Sunday, decided to ride by myself because I had to be on the road by noon in order to get back to Connecticut before 5 PM to be with my sons. Plan was to climb Darling Hill again, this time On the Spot, then hit Pastore Point, take rip down Troll Stroll and then head over to the Sugarhouse Run and take some pics of the old building and finally finish it off with a run down Kitchel with helmet cam running.
As I was riding towards Darling Hill Tim Post and his sons passed me in the their truck and I waved them over and asked if I could bum a ride up the hill but then a sense of foreboding overcame me and I had a feeling that I forgot to lock my car. They said they would wait while I went to go make sure the car was locked. Only took two minutes and then I threw my bike on back of the truck and held onto to it through the window.
I made a few wrong turns before finally getting to Pastore Point and the lookout over the river which cost me some time and I missed some trails that I wanted to ride because I took a wrong turn down Cup Cake when I should have stayed on Loop and headed over to West Darling Hill Road to ride Harp. Oh well, there is always next year.
I still can't get over how dreamy the spot rides!
Very inviting, reminds me of the places I used to camp at in California when I was a kid
Much hotter on Sunday!
After climbing up Coronary, I ran into Tim again and he took me over to Troll Stroll (click for the two different versions) because everyone at the camp was raving about this trail. I think I shot some good helmet cam on this trail but once again it's a little shaky because of the mounting on the camera. I really need a full susser and mount it to the bike! At the bottom, you have to climb back out. The easy way is to head south to more trails that I had ridden the day before, like Eager Beaver and River Run but I was running out of time and the run to the Sugar House didn't look like it was in the cards this time around. Instead, we took the hard way and climbed up River Walk. I had to walk for the first time.
Grades on this trail ranged from 7% to 23% and both Tim and I walked the steepest section but his son, ahh to be young again, climbed everything thing. Of course I probably could have climbed this section, too, with Granny's help but the Spot doesn't have a Granny. Kingdom Trails should rename this trail to Heartbreak Hill!
We cut across the fields back to The Inn at Mountain View Farm and headed down to Kitchel.
We parted company at the bridge and after packing up the bike and my gear headed over to the shower so I could be clean for the ride home, which only took four and half hours!
Getting back home I have already started thinking about next year's visit. For one thing, the Burke Chamber of Commerce definitely wants to have NEMBAFest again and they have already set the dates for June 21 through 23, 2013! I think I am going to either buy or rent a pop-up camper and stay closer to the event to take advantage of the bike demos and other things going on while still sleeping/camping in a more orderly fashion! I have come to realize that while it's kind of fun, I hate tent camping! I think I will also plan on getting there earlier and bring the Monster Cross to do some gravel grinder riding the first day, too! Might be fun to take the Monster Crosser on the trails, too!
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