Episode V: Return to Hawes Pass

First, surprise!

This was an unexpected and glorious...upgrade my buddy made for me. At least the chainline is fixed ;)

He had been recommending the Gravity for quite some time, and I have to say that even with my limited experience with mountain bikes, this is quite a difference from the Diamondback I had been using. With 29" wheels, disk brakes, and a lower top tube I felt much more capable upon this steed. The only adjustment I might end up making would be slightly narrower bars for increased steering responsiveness.

But enough with the bike review. On Saturday we met up for another take at Hawes Pass. The original (more on that later) plan was to do the other route that he had picked for our first outing. With the increased daylight and earlier start, a longer ride wasn't much of a worry this time around. Everything started easy enough with a few scattered puddles from the previous days rain showers lingering.

The trail at this point was mostly flat and straight as it followed the canal. It wasn't long before we reached a fork and we had to decide where to go. Now, the rain we had just got was quite intense and these trails tend to get very rough after heavy rains. He warned me that if we kept straight on this trail then we would reach a hill that would be unrideable under the washed out conditions. I preferred to avoid that so we turned and headed toward the trails we had ridden the first time.

Along the way we came across a nice and scenic enclave and stopped to do some scouting-






Over there looked reasonable



Shoe tying-

Safety first...and rocks kept falling in

And obligatory inspirational bike posing-

 

 

After the photo shoot we continued on what was, at that point, familiar territory. It started to get more technical and I was growing overly cautious of pedal strikes on the narrow route. We passed a few trail markers and I chose to try to avoid the red rocks of death that had struck me down before and to do so would mean venturing out into an area he hadn't ridden yet. Alas, we soon remembered that we had to find our way back out of this treacherous wilderness.

That's an exaggeration, this area is really hard to get lost in. Probably the biggest benefit of living in the valley is that it's a valley. Find a hill and look around until you see the city and you know which way to go. That doesn't make it a small area though, by any means, and we knew this was going to end up being much more epic than that puny 3.5 mile ride he had counted on first.

At one point, we reached an incredibely technical portion. There was even another rider who ogled his singlespeed and gave him a "how-the-hell-did-you-get-out-here" look. I wish he had gotten a picture of it, but he was too busy crashing to bother with the camera. Slacker. Fortunately, though, that seemed to be the last of the really difficult stuff. We had both done a bit of walking by that point and were glad to be able to cruise. Actually, if I remember correctly, we were able to ride the rest of the way out.

In the end, I wish I had been a little more daring on some of the harder stuff, but I attempted most of it and I figure that's the best way to learn. The trip totaled 8.6 miles and was a great concoction of easy and difficult terrain. It is definitely a trail I wouldn't mind doing again.

 

 He also let me borrow a suspension fork to try out but the more I think about it, the more I would prefer to get a lighter rigid fork like he did. With a singlespeed, however, you don't have the option to compensate for a higher weight with an easier gear. I will probably throw it on anyway though just to experience it. Expect a future update on this.