hurronnicane

It did just fall over but it hit a rock retaining wall at a perfect height to strike the frame. It made a really sickening sound. I was thirty feet away and knew immediately that it was badly damaged. I think my son is going to take it to C6 to get it repaired.

We pondered similar fixes. My doctor friend would probably put a plaster cast on it.

Though there is no good way to destroy a frame, this was one of the worst. After riding at Walnut Creek with my family on Wednesday, my son let his bike fall into a rock retaining wall while putting my wife’s bike on the rack. This bike has been solid contributor in the family. I rode it for years and when I moved up into a new bike I felt lucky that he my son had grown enough that it fit him, and he has become a beast on it. He was convinced that he could just wrap it with duct tape and keep riding it but it looks like it will need a lot more than that. Is it worth trying the local carbon repair folks on a ten year-old carbon bike? He was really bummed and lacks funds to start over.

My wife and I rode the lower portion of the Grindstone trails that circle the lake last summer. There were some long swoopy downhills that were really fun.

Zeus.

We have a neighbor in Dripping Springs that caught a jaguarundi on his game camera. The photo was not perfect but I was convinced. The tail and short legs are really distinctive.

Has anyone spent much time in Ruidoso, New Mexico? It has proximity going for it (a little over nine hours from Dripping Springs). We went through there last summer on our way to Yellowstone and managed to get in one ride at Grindstone Lake which was fun. Just wondering if anyone has more thoroughly explored the area. I know Shane at Canyon Cycles used to live there and has talked it up. Twenty five years ago we used to travel to the Cloudcroft area (just down the road from Ruidoso) for mountain biking, but my understanding is that Ruidoso has a more developed mountain bike trail system.

I used to ride with a buddy in Wimberley and we liked stashing thermoses of coffee or other treats without telling the other one. Then in the middle of the ride we would ride up on the coffee or whatever. Hot drinks were usually on bitter, cold-weather days. It made a good ride better.

We did the Engineer Mountain Trail years ago after a local suggested it was sufficiently burly. High alpine fun! We were there in August and there was a lot of lightning danger with afternoon thunderstorms. I think we started at little Molas Lake, followed the Colorado Trail for a ways, and then dropped a ton of elevation.

So I was riding at Muleshoe with my son and had a failed attempt on one of the ledgy climbs. When I went to retry it my crank wouldn't turn, which was when I noticed that my derailleur looked odd. It was up against the spokes. After messing with the derailleur and turning the bike upside down I heard the wheel shift in the dropout. At about the same moment my son noticed that the thru axle was was loose. When I turned the bike over the thru axle had almost fallen out of the dropouts, held only by the tension of the chain and the wheel being slightly askew in the dropouts. In thirty years of mountain biking I have never had my rear wheel almost fall off while riding. I guess I need to be more conscientious about periodically checking the tightness of everything...

Legal mushrooms seems like the obvious answer.

I have yet to see a snake on a ride this year, but there was this......

My first thought when I read it was that "way ether" was a bit of gnar terminology that I was just too old to understand. The trails look awesome, or way ether if you prefer.

"There is nothing more helpless and irresponsible than a man in the depths of an ether binge." Hunter S. Thompson

On a related (sort of) note, has anyone had luck gluing the pad of a mountain bike pad or cover(?) back to the body? The saddle doesn't even have a scratch on it but the cover came loose and now the nose of it catches on my shorts when I get on and off the saddle for descents and climbs.

We have a kid's hydration pack that we could pass on to you. It is fun times when the little ones want to ride trails. We rode with our grown-up kids yesterday at Flat Rock in Comfort, and they killed it!

I enjoyed the event. Wish the film was longer.

My wife and I are heading to Palo Duro in a couple of weeks for our 24th anniversary. Any suggestions for three not-too-long rides? My wife is a strong rider but she gets cranky if we ride too long. Plus, we will be dealing with potentially hot days and little shade.

Actually it is from a private trail network.

Just before Thanksgiving a large group of us went to Hill Country State Natural Area to camp and ride. Because of the extraordinary amount of rain they had received, the trails were almost all closed but the ranger suggested we try the Bandera Bike Park. So we rode from the State Natural Area to the bike park on the road and checked out the bike park. It definitely has a ton of potential. Lots of topography! We lean more towards cross country and while there was some, we spent a lot of time trying to find trails that they told were out there. I hope they get more trail built and get a little signage going. I would happily go back there. This photo is from the top of one of the big hills.

Texas Madrone (Arbutus xalapensis) Texas Buckeye (Aesculus pavia)

Very cool! I was in the Master Naturalist Program with his mom and she would catch me up on Payson's mountain bike racing exploits.