Summer Mountain Biking

Shortly before leaving for Williamsburg (i know, that was over two weeks ago), i decided i wanted to get a last mountain bike ride in before leaving. But by the time i got whatever done i needed to get done that day (actually, i probably didn't get anything done; it's more likely i just messed around all morning) it was already late into the afternoon and sweltering hot in the Salt Lake Valley. Something was going on that evening, and if i wanted to go riding i needed to go now, but where?

Enter Solitude Mountain Resort in Big Cottonwood Canyon. Although you have to drive up the canyon a ways, the cooler temperatures are definitely worth the extra 15 minutes you have to drive. And not only was i rewarded with much more pleasant temperatures, but a blanket of wildflowers as well!

While the resort does offer lift-served hiking and biking, i didn't see enough trails to justify the cost of the lift pass. Besides, i got more exercise biking up anyway. But it was a great ride that i'll definitely revisit to escape hot afternoons in the valley. Plus, they had frisbee golf up there too! I need to go check that out as well.

Overall, a great 6 mile bike ride!

Fast forward to this past weekend (i know, i know, you still want me to rewind to the Grand Canyon and even Williamsburg, and i will, but these are short easy posts)... On Friday Jared, my bro-in-law, Bill, my biking buddy, and i went out to Deer Valley in Park City. Deer Valley is one of Utah's premier ski resorts in the winter, and it definitely lives up to its rep in the summer as well. Bill and i typically try to get out here at least once every summer for our birthday presents to eachother. But i definitely need to get out there again before the end of the summer, what a blast!
Here i am cruising down from the top of the Sterling Express Lift to the trail hub in the Meadow. If you watch closely you might see me catch a little air. Well, actually you won't, Jared was standing in the wrong place, but i did get some air i tell ya!

Here's Bill rocketing through some Aspens on Deer Camp.

Here's Jared on Deer Camp. Although this was Jared's first lift-served downhilling experience he wasn't near as entertaining as Topher, another bro-in-law, last year. Granted, Topher may have been so "entertaining" last year that he opted out this year. BTW, if you don't know, the real entertainment from these rides comes from spectacular wipe-outs. But you can see all the Aspens, they get pretty close to the trail and Jared did show me one wound that came from getting a little too close to one of those trees. And don't get me wrong, he was still real entertaining, he was the only one gutsy enough to try a lot of the freestyle features. more on that later.

Here i am cutting a turn one of my favorite trails, Deer Crest. Man that trail is FUN!

Although Bill and I have been moutain biking for MUCH longer than Jared (over 15 years vs. maybe 5 for Jared), Jared, as usuall, put us to shame. I'm ashamed to admit in all my years of riding at Deer Valley i've never bothered trying any of their freestyle features. i just figured they'd be too hard-core or something. But Jared got us all excited to try a few of them out, and they were actually pretty fun!
Here's Jared's first attempt on the Teeter-Totter.

Although he does end up making it on his first attempt, as you can see, it almost got REALLY entertaining at the end - almost.
Here's Jared's second attempt (his third attempt was basically the same as the second)...

Jared's fourth and fifth attempts were succesful (although he almost got bounced off on the fourth), but i think you get the point. And besides, don't you want to see me try? No? Well too bad, it's my blog.

I think i would've made the first attempt if my bike hadn't decided all by itself to shift gears at the last second - go figure i had perfectly tuned it the night before, but nooo, get it on the trail and it all goes to pot!
Here's my second attempt:

Right after the Teeter-Totter was a little raised platform with a narrow entrance. I, uh, have really fat tires, and couldn't get up the narrow entrance, but i told Jared i'd tape him doing it. Of course, he hadn't actually seen it yet...

Naturally, he made his second attempt, although he did almost endo coming off the drop at the end (he hadn't seen that either...).

And here's Jared catching some air off another freestyle feature on on Homeward Bound. Bill got some air here too, but my camera didn't quite catch him in the air, doh!

But here i am getting some air off the jump too...

I know it doesn't look very big, but it was really HUGE! ... or something.

Overall, we biked over 26 miles - granted, most of it was downhill (and by most, i mean 99%). But what a blast! And downhill or not, by the end of the day, we were all beat! We were at Deer valley from about 11am when we got on the first left until about 6:30pm when we got back to the car (after two flats, three if you count the one Bill had when we first got there), but go figure our actual riding time was under three hours. Don't ask me how that works out.

Mueller Park

We interrupt this vacation report... Wait a minute, who am i kidding? No one has made it through an entire post yet. Apparently, my goal of one trip post per day has already fallen by the wayside. Doh! I was just too busy. And and now i'm a little behind, no wait; i've fallen behind. There, that's better.

Anyway, the other day i finally convinced Joe, my brother-in-law, to take the dirt bikes up Mueller Park. Mueller Park has long been one of my favorite mountain bike rides, and i had seen dirt bikes on the trail a number of times (there are also some signs indiciating dirt bikes are permitted). Anyway, there's a couple of trails that head off from the meadow at the top that i had always wanted to explore. i hoped they would either connect with the City Creek trails or traverse the ridges north or south. But the trails would usually get too rocky to be enjoyable on a mountain bike. On dirt bikes i figured we could actually explore for a while.

