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Thanks to everone for coming out and riding today. I had talked to Beth on phone after their friday ride, and they said it rained all day long on their ride friday. Plus it was alot cooler friday. There was only 20% chance of rain I thought. Well started heading toward huntsville on saturday morning, and about 5 or so miles of getting there the rain started in again.
So it was raining when we met at Winona road. Well we didnt drive all this way to not ride, so we headed on down Winona to our parking spot. Luckily the rain had quit by now. But the damage was already done from raining all day yesterday. I had us a pretty good route picked out, but after having trouble on the first little hill climb due to it being so slick, we had to figure out another game plan. As the original route had some big hill climbs that were going to be impossible today.
We started out 25 to 24. Which is a fun trail. It has one slight hill climb in it that gave us a little trouble. I was first one up and made it ok, but it was pretty slick. After we got up that, we continued on 24, where shortly after I dumped it in a mudd hole. Branch was down that sent my front wheel sliding and me face first into the mudd..
After that we hit 21 for a while and the plan was to do 61 off of 29, but I tried it, and there was no way. Just too slick and steep. So we continued on 29 out to the overlook. But before we got to the overlook I went thru a good sized muddhole, and there was a log in it that you can't see until its too late. So little added a little more mudd to my outfit at this point.
From there we took a little break at the overlook then had to figure out a different route as the original one was out of wack due to the rain. We decided take a chance on one of the hill climb trails, but we were going to go down it so it woudlnt be as bad as going up. We went down 56 to 77 then to 33. Then shortly on Brimstone road to 30 to 11 to 45 back to the truck for a lunch break. After that it was after 2 something, and most everone was ready to call it a day. But 5 of us decided to head back out (Beth and her husband Steve) and the Ohio guys and me. They had both invested alot of time and money coming down here to ride, so we wanted to make sure they got their money's worth
So we figured out a game plan, headed back down 25 to go to eastern part of 27. We wanted to skip the section of 27 next to new river, as I'm sure it was a total mess with all this rain. As its a mess on a dry day. So we did 27, then I originally was going to do 23 then get a game plan after that, but then I thought lets go up trail 22!!
Well 22 was slick as well, and we got to the top of the ridge, but then Beth realized she had busted her crank case cover. It was at the top so it would hold till we could get her back. So at the top of 22, we decided to go back way we came to nurse her bike back. Which is probably a good idea we did that, as it got dark quickly after gettin back to truck. Well on way back, there was a shortcut section of 23 that we took that is normally a fun trail. the lower section of it looks like the jeeps have really tore it up. It was a muddy mess. I was beginning to wonder if we might get stuck in it. But we made it out and back to truck. Where one of the Ohio guys let me ride his GasGas 300. This thing was a wheelie monster, I rode a good wheelie on it I bet 30 or 40 years effortlessley. Now I'm hooked! I think I'll put one of those on my Santa list
Here are the pics I took from the ride..
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