Winthrop last year (video by Megan Rose):
Untitled from Megan Rose on Vimeo.
Winthrop this year:
VIDEO 2010 by ANdrew Dye!
Winthrop 2010 from Andrew Dye on Vimeo.
Our crew was a little smaller this year and sort of even smaller on most days due to people having to do some extra work/studying (and I wasn't one of them... yipee! for now).
Day 1 we all warmed up on Buck Mountain where the trails are relatively smooth, fast, and fun. We made it back to the car just in time for downpour #1. Kathleen and Angie had to head back indoors to do some work and the boys and I headed for bike ride number 2 of the day - Pipestone Canyon. It was a new route for Andrew, Paul, and I. The present half way up the steep climb was this amazing canyon that appears out of rolling hills. It was amazing, a great chance for me to get a breather in before the rest of the climb. The descent was rocky and more technical than Buck but beautiful. You descend into farm fields and then ride through forest and below the canyons... Winthrop, was not disappointing.
Day 2 typically our monster day of adventure and mountain biking. We woke up to rain, felt a little casual so decided on a 10 mile or so loop. We were up for trying a new area to keep our sense of adventure perky. Well, an adventure we got. We headed towards Tiffany mountain, about an hour drive or so from the house, up a really long logging road. We decided to park the car lower down in case we wanted to extend the loop form its original route on the map. The temperature dropped from 15 degrees to 10 since we left the house.. brrr.. you could feel the winter air not too far off. We started to climb, first on the road, a little descent and then climb, lunch, single track climb, hike a bike climb.... until we reached our second pass. A little descent through a forest that suffered from a forest fire years back we found ourselves at a junction. A little exploration eventually took us up what I thought was a cliff... minutes later I found myself with the others hike a biking on the side of the cliff.hmmm... I thought this little exciting hike would lead us to the down... the wind was picking up and the air becoming frigid... but alas we reached the pass to find out we were to go up around the ridge to the other side... oh yeah... really I love this stuff.. it reminds me of adventure racing which I love... so off we went on the side of the ridge most often then not pushing our bikes up the sandy, exposed slope. We finally reached Whistler Pass, the wind was fierce and my body chilled quite quickly.. We were off on the longer descent down to our cars.. this trail had obviously not been used in quite some time except for maybe a couple of hikers? last week? the trail consisted of a faint trail through hip high grass... it was interesting and different and well my favorite word: adventurous. I was feeling very very cold so was trying to just make it down before the chill through my body got any worse, my feet and hands were already numb. Happy to say we made it back to the car in good form and ready for beer and chips.
Day 3 Cedar Creek
We wanted to try a new trail not too far from the house. It was to be an out and back to a mountain pass. We didn't have all day on Monday as we needed to get back to our respective homes but the sun was shining in good Winthrop form, nothing better to do than go play outside in such fabulous weather. The start of the trail was steep but fairly smooth so rideable... we made it to the waterfall sweaty but happy. From the waterfall onwards for a good while the trail is steep, rocky, muddy and fairly difficult to ride up (well for me at least), I got some more practice at pushing my bike. Kathleen decided to stash her bike and just walk up... At some point Paul was feeling tired, and prob tired of pushing his bike so decided to head back down to take some pics along the way in the valley. Kathleen kept walking and Chris, Andrew, and I continued up the trail with our bikes in hopes of some smoother trails (like the book told us there would be)... happily fun single track trail appeared and into the valley we rode, the forest opened up and the mountain tops could be seen. The meadows were gorgeous. Due to time constraints Andrew and Chris made the decision to turn around, and head back down what we thought would be a slow and tricky descent. To my surprise the descent was awesome! totally rideable minus some very short sketchy rocks. It was fast and fun! We will have to come back and tackle this trail to the top next year, its a good one!
live, love, laugh,..DREAM!
lina
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