Crusty Cassette

A few more photos

A poor precedent.

"I'll meet you where the llama farm was," Caroll explained over the phone.

"Barr Road?" I asked.

I had tried the new calendar at http://twinriverscyclists.org as a means of sending out ride invitations.

When you create a new event in a Google Calendar, you are given the opportunity to invite guests and you can invite them from your addressbook. Very simple. I transferred most of my cycling addresses into a gmail account and there they were. I like this system and used it to invite some likely suspects to the Weiser River trail ride in May. As a result we ended up with a trial trail ride last weekend and several takers and maybes for next spring. Cool.

So why not for my ride invitations? And there was the light!

I have stopped sending out invitations to the list I've been using on the strength that the new twinrivers group should be more interactive. Not only do you hear from me but from all those others proposing rides and discussing them.

I am disappointed that so few of the original list members have actually signed up. Using the calendar to invite specific individuals seemed a clever idea and I was reinforced by Caroll Ellis's immediate Maybe. It was also nice to know for sure that Doyle and Dave Tibbals were not coming. Not that I wouldn't have enjoyed their company but I wasn't going to have to wonder if they were showing.

So Caroll's call was good news. We were talking and although it looked as though Caroll would be my only guest, I liked that the discussion had started. Caroll was being timid about joining what I have described as an endurance ride. Turns out she had her mother's promise to bail her out should she need sag some time during the day.

And just as I was putting on my helmet Saturday morning, Caroll called again. "Could you meet me at my house? I don't like that section of road from Barr to Web ridge."

So here was Caroll once again managing just the sections of the ride she wanted to do.

I already knew she'd call home before riding up Lindsay Creek, but when she began lobbying for a road bike ride on the gravel of web-canal so that we'd not have to climb up to Web Ridge, I called her on it.

"If you're trying to avoid Web Ridge, you have no business . . ."

". . . climbing to Winchester," she finished with a grin.

Some times you just have to set boundaries for Caroll. I think this managing of what portions of the ride you'll do, is likely a bad precedent. But I was happy to make this concession for Caroll's company today. And did I mention the light?

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So how slow was Caroll?

In her own words: I'm so slow the spiders are building cobwebs on my bike.

To be fair the webs were dangling off my bike as well. The spiders were having their annual outing spinning webs and letting them drift in the light breeze wherever they might.

But when we turned out on 95, Caroll sped off making me work to keep up. "Too much riding with Sean," I thought. She had a tendency most of the day to push herself a little hard though she was concerned both about slowing me down and with overdoing. I was confident she'd do fine. She had ridden from Palouse to Colfax in high winds earlier. This was going to be a cake walk.

And it was a great day for lolly gagging along the road.

On Wednesday the sun had come out making me turn a 30 mile ride into a 50. The forecast for the weekend was even better. This might be the last chance of the season to ride out of the valley and Winchester is my favorite ride. I knew it would be cold when I started and that it would likely be cold at Winchester, but temps in the 50s? If the sun is shining and there's no wind, I won't even need a jacket. I couldn't resist the invitation.

"Did you talk with Caroll all the way?" Linda wanted to know when I got home.

"Pretty much." Linda, of course, is a connoisseur of conversation and I knew she ached to have missed so much time with Caroll.

But we did talk. I learned that Caroll (shh) supports some form of socialized medicine. I learned she's enjoying meeting and coming to understand her new patients with patience. I shared my relief in being retired, my burnout with education and its issues. I learned Caroll has relatives all over these hills. And, finally, we agreed we both liked Sean better when his knee hurt him.

And there was the light.

Caroll had never ridden down Gifford-Reuben and was also looking forward to watching the fall colors. They didn't disappoint. We dropped arm and leg warmers for the climb up Winchester under a cloudless sky though cumulus clouds darkened over Winchester itself and we needed those jackets riding by the lake after lunch.

The air was clear and crisp as it so often is not in the summer. Trees of gold contrasted against the evergreen backdrops. A single evergreen in a field stood out against the stubble so golden as to be almost white in the slanted sun. There an occasional red tree stood among the yellow. The fields had been cut, plowed, in large swooping swirls accenting their swollen surfaces. A tractor swooped through burned and blackened earth spraying and raising a black cloud to remind us this was working country.

And, oh, the light. Bright but slant leaving long shadows even at noon to create lights and darks giving relief to landscapes too easily dismissed as bland under heat-dimmed, dusty aired, summer skies. Everywhere one looked, contrasts drew the eye. the light.

The light

Pennsylvania Colors

It felt so good to come home last night. I’ve been in Pennsylvania for the last 10 days with my mother. This has become an annual pilgrimage for her visiting friends and my dads relatives in Windber Pa (named for the Berwind Coal Co of about 75 years ago) which is near Johnstown ( Johnstown flood fame).

More Pennsylvania Pictures

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For a grey day, we had some pretty good fall colors.

More Photos

Steve's been trying to coerce TRCers south to ride the Weiser River Trail for two years.

Suddenly he not only has it on the club Calendar for next spring, but he actually has Doug proposing a ride this last weekend.

I was typically skeptical. A mountain bike ride? Drive all the way to New Meadows? But with Linda still in Pennsylvania (blog and photos are promised) and not many takers for local rides (McCracken's gone fishin'), I had no excuses.

I installed liners and new tubes and pumped up my tires, eyed the weather forecast and crossed my fingers. Since riding with Doug last Sunday on Asotin Creek, I've had one flat after another.

The pilot flatted on Tuesday. I changed the tire before my ride on Wednesday but, in haste, did not check closely enough for the offending object. I found myself changing a flat near the Trading Post. So that's two.

