schnauzers.ws

A long weekend of riding and trail building was ahead. I haven’t taken time off of work in a while, so I was do.  I’ve got lots of vacation days, just never enough time to use them.

With the camper loaded it, it was off to Buffalo Creek.

I managed to get a few good rides in spite of the weather.  The old saying of “it’s Colorado,  wait ten minutes and the weather will change.”, did not work this weekend.  It was rainy!  It had been rainy for a few days.  However, I did fine some intermittent sunshine just long enough for a pedal.

The rain has done something special, though.  It’s changed our semi-arid desert into a lush green rain forest.

Ok, well maybe not quite a rain forest.  It is the greenest I have seen a summer since moving here.  Usually, all the grass would be brown by now.

It was kind of nice riding on a Thursday out here.  Not another soul in sight.

It was also cool to not be patrolling for a change.  Just a ride.

Since it was a trail building weekend, I decided to check out how some of our older work has held up.  If you build it right, you don’t have to build it again.

If this were edible, I would be a very fat person!

Starting from the highest point in the forest, I wanted to make sure I maximized the downhill before having to climb back up.  It never seems right finishing a ride with a climb.  So, I stayed around some of the fun parts, like raspberry ridge.

You’ll see this trail in the right of this photo, in a later photo from a completely different angle.

So, why name it Raspberry Ridge?

Like I said, maximize the downhill!

Remember the trail in the black and white pic?  Here it is!

It wouldn’t be camping without a Schnauzer gourmet meal.  I’ve been experimenting with different burger ingredients.  I think I found the right combo of meat, spices, and “special moisture inducing emulsification” (pay no attention to the meager Banger paying homage to it’s burger brethren.

Creepy haunts before the evening stormy light show.

This weekend was also about building trail.  An amazing crew (my crew, especially), banged out an exciting re-route of lower Sandy Wash.  Instead of people blowing by the turn, it’s not one continuous flow from upper to lower.  We even had time to cover up the old trail, before we got drenched in a 45 minute downpour.