Branching Out

Mikey and I headed to Greensboro this weekend to celebrate our three week anniversary by visiting Ethan and scoping out some his local trails. It looks like Ethan has a pretty sweet set up with some quality trails just a few minutes away and a greenway system that goes to another park with more good trails. The first trails we hit were at Country Park and were a bunch of fun. They had a nice flow and weren't very technical. They definitely had a fair share of roots but nothing over the top. At one of the entrances to the trail there was a section for freeride and dirt jumping. We rolled through the jumps and decided that you would have to be a little insane to really ride that section, but it was cool to see. After riding Country Park we hopped on the greenway and road up to Brandt Lake where we rode a little bit of the trails at Bur Mill Park. The section that we rode was fun but not enough to give an accurate rating for the whole trail system. We also rode Owl's Roost trail which is also at Lake Brandt but not in Bur Mill Park. These trails were a ton of fun with more obstacles than Country Park. They had a bunch of log rolls and some really fun downhill sections. Towards the end of this trail there was a log roll that I thought I could ride over without much trouble. I was wrong. I went to ride over the log but instead my front wheel hit the first log and stopped. Unfortunately I didn't stop until shortly after hitting the logs that I thought I was going to roll over. I should have expected this since I haven't really wrecked in a while and was overdue for a good one. Luckily Mike came away unphased and I only have a couple of scratches. Overall, it was a really fun day of riding and a nice change of pace from the Raleigh area trails that I usually ride. I am looking forward to more visits to the Triad to try out more of their trails.

In other bike news, I have started thinking about another dream bike that I will never be able to afford. I don't really have a use for this bike but I just think that they are super cool. It is one of these bamboo bikes. I think that these bikes are really sexy and would be really cool to ride around town on. They are supposedly more plush and comfortable than carbon fiber, although a little heavier. Unfortunately, I don't have an extra 3k to spend on a wooden frame but maybe I will when I find that duffel bag filled with money that I am looking for. Although not very practical for me, Calfee is working with African farmers to teach them how to make their own bamboo bikes for transportation uses. Even though I can't afford one of those nice pretty frames right now I may look into building my own. I think I may be able to cut off the tubes and use the joints from Ann and bond them with some sort of epoxy. Here is a guy that built his own bamboo frame and how he did it. He is a much more experienced builder than I am but I may look into it the next time I get really bored and want a project to work on.