AVL, or the little city that rides like a big one

Asheville is great, and by Asheville, I mean specifically the riding that can be had in Dupont and Pisgah, the sleep at the Bent Creek Lodge, and the food at Tupelo Honey Cafe. If you're a proprietor of one of those fine establishments, email me to discuss my advertising fees.

Saturday we rode from the Turkey Pen trailhead. Up a long steep dirt road is a pretty sophisticated trailhead, with 4 options and a big map board. Pisgah is giant, and the loop we were looking at seemed tiny compared to the expanse of the forest. 4 hours of snowy cursing, muddy rock gardens, and waning daylight later, we put our muddy bikes on the car, and thanked our lucky (and now visible) stars to have survived an "epic" ride unscathed.

Squirrel Gap was a little squirrelly and a lot snowy. The 2 hour loop took 4 hours.

Dupont has every trail surface and every difficulty level you could ask for. As the locals reassured us several times, it's the best riding in WNC when the ground is wet, and I mostly agree. Some of the less-sandy sections were a little peanut-butter-y, but for the most part the trail seemed very stable and sustainable. Dupont is very hardtail (rigid, even) friendly (though we avoided the gnarliest trails, due to icy/slick conditions) and all of the downhills flow amazingly well. The first singletrack we encountered was the Hilltop Trail, which primed us for a fun day. Even the short and seemingly uninteresting trails rode exceedingly well, fun rolling and well bermed turns were everywhere. As you can see here, we meandered all across the park, and got to ride up most of the hills Dupont offers. The park is just so big, complex, and well developed (sounds like a fine wine) that you'd have to ride several iterations of every different loop to really get all of the trail, and from the sounds of it, it's all worth riding.

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what a terrible view

It wasn't muddy at all, I swear.

Dupont had the best signage and upkeep
of any trail system I've seen

We stayed at Bent Creek Lodge, and came close to calling it a religious experience. It was fantastic.

Just go stay there.

The third side of the Asheville love triangle was the Tupelo Honey Cafe.
Free Biscuits. Amazing Food. Great Service. Cheap.
Everything that is good about the South.

For those of you that prefer a TL;DR: Go to Asheville. Now.

Adventure to WNC and A New Blog

A new adventure this weekend and a new blog to share it.

Francine and I are departing early in the morning to make the 6 hour drive from Richmond to Asheville and Brevard, where we'll ride a fast (and hopefully fun) loop of Squirrel Gap in the Pisgah NF (trail map), at the recommendation of one Jesse "I created the trail hardtail" Leadbetter. The original plan was to leave this morning, but as all things, responsibilities at the Studio took precedence. We're looking at the Bent Creek Lodge on Friday night, so we can roll the recommended trails in the morning, following a jaunt down to Dupont to rally those trails. Then a night-time return to RVA to get some quick rest before heading to Fooftown to stomp out a SS Pantani attempt. 'Attempt' is the word, definitely not 'ride'.

My last attempt at Pantani ended with this, then I "attempted" the
walk to the car, with a gracious save from Ms. Rapp

Weekend adventures like this are what fill my dreams, when it's not a dream about having a 15lb steel singlespeed with perfectly clashing anodized colors. After spending a week in Crested Butte, CO this summer, I realized that places and adventures like that are (for me) what make life worth living, no matter what other shit has gone down the rest of the year. One amazing and satisfying adventure can make tribulations like self-doubt, unhappiness, and stress feel like passing white clouds when one has to face the thunderhead of dilemmas like "should I ride the IMBA epic 401 trail or the locals' favorite RenoFlagBearDeadman." Let's stick to the big problems here people.

Problems like "pro-choice or no-choice at Pantani?"

With a little luck and a little getting-up-when-the-alarm-goes-off, we'll be enjoying WNC and some new and exciting trails tomorrow.

Let's hope this whole blog thing is a habit I can get into.