Wednesday AM the temp inside was 44 degrees, outside I learned it was 9 degrees. There was just a few inches of ice free windshield. PT appointment @ 12:00 and no riding after sesion. Too cold to ride. Fun stuff @ Dupont would have been frozen water ice. Visitor Center was closed but restrooms were unlocked. Hung out @ The Hub before PT appointment. Sam said i could service my rear wheel in his warm shop.

Kim worked on my knee @ PT. She said that the condition of my body indicates that the injury issues are old and will take time to restore. Perhaps. I left my pen in her office. Called her and she had discovered that she gained an extra pen and will put it out for me on Friday. I have another appointment on Monday.

Back @ Hub. Regreased rear hub and readjusted rear brake caliper. Made offer to Sam, owner of The Hub, of a picture show for their store & clients should they want to pull something together. Sam told me on Thurs AM he was meeting w/ Ed Sutton from Trail Dynamics to appraise a, in construction trail from Club Gap. I asked to go along.

Scott from Indianpolis saw me in Pisgah Sunday and is in contact w/ me for a weekend ride. Bruce from Asheville is going to Ellijay, GA this weekend before my trip plan.

Wed eve I decided to head to camp spot to fix dinner and work on some offline stuff instead of hanging @ Dolly’s which is why there was no post Wed.

Another cold night and I did not sleep warm even w/ doubled down blanket & heat on high. Again the temp was single digit. Put on wool long underwear for 9:00AM woods hike looking @ trail work. Bright sunny skies but still just cold.

Falls along road:

Ed knows Bill. Bill, I set Ed up with the California rider for you to finish.

On a previous trip in my van a young man struck up a conversation about my van. I learned that he had spent 5 winters @ Alpental @ Snoqualmie living in his trade van. He said an issue for him was moisture. I said I had the problem in hand w/ a roof vent fan. Today I reached into my “clothes closet” which is a bracket to hang  clothes hangers on that is aft of my frige & forward of the rear door. I noticed that shirt sleeves are damp because moisture is condensing there. I need several days of hot temps to dry things out.

Fred is back @ Visitor Center which is opened. Going back to visit after shower.

Still having problems w PICASA for pictures.

Knee pain today is about the same.

Drove back up Avery Creek and spot number 2 was open. Homecoming. I have lived there longer than any place since July 9 when my house closed. Abandoned camp was cleared up except for townie bike that is locked to a tree. Fred told me that these campsites are the most popular because they are about 3 miles from town.

Plan is to ride a Bruce suggestion: Ride up to horse stables, climb to Buckhorn gap (52 mins from van), down to S Mills River trail to Squirrel Gap and turn around @ Horse Cove. Cold clear blue skies started the ride about 10:45. I CAMP IN A CREEK Bottom with high hills that block sun till maybe 8:30. The ground froze last night. My bike cover had ice blocks where the rain froze. Big grind up logging road to Buckhorn. There were several downhills on the road that had to be reclimbed on way to Gap. Tread frozen. Buckhorn is where Black Mtn crosses ( see previous blogs). Buckhornt & S Mills are old logging road beds w/ a ST down it. Shallow elevation change; just old road riding. Crossed river & picked up Squirrel Gap which is old ST hiking trail. Way more interesting & challenging. Skies have now darkened & snow flurries are falling. Its around freezing. I am wearing a wool long underwear top under my Pisgah Works wool jersey under a windbreaker. My heavy gloves, shorts, tights, insulated booties, & helmet cap. Nobody else out.

The ride was uphill about 5 miles. Sort of got warm. from Buckhorn back to van was mostly downhill with those short uphills that were down on way up for warmth generation. I still got deep cold.

Checked out beaver activity on creek @ horse stables. Saw Sam’s rig near Bennett’s Gap.

Back into laundromat for shower & wash. deep cold that hot shower water would chase away, but the hot water quit before I rinsed off. Clean but still deep cold. Snow flakes are now falling intermittently. Running late today.

Parked @ Dolly’s. Getting colder also. Snow flurries. During dinner sister Lynn engages me in telephone story telling for an enjoyable time.

Forecast wants less than 1″ snow. Road to & from XG is mostly flat. I hope no problem w/ snow. Got heater on high.

Sitting in my van in Dollie’s Ice Cream gravel parking lot on rt 276 to interior of Pisgah NF having cleaned up the kitchen & dining room of a simple skillet dinner of sweet potato, chicken breast, broccoli steamed in olive oil, curry, & cinnamon. Make this dish frequently as it is easy,  quick to fix, & is healthy. Back in the house day I might take an hour to fix dinner; on the road I have cut that time in half & eat more simply. I could still fix most gourmand meals I want if I invest the resources.

Kitchen cleanup is heating a small revere ware sauce pan full of water for wash & rinse. The gravel is the perfect sink water wash station.

I push the computer to create a place to put the skillet down & chow down engaging the manners I remember. I get no practice of talking with food in my mouth.

Back to history.

Fix Bfast & clean up. Bill invites me up for pancakes and the 3 kid active show. I believe they are a pair of 3 yo twins boy, girl & a 2 yo girl. Little kids. The house also has 3 dogs, Sadie the oldest has the kids figured out. One of them takes a plate of pancakes to the front room. Their hands are just about dog mouth height. They put their plate down & Sadie cleans up. Kids always have a clean plate for seconds.

Bill drives us way out into South Carolina countryside to pick up the TH for one of the 40 yo hand built hiking trails that have had bike trail work on them. Great riding on trails that had rocks & roots. The gulleys we crossed had not been smoothed out by machines and were quite abrupt. Sections of ST were connected by some good distance road ride. The last piece was 9 miles back to car. I drank all my 70 oz less what spilled out the unsealed top early in the ride. I started cramping really hard if I pushed overly hard going uphill. Made it w/o body crumpling leg cramps.

What we rode was just regular hand built trails, almost like all trails in the same geographical area. FATS is an experience in riding that is unique. There is no question that you are riding something different when you ride FATS.

Bill drove by FATS to pull down the trail closed signs because of the wet trails. We passed the parking lot, there might have been 80 cars in there, the most Bill has ever seen. It was a beautiful warm sunny Sunday afternoon.

On Sat there might have been 50 cars but we hardly saw a rider on our 19.89 mile ride.

Sunday’s ride finished @ 27.97 miles, the longest so far this year & 1911′ vert.

I went with Bill on an scoping trip for a trail building proposal on the Greenway in N. Augusta. I rode an old hardtail steel frame, no clipless pedals bike with funky brake lever shifters, and no helmet during our tour.

I was invited to dinner. I did watch the SuperBowl and enjoyed Springsteen’s halftime show. A Springsteen concert at the SuperBowl. You all got treated to Bruce. I left the game early 3rd quarter and missed out on the close game.

Said goodbye to Bill as he headed to work. I visited w/ Liz and the kids for awhile. Liz can understand what the twins say, I can’t. Their activity is like herding cats.

Drove slow roads back to Brevard. Started raining near the SC / NC border on into Brevard. Settled back into routine of grocery shopping, hanging @ Dollies for internet access, and shortly the drive back to my camp spot. Forecats here is for cold temps & snow @ night.

Wed is PT appointment for another go @ my knee. Bruce, of Pisgah Works wool jersey fame, is inviting me on a ride. Young people, I like them but I can’t keep up with them.