here’s how things got underway.

Custom rotor shaping courtesy of the Mystery Downhill.

I can fix it. My Dad’s a TV repairman. He’s got the ULTIMATE set of tools.

It was overcast and with the thick sumer growth, really dark in the trees. This is just a long excuse for having a lot of blurry shots from today. But it was really dark. Honest.