Riding Raystown Lake Trails

Today was another day on the road. The move from Harrisonburg up to Raystown Lake in PA was a nice jaunt. It looks like I will be working with a nice little crew moving along building a very uniques 30 mile trail system in this single build season. The trails offered a few unique experiences. Check out the overlook at the top of the mountain it was enough that Rich had to try not to think bad thoughts....think no evil monkey. Then we descended down to the lake and dipped into the H2O, let me tell you on a hot day it is quite nice to get into a bit of water. I thought about the "eventual in a system like this. You leave the campground where you and your friends have been having a great vacation so far. You jump on your bike nice and early while things are still cool, as the afternoon heats up you head to the bottom of the trail system and find your way to Beaver Den Cove, and get onto the boat with your friends for a water bound afternoon. Yeah sounds nice doesn't it.

Design Day and Dial In With the Locals...

Today was great did the final design for the H'Burg Pumptrack Expansion. Check it out.



Also, this afternoon I got to work with the local builders and ride with some folks doing a bit of tweeking and riding. It was a great afternoon all told. Now it is shower time and dinner. Enjoy the show.

Day 2 in H'Burg...

Today was spent roaming around Harrisonburg, VA planning the expansion of the pump track at Hillandale park in town. I have tossed in a few choice photos of the work that has been done in the park so far. The track currently has a roughly 1800 sq foot footprint, the goal is to expand that to around 12500 square feet. With a number of options. I am trying to create a real pull to entice the community to really start building around the area. Photos of the finished design should be posted by the end of the weekend and a construction time frame will also be produced.

Here are the photos. One of the trail markers in the park, I really like these. Then a photo of the boys talking on top of the micro spine between the two existing tracks, finally an overview of what the current state of affairs is. Enjoy, now I am off to ride with the locals and see what kinds of skills they have. Hope I don't hit any parked cars.

On the road again...

Okay last night was spent in Blacksburg visiting my little brother and having a rough night. Today was the raining, misting, drive up to Harrisonburg to work on a pump track master design in the Hillendale park.

My stand-out for today was the trail work with the Shenandoa Valley Bicycle Coalition. "Dirty Thursday" out of town. We did some super fun stuff with rock. Check out the photos. And the camo truck at the beginning of this post? That was the crew leader, yeah I had to follow him to the top of the mountain. Cool rattle can paint job, Huh.

Bele Chere...the mustache contest....

This weekend was great, hanging out with good people and now I am winding down into work mode a bit. I spent today in Barntown. Photos soon to come, there is some great stuff on that mountain.

The weekend started in a respectable enough way taking care of some final business before settling in to a relaxed state. Saturday I went to the PAS booth at Bele Chere and attended a MUSTACHE CONTEST...Photos most certainly to come.

Yesterday was a visit to the "Green" to play around in the water on a super hot day with friends. While on the "Green" I ran into my neighbor and learned about the "bubble", when the water comes up, it comes up fast.

Now, it is time to start packing and prepping to head to Harrisonburg, VA to see Rich Edwards from IMBA and go to Chambersburg PA to build a pump track. This should be a great project. This is exactly in line with the direction of jobs I have been heading towards.

Also on the mind is the concept of being fully mobile to handle this work. It would allow me to have a fixed rate for mobilization and begin moving closer to that turnkey pricing. It would also allow me to work well, year round. As I research I will begin posting my research on truck and accoutrement. Looking to tomorrow, take care.

A Volunteer Day...

Well, things have been going well as far as creating some fall work goes. I spent all day Monday working on catching up on a few things. Today though was volunteer work for PAS I met with the folks at the Forest Service and learned a few valuable lessons. I walked a bad flag line in Pisgah and transported a trailer up to Asheville. I got a small ride in at DuPont, but the wrist is still bothering me a bit, I will lay off the bike for a couple more days.

But, this afternoon I wanted to figure out the project for "Dirty Thursday" in August and I think the Pine Tree Trail in Bent Creek is in dire need of some love. Here are a few photos of the "blown up" sections. Some narrowing and root cutting will allow people to stay on line and may neutralize the trail a bit, but should keep things fun. Check-em' out. Tomorrow it is watching L'Alpe D'Huez and then heading to Barntown for some more work. Enjoy your Day.

End of a bad week, but should be a great weekend.

The Barntown project beat me into submission and taught a few hard lessons this week. The rental machine had been a bit on the fritz from hour one. It turns out the right track was WASTED. I left the machine sitting on the side of the mountain last night because I didn't have the right wrench to loosen the track adjustment, so today I had it and set the track back on. Miraculously it came off literally five minutes later....what the!. So I took the track off and low and behold the track was BROKEN. Looks like some other rental customer had run it with some type of object against the track, well the metal bars that the sprocket grabs had been pulled out. Rich Edwards of IMBA knows exactly what I am talking about.





The lesson? Check the tracks all the way around on ALL RENTALS from here out. Hopefully I will be able to get a bit of reimbursement for the time I lost.



This weekend it is CAMPING next to a creek and CHILLIN' I can't wait.