Sunday 6 August 2006 - Redhill and Oxford Falls

Although the entire Redhill / Oxford Falls playground was saturated, we managed a ride today without a drop of rain during the journey.

The day started almost on time, with T-Bone, Brian and Stephe gathering at Lady Penryhn Drive, where we waited for Ed. Ed, who was running late (surprise!), then rang in and asked for instructions - somehow, he interpreted the instruction "Lady Penryhn Drive" as meaning "Morgan Road" - which we discovered when we rang him 15 minutes later... Ah, Ed. While waiting for his next attempt, we went into the newly refurbished Redhill 'playground' and tried to work out just how all those free riders do what they do... It was fun, and incident free (although T-Bone landed a couple of scary looking attempts).

Ed arrived, and we set off on the ride proper. Everyone seemed in good form, and - despite getting our feet wet in the huuuuge puddles that existed everywhere - the day looked promising.

That is, until we arrived at the Redhill technical rock section where, for the second week in a row, Stephe demonstrated that his luck had now really run out. What started out as a fun, and mildly aggressive drop down the rocks, turned into a wussy roll over a ledge, front wheel plant, face plant - four stitches in a split lip combo... Bugger.

We fixed the front tyre (another pinch flat in the course of the disaster), took basic medical treatment (Brian saying "are you ok" and the odd dab with a tissue), and pressed on - a slightly disturbed Stephe was a bit shattered from there on, but it was still much fun.

By the time we got to the Oxford Falls side, we were back in the groove and made a couple of good technical uphill challenges, which was satisfying. Unfortunately, the wet and slippery conditions contributed to a couple more accidents (T-Bone demonstrating that, if you get hurt in the first one, you should back off and not have another seven stacks in a row). Despite the increasingly poor form, we dropped into Deep Creek from the north side - which was still fun, even tho' we gave some of the bigger risks a miss.

An enjoyable burn back along Deep Creek, a sprint by Brian up the Sport and Rec hill back into Redhill proper (fitness is a glorious thing), and then Ed led us on a final charge from there back to Lady Penryhn.

Unfortunately, the mothers dropping off their children for a little play at the Redhill jumps were somewhat taken aback by the abundance of blood we displayed as we arrived back at the cars - we probably set back the kids' chances of further independence by another year or so!

If it wasn't for the pain - we'd have all had a great day. Unfortunately, with Doug still recovering from a bad back, no photos, no GPS.