Tuesday, March 29, 2011

on the road to ruin

I bought new shoes last week. Not because I needed them but because they were 60% off, which is a good deal. So that means I now have two pairs of shoes which means it doesn't really matter if I get one pair wet, not that that ever really stopped me before.

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Monday after work I parked at Fisherman's and headed up 1206 with no real plan. It had rained a lot recently and I didn't really feel like getting my bike all muddy so my original plan was to ride 1206 out and back to 276 but by the time I made it to Yellow Gap that didn't sound like fun and I didn't feel like going up Laurel or over to Squirrel so when I saw the left turn onto Bradley Creek that sounded like the perfect choice. It is still March and Monday was the coldest day in a long time so Bradley it was.

Has anyone else noticed what is going on with the signs in Pisgah? They are being changed to reflect what is on the 'new' 780 map. This is potentially bad in some instances for mountain bikers, FR229 and 140A, for example. The start of Bradley Creek on 1206 used to be hard to find but it was there and signed such. The sign is now gone and the official start is now at the YG9 campsite as shown on the new map. Here is the old hidden entrance:

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This means anyone riding Bradley gets one extra creek crossing! I love this stretch of Bradley - it is truly a thing of beauty.

The old Hendersonville reservoir:

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From there it was up the false climb that is 5015 and back down to the truck. A fun little loop.

Yesterday after work it was right back to Fisherman's but this time in the new shoes and up 5000. I felt like doing something crazy so I went all the way up to Bent Creek.

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But I didn't want to get to crazy and actually ride in Bent Creek so I turned around and went back down to 5001A or 5006, whatever the old Spencer Gap trail is now called and did the classic Spencer > Trace Ridge route.

Unidentified riders on Spencer:

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Down Trace to Wash Creek and back out 5000 to finish with dry feet.

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