Unfortunately, either the trails were really, really old or were just game trails. (Joe is actually standing on the trail, and where i'm standing, taking the picture, is also on the trail).
The one that went up eventually became too overgrown to even find on foot.
And the one that went down looked like it would probably connect in City Creek, but was so overgrown and steep that it wouldn't be enjoyable on a bike. Oh well, now i know.

Since the last time i rode up there (probably four weeks ago), the flowers have really popped up all over the place. Really, really pretty. And going back down the backside was actually much more enjoyable on a dirt bike.

And we only got a couple of crusties from anti-motorcycle trail users. Oi! Don't get me started on anti-trail or anti-trail users. No seriously, you don't want me to get started - you know i'm long winded.

I highly recommend this trail to mtn. bikers, hikers, and yes, even motorcycles. However, i must insert that i also highly recommend that bikes and even more so motorcycles, exercise extreme caution when riding this trail. It's not that it's difficult, it's just a very, very popular trail and thus very busy.

My personal recommedation is that motorcycles only ride in off-peak times or just take the backside trail. I only attempt to ride it on my bike when i figure i'll be one of the first or last ones on the trail, or in the middle of the week between breakfast and lunch or right after lunch. Just because you're allowed doesn't mean (ignorant) people won't complain and try to have you banned from the trail - jerks.

These are actually all pictures from the backside of Mueller Park (except the couple up top while we were exploring). We tried to get off of the front side as quickly as possible to annoy as few people as possible. But don't get me wrong, the vast majority of the trail users we encountered were extremely polite and pleasant.


It absolutely amazed my how green this trail still was! Oh, and some kind soul or souls cleaned all the obstacles off of the trail, so it's all ride-able, well, at least for someone like me. It may have already been ride-able to everyone else before.


This is actually a little closer to the bottom. The picture does not do justice to all the wildflowers that were out. So pretty!
I wonder if planting some of these in my garden would be a mistake...

Oh, and Dacia and Joe have been asking me for a while for a picture (hopefully) like this, is this kind of like what you were looking for?

Summer Adventures in a Winter Wonderland

So i had an appt. with the Dentist yesterday, but lucky for me it wasn't until 3. What's that mean? That's right, time for a ride. Only one thing, i haven't been riding since July. And even then, those were lift-served rides, so they hardly count. What with work, and projects around the house and well my general laziness i just haven't found or made the time very well the latter part of this summer to get out and ride. So yesterday morning after we dropped the kids off at school i had Jen take me up Big Cottonwood Canyon to the trailhead for the Wasatch Crest Trail. And this is the scene that greeted me. Did i mention that the recent rainstorms in the valleys brought snow to the mountains? I foolishly assumed it might be gone from the mountains. Occasionally, it was, but in it's place i found mud! Yay!

So why did i choose to ride when there was a good chance there'd be snow and mud? Well, mainly i forgot, but i also really wanted to get some good fall colors before they were all gone. So let's count 'em up: i'm fat and out of shape, there was snow and mud, and i decided to take my camera with me. And in spite of all this, i hoped to finish in time to still make the dentist. Think i made it?

The ride kicked my butt in a way i didn't really think it could. Sure, i was outta shape, but that outta shape? I guess so. Don't get me wrong, i wasn't collapsed on the side of the trail or anything, but i definitely took more breaks than normal (to take pictures, of course) and went much slower than normal (HELLO granny gear).

Unfortunately, it seems that up high most of colors were already gone. But that doesn't matter, the trail and surrounding mountains are always beautiful. Look at that sweet singletrek!

The picture above is looking south towards Little Cottonwood Canyon. Below is the section commonly referred to as "the Fin," a short rocky section that's all but unrideable, at least by me. The picture is looking north east in the general direction of Park City.

Below is Desolation Lake, looking West towards the Salt Lake Valley. The benefit of the ride is that it's not too often you get to see too much of this with snow. It's fairly difficult to get here in the winter.

I love Aspens. I love the sound they make when the wind blows, the color their leaves turn in the fall, and most importantly: riding sweet singletrek between them! Granted, i wasn't getting much in the way of a variety of colors, but hey, yellow is pretty.

This is headed back into Mill Creek Canyon. Very pretty, but unfortunately the last dry section of the upper trails. The rest of the way to the Dog Lake Trail was either covered in snow, or mud. Sweet mud... in my eyes, ears, nose, but that's okay, by this time i was already covered.

Fortunately, the rest of the canyon was fairly dry, or at least it wasn't covered in snow. There were some puddles and if i hadn't been in a hurry (because i was going so slow) and already pooped, i would have probably enjoyed it.

These pictures don't do justice to how covered in mud i was. Also note my poor camera bag. Oh, and my poor bike. It took almost an hour to clean the dang thing. And by clean i mean not dirty, not actually clean. Oh, and of course, poor dentist. Since i took so long, i didn't have a chance to clean up before heading over to the dentist. Jen wouldn't even let me sit on the seat in the car, i had to sit on my jacket. Speaking of Jen, i thought we'd have to stop on the way to dentist so i could negate the healthy value of my ride with some greasy food from Wendy's, but guess who made me two sandwiches? What a wonderful wife i have!

There ya have it, my little adventure. Lessons learned? I'm out of shape (i kind of already knew that though) and should ride more. Hopefully, i can take advantage of whatever nice weather we still get this summer/fall. Oh, and i have a great wife, but i already knew that too.