Sunday 31 May 2009 - Ourimbah

It was wet when we woke up, it was wet when we left, it was wet as we were driving, and - somehwat suprisingly - it was wet when Whisperer, Steve K. and Stephe arrived at Ourimbah.

We spent a long time hiding under Steve's van's shelter, and it didn't stop.

It did, however, stop when we left...

Ah, Mountain Bike riding - you're a cruel master.

Sunday 17 May 2009 - Terry Hills

Well, well, well...

For a long time now some of us have thought of Terry Hills as something to be avoided, unless it was time to take the family out for a dawdle or a training ride.  So, while Whisperer's suggestion that we head that way for a quick midday ride was happily accepted (it's nice that a registered 'roid' still wants to ride with us!), there was still some apprehension about the potential fun to come...

Turns out it was, as pretty well all mountain bike rides are(!), a hoot.

Phil, Brian (on a very freshly spruced up mount), and Stephe met Whisperer at the Terry Hills shops around 11.45am - a beautiful sunny day, and lots of roadies and a few other mountain bikers around.  We headed off along Mona Vale Road, dropped down Duckholes Track to the bottom - which was much more fun than previously anticipated.  Who knew that such an entertaining bit of single track was just sitting there waiting for us - albeit a relatively short stretch.

From the bottom, we wandered back up the bitumen to the Center Track (sp? waiting for advice on how much of this I have described correctly), with a very sharp and solid climb off the road to get back into it - which was a good challenge, and eased off into a decent climb back to the top gate of the National Park.

Another quick road section, to take us back to the lofty heights of Terry Hills, and then we were on to the Perimeter Track.  Which turns out, if you are being pushed along by healthy people (!), to be quite a bit of fun...  A few adjustments along the way (it's always handy having a bike whisperer along, eh), a quick opportunity to check out the view (about three quarters of the way out the Long Trail), and much fun was had.




By the time we'd finished gawking (and chatting to some of the many other riders and walkers out at that time of the day), time was running short and we headed back - slowed only by the sad and less fit members of the crew (tragically, very much aware of their limitations!). Oh, and the spontaneous race that emerged between Phil and an eight year old girl, where he was roundly and satisfyingly whomped...

Turns out that we managed a very respectable 32kms, came back happy, and had been introduced to even more possibilities in our own backyard - so that can't be a bad thing, eh!

Photos are here (sad, without Doug, of course), and the .kmz is here.

Sunday 3 May 2009 - Menai

A perfect day (albeit one that started out cold!), for what was intended to be a short ride around Menai, and then on to the basketball - Chris, Cooper and Stephe:



Track in good condition, although the motorbikes had churned a fair bit of it up recently - making many of the more challenging sections even more difficult. As some sort of karmic equaliser, we did see a couple of broken down trail bikes out there today - so perhaps the God of Mountain Biking is looking down and keeping things a bit more even!

Fair to say that the place was looking great, as ever:



Chris hadn't ridden for a while, and decided to push a few of the technical bits - leading to a little bit of skin scraping and the like - but it appeared as though he was having fun... Cooper was pretty happy until a bit over half way, when he discovered that the promised one hour ride had already covered that, and we were at the most remote point at that stage!



Unfortunately, things got worse as Stephe took a wrong turn on what was intended to be a short sharp run home - and we ended up meandering around a bit longer than anticipated.

That said, it was just a 15km dash in all, but much fun - as always.



The photos, such as they are, are up here.

Embed video pages

Here's a Metallica clip: