Ride Report STR Hurkey Creek Campout

MEMORABLE MOMENTS:

1) Liz(dirtmistress): "Hey, where is that dusty chick?"
2) Scott: "Liz singlehandedly caught both of my cheeks"
3) Lynn(Sheclimbs): "Either you go first or go later, there is only 1 line!"
4) Craig(CalEpic) to Jessie: "When I was your age, the only thing I was concerned about was chasing @$#%#!
5) Nan(dusty) sharing her interesting rollercoaster lifestory. Thank you for sharing. You are making a remarkable comback.

 

I really enjoyed reading all the RR's. You guys had a blast! Work prevented me from making this one Next time.

 

I can't believe you actually brought that much wood.... Veronica must be a Pyromaniac? :?:

 

I think that should be Steph's new title. :clap:

 

Oh so it was STEPHANIE that was banging the pan next to my little blue tent :lol:. I guess thats payback for keeping EVERYONE UP till 2am. Get your earplugs ready because I'll be there for the next camping trip as well. :beer:

 

Done :lol:

 

For a second I thought you were "watering the plants"#-o:lol:

 

What's the best campsite to be in that obeys the "Quiet" code of 10PM to 6AM?

Steppie?

 

130. Farthest from all the other campsites and right next to the trailhead.

 

Looks like I missed a good time. ](*,)

 

Yep

 

I suppose it has more to do with who is camped near ya. Quite is for generators and music. It takes a loud party before they tell ya to keep it down. If you want quite use one of the primative campsites off Thomas Mountain Road.

Dean

 

My late ride report!

Let me start this off by saying that I knew the bike was going to be perfect when I rode the tight left hand switchback into the ladies bathroom and never touched the entryway going in!
Made it out too!
The bike, a Merlin for those that don’t know, is better than I could have ever dreamed. It made me feel things I never thought possible! I made it up switchbacks I KNOW I wouldn’t have made on my really heavy 27 pound Santa Cruz!
The power transfer from the pedals to the rear end digs in almost instantly. A couple times I thought I was toppling over on something and I leaned forward and jammed the pedals and BAM, I made it! It is unbelievably responsive and I felt like I’d been riding it my whole life! It tracks beautifully and just feels perfectly balanced and smooth. There’s no frame vibration or feedback on stutter bumps and it goes where I put it. Which wasn’t always a great place! So there! When I say it’s name softly..EllMer..I mean MerWorth..it’s like praying... It’s like a gentle breeze on a fragrant spring day, it’s like love on a tweed couch. Anyway, it’s hot and I want more!!

The week-end with the group was beyond phenomenal! I was very nervous about going alone but everyone was just great. I wish I could have met more people like “whatkeepshappening” and Vickie and others but in such a large group, it is so difficult!! I’m sure I met people but I’m so bad with names, I don’t know who you are and I apologize!. Nancy understands!!

I want to give a special thanks and ten tons o’ love to Lynn(Sheclimbs) for the Chile. It was delicious.
Ken and Marizel for the home made baked beans. Yup..delicious.
Denmother for her left over shish kabob. Quite yummy though not quite done enough!
HUGE HUGE THANK YOU to Slowspokes Ann and Andy for breakfast both mornings and for turning me on to Batter Blasters!! AWESOME!
I just finished the last can here at home!! That stuff is gooood!
Ann again for the s’mores and being the doting mom s’more specialist!!
Sdyeti (Steph) for more s’mores.
Especially Steph on Sunday that fed me as I bonked up the long fire road grind. A granola bar & almonds, although I prefer natural and not roasted. Next time ok?
Dell (Laddjasper) for the trail mix.
Another guy..sorry..was it Ian?? He gave me a quarter of a sandwich. Bread was a little dry dude! But thanks!!
Todd! (Epicriderat!) Thanks for the coffee in the morning sweetie. It was great!
Dean! (Steppie) Thanks for the coffee in the morning sweetie. It was great!
Dell! Thanks for the coffee in the morning sweetie. It was great!!
I really appreciate you all and thank you very much. I really felt the love this weekend.
Oh yeah, thanks to Allison & Justin for setting this up & Dean, Lynn & Scott for always making me feel welcome.

I have 8389 feet of climbing for the weekend in 58 miles totaling 8 and a half hours with an average of 7 whole miles per hour!

Friday was an eye opener for me as I had no clue such swoopy single track existed in Imawild! We did 10 miles on a race course and it was just a blast!!
Saturday was a mellow yet epic Steppie ride that had 13 total people starting the group. We later picked up Tim passed out in a meadow waiting for us. That put the group at 14 which made an apparently superstitious Steppie happy. Ernie Maxwell was an amazing trail with just the right amount of technical on it. Want a great wheel to follow? Stjunkie, Scott, is one of the smoothest riders I’ve ever seen! Always good to follow his line on anything if you want to get better!
Although he did begin tipping over backwards to the wrong side of the trail on Ernie Maxwell and luckily, I was there to grab and pinch what little ass he had and push him back forward.
I guess it was his ass because he doesn’t have a muffin top. It felt weird though. Hm.

At the top we were joined by Justin, Allison, Luke, Eric and a few others. Off we went down the trail. It was so fun. Not too many hikers and we were respectful as were they!
At the regroup, Lynn(Sheclimbs) took forever to join up so Scott and I went back a long way (so we got to do the fun stuff again) We found her coming down and she had broken and fixed her derailleur hanger by herself! YEAH!!

We rejoined and headed off to begin some hideous climb where my gradient on the computer averaged 17% and I saw it at 23 and 27%! That was a piece of work. Hats off to Eric(Singleminded) for doing it on a SS. And yeah, to me, because mean old Justin Mann challenged me so I attempted it in my middle ring. I got over 3/4 of the way before I caved in to the granny of love. It didn’t hurt that bad but gee, I couldn’t breath or turn the pedals without falling over! Don’t challenge me Justin!!
The groups split up there with the hope/promise of meeting in some valley somewhere. I went with the Mann group and it was a rock & roll time! Ilovemybikeilovemybikeilovemybike!!!!

We stopped to look at some stupid view of the tops of trees and then flew down more awesome single track!! What a blast!! A fun log pile to roll over and boulders to roll over and putting faith in the people in front of you that they aren't actually riding off a cliff edge on the other side!
Up some steep hill and then there was Dean! YAY!! I was so glad to see him and the original group I started with. We all hooked up again and I was wishing it would never end!!

At the ‘go to camp’ or ‘add 5 more miles’ junction, where apparently we discovered we missed a trail called “Missing Link”, some of us, although spent and exhausted, opted for another 5 miles! YEAH MAN!! Justin, Allison, Ray(??) and myself topped it off with more whip cream and sprinkles!! Sweeet!

Back to camp for an Accelerade and put the legs up and relax. 29 fantastic miles. A stinging un-fun hot shower and it was off to mooch..I mean visit!
Saturday night,,Ambien is my best friend.

Sunday, break camp. Ride Thomas mtn. Long grind up. Bonky, dead legs but still happy because it’s beautiful and challenging ride.
Steph and a few others fed me but I never felt 100%.

FYI, I forgot my energy gels and forgot to make a sandwich at camp.

The trail down was another sandy blast at the top and rocky tech challenge as you got farther down. I was with Sdyeti for the most part and it was a blast till I stopped and she said ‘what’s wrong’? and I said I think I have a flat tire which of course it was hard as a rock so that was my cue that I was whomped! I was really pleased at how well the bike and I did on the trail.

Except for going ass over tea kettle once when no one was around to witness & once with steph but landing on my feet, I faired pretty well. In spite of the dreaded switchback that I had been thinking about even before the trip! I have never gotten it and as I walked up the trail to attempt it yet again, a group of guys rode up and saw me walking up. “Is that the switchback Liz?” one asked. ‘yep’. They all tried it and even the bearded fly boy from who knows where, was not graceful going over though he was the only one to make it on the first try. Everyone tried it a number of times. Some made it some didn’t and some bumbled through it and rolled on. At least I don’t feel too bad now. It’s a tough one that looks easy!! It hasn’t changed in 10 years!
I’ll try again though! Maybe when I’m not so tired??

Poor Todd! Epicriderat was cramping so bad and I could not do anything to help him. He looked in agony and his bikes shock was broken too! Poor guy! Are you ok?

Kudo’s to Professor Chaos for staying with his wife and torturing her on the hardest ride she’s ever done I’ll bet. But she’s a tough cookie and I heard she had a good time!
Went to lunch with Eric, Dan, Steph, Justin, Allison, Andy, Nancy, Roger and got a steak and had some laughs.

Man! This weekend was great! Cured me of any worries about too many people on a ride. When you're all close to the same ability, who cares how many show up. Um...well maybe 20 is a lot!!
Hey Dell! Next time I ask if you wanna race, answer me!!
Special Hi to Troy (Trizz), an Iraq war boy that needed a hobby and decided to mountain bike a few months ago. Lucky you discovered this crew and you can’t go wrong with Dean and his ilk!
A shout out to Margo and her TROUBLEsome side kick!!
This was absolutely fantastic!!
Thanks!!
p.s. as usual, I'll post up pictures when I get posting dialed in better.

 

Dang ! I wish I could have met you too! So many people...so little time. We should have all worn name tags!

 

I did! It'll be there on my helmet forever!

 

Thanks for the great RR and especially thanks for my new sig
Looks like I missed a great weekend as well. I'll have to joing you guys next year...???

 

I can verify.....

She did still have it on......I even asked :?:

 

Rockin' Road Trip

Another rockin’ roadtrip! Thanks to everyone who attended, still can’t believe how many people showed up this year. Just as STR has expanded 10 fold so has the number of people attending all the events.

It was wonderful to meet so many new people and hang out with some of my "homies".

Many of the newer STR members seemed to gravitate to our campfire, but then again when you’re camping with Steppie that’s always to be expected!

Welcome to Trizz, Dusty and Mtb4fun, I thought it was very cool of Kelly to set them up to use her site. We missed you this weekend SheDevil but we took good care of your stand-ins (I hope?) Professor Chaos and his wife Marizol joined us as well along with a few additional peeps who wondered in and out throughout the night.

Liz/Dirtmistress has been renamed the “camp-tramp” and as she mentioned she did an excellent job at playing the pathetic delicate flower as she went camp to camp mooching meals, snacks and compliments on that amazing new rig. It really is a beauty.

Delicate Flower amongst the Daffodils


Spokes and Sprocket really out did themselves this year with their amazing breakfast buffet, thank you for fueling us up right.

I was really looking forward to riding these trails this year and measuring my improvement from a year ago. I have a new/different bike and a lot of miles since last years trip. The ride up to Ernie Maxwell was relatively painless this time around. Pleasant surprise.

It’s always fun to ride with people on new dirt. It was Jfsh and his crew, Scotty and Dan NO photo’s first trip to Hurkey. Scott was saying it was nice to reciprocate the favor and show Jeff and Co. around for a change!

The Trail Masters consult


As we headed back down Ernie Maxwell I sent Jfsh in front of me and took-off. My first mistake was trying to drop a little rock that of course Jeff made look effortless, one would think I would know better about following the leader after years of trailing the Junkie but I was feeling confident and ouch down I went, unfortunately on my derailleur!
At this point everyone was long gone blasting down the single track goodness of Ernie Maxwell. I had no choice but do some on the job learning…fortunately I do carry an extra d-hanger and having recently purchased a new multi-tool had the right tools to do the work! I managed to fumble my way through it and swapped out my hanger. Note to anyone who relies on their riding partners for on the trail repairs, pay attention so you can do it yourself when you need to. I’m spoiled by Scott and Dean but fortunately I at least watch what they are doing.

I was worried about holding the crew up so I took off as fast as I could. Scott and Liz caught up to me up half-way up the trail. Thank you both for being my search party. Big thanks to the entire group for waiting for me. I felt bad that everyone waited for me at the end of the trail. I would have felt a whole lot worse if I had just been slow coming down at least I had a good excuse but thank you to everyone I really appreciate it!

The grind up to Southridge was grueling as always but the payoff did not disappoint.

Thanks to everyone Dean, Scott, Jonathan and Greg for helping me tune up my trailside repairwork. The derailleur worked flawlessly on Sunday’s ride.

Sunday was a true test of my improvement. Last year I was one of the last people in our group to climb to the top of Thomas mountain, this year I was determined to rid myself of the almost DFL title! When we started climbing I was feeling pretty good and as time went on I found my rhythm and took off. I am one of those sickos who happens to love climbing so this was heaven for me. It’s a great feeling when you are working hard but feeling strong. Mtb4fun and I seemed to have a very similar cadence/pace and rode most of the way up to the top together.

JasonMason caught up to and passed us on the climb. Such as tease just as I had him in my sights he’d take-off. I think Tim’s giving me a run for my money in the happy dept too, you guys think I smile a lot, I think Tim is always smiling and laughing on or off the trail. You got to love that.

I want to congratulate Marizol for her longest climb to date. She made it to the top with a huge smile on her face and said that was her best ride ever. Way to go girl. Feels good doesn’t it?

I loved watching Troy climb up, he said this was his longest ride ever and the boy has only been on the bike for about 4 months! Could have fooled me. Glad you’ve caught the bug, be warned this addiction is hard to beat.

Finished off the weekend with that awesome ride down Ramona, the trail seems to go on forever, great way to finish off the weekend with a happy ending!

Got to meet MsCalEpic looking forward to taking her out on the trails with us soon. Nice to finally meet Traci face to face too. I still didn’t get a chance to ride with DenMo or Steph but there’s always the next trip.

Thank you Alison for getting the ball rolling on this one. I’d have to say group road-trip No. 1 this year was a huge success.

Thanks to all who made this a wonderful weekend.

The ass that Liz so proudly grabbed...

 

So the rumors were true!!!...you DID eat everyone's food!!! She even called me before the trip and said ..."hey Kell...you gonna bring food for me or do I need to bring my own???" I said "dude....you're not even at my campsite"....she said "oh yeh...but really, do I need to bring my own??"

Liz you're a crack up!!!

 

Hey Lynn, I knew we were in great hands with you and your crew giuding us. I had no doubt we were going to hit the good stuff. I know Scott likes to explore and check out new trails and routes just like I do. After several trips showing Scott around up here in Kernville I remember writing him about riding in the San Gabriels. He wrote back,"I have a great route in mind. Payback is not always a bitch."
The fact that you guys were going to be there was one of the main motivations for me to work things out so I could make the trip. The next time you are following me I will try to crash for you or something.