Heartbreak Ridge on a Monday

I parked at Curtis Creek and started climbing. It was nice to see this creek with a little water.

A long climb to the top.Made it onto the parkway:

There was a little smoke in the distance. I noticed some close to Marion on my way to the trail head.

What an incredible ridge line

Finally on Heartbreak. The trail had some downfall that I had to pick up. Most of it was dead trees that had fallen over during the windstorm yesterday. I had to wrestle a few of the bigger logs but managed to clear a path through everything except the downfall that was already there before the windstorm. Some areas also had alot of leaves piled up but not for very long stretchs, overall it was "good to go". Sweet, sweet single track. Mostly frozen ground which made for some excellent trail conditions

The views from Heartbreak are some of the best

Onto Jareds Creek road.

There are some pretty nice views from Jareds Creek as well.

Total mileage: 28 miles

Total elevation gain: 8,739 feet

Starting elevation: 1,774 feet

Maximum elevation: 4,758 feet

Total time: 5 hours 30 minutes

Moving Time: 4 hours 6 minutes

Stopped time: 1 hour 23 minutes - mostly spent clearing trail -it'll be good to go next time

Avg speed: 6.8 mph Max speed: 35.7 mph

Amos' Epics

2/7/08 Thursday morning at Wilson Creek

Wilson Creek was running just a little below -3" when I got there at about 8:30. I had a nice solo run and jogged my shuttle.

7:30 a.m. Rendezvous @ Mortimer

Josh and I met at Mortimer right at 7:30 - actually it was probably 7:34 when I drove up but Josh was ready to go. We were pedaling along Wilson Creek by 7:38 a.m. - really. I'm glad I had gotten dressed and mostly ready at home. It is very cool to ride on the forest service road early enough to hit it when it is still frozen and not the slurpy, slush it became by the afternoon.

This was his first trip to birthday knob:

The forest service road was frozen hard solid all the way up Wilson Creek Rd and C.C. Rd. When we hit the saddle and took a right, the ground started getting thawed out and the temps warmed up significantly. When we got to the top of the forest service road and started on Raider Camp, there was immediately some serious fallen trees and heavy branches. We worked for a long time on multiple trail jams - there was some significant devastation through there. We managed to clear a passable route through most of the downfall after downfall but there were a few places we could only clear enough to carry our bikes through the mess - these will require help of the chansaw nature. Luckily the further in elevation and distance we worked our way down Raidercamp, the clearer it became and was good to go after a distance. Still, that was the slowest I've ever traveled that section of Raidercamp but all the work will be worth it the next time we ride it. I'm more sore from the trail work than the bike ride!

In the photo above Josh was pushing one of the areas we just cleaned and heading towards the next down fall just past where I was standing, no point in riding that short distance. Notice the ice chips on the trail. They were all pretty big and had fallen off of tree limbs/branches.

Finally made it to the Upper Falls.

Another first time visitor to the falls.

Distance: 20.3 miles

Elevation gain: 5,141 feet

Total time: 4:13 Moving time: 2:43 stopped time: 1:30 (a lot this time was spent clearing trail by breaking/moving all of the breakable/movable limbs that broke and or blew over while frozen). Amos' Epics

Big O & then some more Pt. II

It was his first time riding this trail and I think Dan enjoyed it. A little "air time". Yeah, I think he liked the trail.

What is not to enjoy?

Onto a "there and back" that Dan knew all too well:

PT.II Distance: 21 miles

Elevation Gain: 5,037 feet

Total time: 5:08 Moving time: 3:04 Stopped time: 2 hours (it was a very casual ride)

Amos' Epics

North Fork of the French Broad River

I got up early and checked the levels. I hit the road with intentions of heading to either the North Fork of the French Broad or Big Creek. By the time I got to Ridge Crest at about 8:45, the ice had settled pretty heavily.

I talked to Wesley and we decided on the North Fork. We got to the river pretty early in the day. The gage under the Hwy 64 bridge was 1' 3". It was a nice juicy level.We met up with John at the put-in parking lot. He showed us how to smooth Box Car in a C1 then blasted on down solo. We took out time on the first run. It was the by far the best level I've paddled the North Fork.

The next guy covered his face so that he couldnt be identified.

Wesleys first run on the North Fork and his first run of Box Car. He did great!

This next rapid is called Submarine. The wall on the left is undercut and the hole is pretty sticky.

Wesley ran it first and was a little bit too far left in the shot below but he pulled it out and redeemed himself by smoothing the line on his second run.Post first run at the short takeout:

The next set of shots were all taken during the second run. We paddled down to the regular take out for this one and Wesley hitched a ride back up to the car.

It was a good day on the river with great levels.