Tue, 11 Oct 2005

We returned to the Bear Creek mountain bike trail
in Ellijay on Saturday. This time I had opted to rent a bike, instead of going through the hassle of shipping mine up and back. After exchanging some emails I got one from Cartecay Bikes in Ellijay. It was a white Kona hardtail in XL. The front brakes were a little iffy, but we got them working to the point that I felt confident going downhill with them. Bruce had his own (Giant?) hardtail.


This time we drove to the top of the mountain and parked at the trailhead there. A couple of bikers already there told us that we would be going down the mountain, doing a loop, and then coming back up the same trail that took us down. And that's what happened. I had the GPS with me, but once or twice after a stop I forgot to start it right away. And a few times the signal was obscured by trees. But you can still see the basic trail on the aerial photo.

The ride was good. It took me a little while to get used to not having the great modulation and braking power of the Magura Martas on my Trek Fuel, but eventually I adapted. There were a number of water crossings, but both of us managed to stay dry. I got some shots of Bruce doing the water crossings, but none of them are really outstanding. I'm still happy with the camera phone, and am not ready to start carrying a camera as well.

We stopped for a rest at the Gennet poplar, which the people at the trailhead had told us about. It is a big tree. If you like that sort of thing. I decided once and for all that the digital zoom on the camera phone is basically worthless. That shot of Bruce sitting down is at 4x zoom, which simply uses 1/4 of the CCD in the camera. I would have gotten the same effect by shooting normally, and then zooming in four times with PhotoShop.

Soon enough we were back at the top. It's a lot easier to climb on rocks and hard-packed dirt, instead of the loose sand we have here in south Florida. Plus up there the trail builders don't feel the need to throw in artificial obstacles (like logs) at random. And there's no elephant trunk roots, either. I think the hardtail might have helped, but I'm not sure. The stable platform on my PUSH-enhanced rear shock is really, really good. The first picture here came out really good with the lighting and the sun, but Bruce looks like he is about to start dancing Swan Lake. We stopped on the way down to check out the view. And then we dropped off the bike, got some pizza to go, and made the drive back to Marietta.

posted at: 07:28 | permalink |