Black and White
Greg took this shot of me on a bikepacking overnight last fall. Its a marker and a reminder of the stark contrast to how I have felt for the last several years – finally kicking fitness and health into a higher gear, dealing with an auto-immune disease, and finding my riding and adventuring spirit again. At the end of last fall I don’t think I felt as good on a bike since I was brevet training back in 2006. I couldn’t ride brevet distances right now – but things were just clicking along. Single speeding most of the summer helped – but also having energy again to actually enjoy being ‘out there’ – be it on a hike or on the bike.
September Bikepacking
Summer trip with Greg, Wil and a couple of new friends to the Moosamaloo area. ~50+ miles – dirt road, gravel, single track, some schwacking. Camp, swim in Silver Lake, eat, fire, night, ride back to the car.
May favorite shot of the trip:
I really needed to write it up months ago, and revisited it now as the winter weather sort of sucks (rain, freezing rain, disappearing ski base) – so I’ll let the pictures speak.
I rode on my Krampus, but put a 5spd cluster on the King hub’d rear wheel. Worked great, little more range than single speed, saved me on some climbs. Was useless for chasing the crew on the downhills, but that was a known factor.
At the time I hadn’t felt as good on a bike in a long long long time.