I stopped at TNT in town before riding home on the off chance that they carried 29er tubes. After Sunday I had no spare tube and was riding on patched tubes. I didn't want to make the drive to B&L and was pleased to discover TNTdid indeed did carry 29er tubes though I saw not one such bike in the shop.

At home I carefully changed both 29er tires inserting liners. That's four. In addition Linda's back tire was an old one I hadn't tossed and had used to replace the one with cuts before Joseph. I changed that tire with one of the two hardcase tires Sean had brought me at the board meeting. That's six tire changes. Maybe I should work in a bike shop?

While I did pump up my front tire twice during the ride, I never had a flat but my tires were the subject of some fun nevertheless.

"Who sold you those narrow tires," Steve needled.

"Sean. He said that's what he was riding and they would do well on the routes I usually rode."

Never secure on a mountain bike to begin with, when suddenly the trail surface intersected with a curve of road heavily graveled in granite bits, I stopped, thus avoiding a potential fall. Later Steve kindly suggested that my narrow tires rather than my bike handling skills were at fault. He also noted that "Sean tends to transfer his own skills to others" meaning that a trail condition Sean might find of no moment would not be so for a less experienced rider--me.

Several times on the trail I found myself unclicking as we navigated a gate designed to allow cyclists and deny cattle or when we rode over a section of trail the cattle had made their own special potty. It was both wet and sloppy and ridged and rough from the cattle hoof prints. In my own defense it was Doug, not myself, who actually went down on this section on the return trip.

Doug's Down

Eager for cycling victims Steve had arrived in New Meadows about an hour and a half early. On the way up I had warned Doug about the Largent Guide to North Idaho Cycling. Steve lived up to his reputation by announcing that he had used his time to drive around and had actually seen the trail.

Doug had expected to drive to the trail head near Tamarack Mill about eight miles south of New Meadows. Steve said, "It's just 3 or 4 miles from here." At 37 degrees, we bundled up. Doug made do with fingerless gloves having managed to bring to gloves for the same hand. He maintained he was comfortable but he never removed his tights or long sleeve jersey even when Steve and I did on the return trip. He didn't have shorts and a short sleeve option but he claimed he was comfortable.

Steve's idea of having seen the trail turned out to be a pleasant jaunt on the wrong road and the joy of carrying bikes over a barbed wire fence. We ended up back on the highway. But the next turn he got right. The little sign proclaimed Weiser River Trail. At least that's what he said. I was too busy just hanging on to my ride to bother reading trail signs.

Well, we were on the trail, but not the railroad bed. We were bypassing the Mill which meant a bit of climbing and another descent. We also paused a couple of times to decide which of the many equally seedy looking road beds was the correct one. Somehow we managed to descend on the right road to the railroad bed.

Crews have cleared and flattened a wide trail. Rain had dampened but not muddied the trail. Much of the first few miles was hardpan covered in a blanket of needles. Very nice riding and down hill. Steve was concerned. "I thought the maximum grade was 2%." We weren't working hard and the trail looked steeper than 2%. It turned out to be an optical illusion or we managed to miss this section of trail on the return trip by jumping out to the highway for the last 6 miles to New Meadows.

The trail surface varies often every few hundred yards. I've been on many dirt roads that were smoother than this trail even at its best. But dirt roads have a way of turning washboardy, rutted, and of presenting boulders emerging from the surface. Here's how the Friends of the Weiser River Trail put it:

"There are still rocky sections, a legacy of the ballast used for the rail bed, but the footing is excellent and suitable for the casual hiker or biker. We recommend hoof protection for equines if you plan on traveling more than a few miles."

Hoof protection. Good idea. Those little rocks seemed almost invisible to my bad eyes but I felt every one. Steve suggested riding this trail with out a shock might not be a good idea.

What the Friends fail to mention is that the trail winds through open range. We were greeted by a wide-eyed yearling who scampered through a fence and back to his herd grazing happily in a field. Not all the cattle were in the field, however. Some had taken up residence on the trail. Their leavings were evident for several miles. Including that one bad patch that took Doug down.

Doug called for the ride, but he's the new guy. When Steve suggested riding to Council for lunch, I took him seriously though I did throw in a PBJ and an apple just in case. Doug had wanted to do 40 to 50 miles but he also wanted to get home about 6. I was surprised when he told me that on the way to New Meadows. I planned for a 7:30 return. At 25 miles we had not quite reached New Meadows and Steve hadn't brought more than a bar. I wanted something beside that PBJ. Doug was torn but he decided to keep going. It was probably going to be too late for him to get back by 6 anyway at that point.

We ate in Council and started back with 30 to 32 miles depending upon whose computer you believed.

Chilled from being over warm before we stopped, we kept our long sleeves and leg warmers on for a mile or so. I rolled up my sleeves and took off my leg warmers. A few miles further on, I took off the long sleeved shirt. The climb was mild, but we were staying warm. Steve took off another layer of cotton.

Now Doug and Steve have much in common. Doug doesn't like our time zone. Steve hates it; Doug's a morning person. Steve is dismayed at TRCer's reluctance to get up early for a ride; Doug loves an adventure. Steve's a bit more staid but he can't resist the urge to explore an old building or turn in the road.

But they disagree on this one detail: Cotton.

Doug's GPS reported that the elevation change between New Meadows and Council had been only about a 1000 feet. Still we averaged about 10 mph on the return. With stops that meant 3.5 to 4 hours. Doug was beginning to feel the pressure to start home. He recommended we take the highway and avoid the rocky section of the Tamarack Bypass.

Out on the road, Steve and I found the increased speed also increased the chill. Doug smiled in his long sleeves and tights. I smiled 'cause nobody was laughing at my narrow tires anymore.