Jesse and I agreed for a Thurs meet to ride the NUT when I left Jason’s house. I decided to go to Oakridge for the days b4 our NUT trip. I spent the night in a FS XG right on hwy 58. I was too tired to realize how close I was to free Oakridge.

On a sunny morn I drove into Oakridge to the Willamette Mercantile hoping to connect w/ people I know. I met Richard who speaks wild flowers in We Speak Oakridge language. We enjoyed each other’s company as either were eager to move on, he work and me a gargantuan climb up Alpine.

I drove back road to Westfir and Office Bridge, the longest covered bridge in OR and the start of the Alpine trail. I filled up the solar shower and hung it on the side of my van. I geared up then pedaled off. The first part was along the N Fork Middle Fork Willamette River. I encountered 3 GOATS working on the trail. They had a tracked like dump truck bed that they used to haul gravel to ameliorate several wet spots. Their effort has been more successful than my creating flow lines w/ a shovel b4 the 2011 race. Poison oak did not attract my attention.

The trail dumped out on FS road 1910 and the hurkin logging road climb to Windy Pass which is not quite @ top of Alpine, it was as far as I wanted to expend effort for. 7.85 miles climbing 2588′. Beat me up. I raised the tip of my saddle because I thought my pain was caused by it being too low. Wrong move as my sitting area was toasted and painful. The road gave way to single track for next 8.76 of wooded deep tree cover old hand built hiking trail dropping 3253′. Stupendous as always. Last summer a fire burned over some of the trail. Very steep hillside on narrow bench cut trail. Big trees. Lots of moisture. Man, spectacular. Come ride Oakridge.

At Red Bridge a young couple were preparing to shuttle him to top of Alpine. Toy truck. He asked me if I wanted a shuttle back up to ride it again. Shit, I was 3 sips into a beer and mentally satiated from my ride. I declined. I told him about 2 guys who might be on the road climb and they might want a ride. My solar shower delivered hardly tepid temperature. Wind was blowing, too cold to stand outside for a shower. I took my shower stuff to the restroom that has a large enclosed toilet area and a floor drain. I shut the door and hung the shower over a partition and took a wind protected chilly shower.

I dallied passing time till a 5:00 beer @ Brewers Union which is on Main street in old town. Craft beer, theirs is cask condition. Ben was involved on the patio. Catrina entered. What a spark plug woman. She was involved in creating I Speak Oakridge. Warm hug. I sat outside sipping my beer. A rider pedaled up that turned out to be Derick whom I was looking forward to spending time w/. Warm greeting. He is a co owner of the Cream Puff. He filled me in on what is happening w/ trail access. Oakridge is about to blow up. They are earning their IMBA ride center rating. Although the pump track is grassed over. Wonderful being back in town. I split just b4 dark to sleep out by the airport.

Forecast was calling for serious rain as far as the weekend. I checked bend’s forecast which called for slightly drier conditions. I drove back to Bend today after visiting w/ Eugene @ the Mercantile. Cool bunch of people.

My right shoulder is not happy. It hurts 24X7. Today I made a PT appointment for tomorrow.

My ordered seat post didn’t happen. I asked Web Cyclery if I could ship a post I bought on line to them. They said Yes. I have a LEV coming arriving Fri. My Reverb needs new parts. The LEV is a better post that in the long run I save $.

Stopped for a pint of beer @ 10 Barrels. Mike, the manager remembered me. The bar tender poured me a beer, cutting in line. Everybody knows your name. So great for connections which take time to develop. Visiting new spots just aren’t the same but they are what living on the road are about. I received a jusy summonds for King County that I need to turn down.

Morgan of the former IMBA TCC published their ride story of the Maah Daah Hey trail. Great pics, I lacked the time to read the article and cash to buy the mag.

I drove out to my new sleep spot in time to see slow flurries falling in the sunlight. Forecast calls for 50% of .5 of snow.

Dreary weather over night that carried over into the morning. Today I drive down from Santiam to Alsea over to the coast. Successful drive down the mtn, brakes still work & driving the same way.

I arrived @ closed library meeting place in plenty of time. Towards the meeting time and I am the only rig in the lot. I was starting to fish for the meeting data when Jesse and Lori pulled up in their IMBA TCC car. Greetings. Jesse checked my web site several days b4 and commented it seemed we were riding the same places just separated by days. He struck out also on Buckhorn and Henry Coe.

Friday’s presentation was to land managers. This project is on BLM land. A bunch of BLM folks including a ranking person who manages this rec project. BLM will build a core trail for multi use. Extending from this loop will be refined user groups: Horses no bikes, bikes no horses, hikers open to all. It will be up to the user group to obtain the funds to build their piece. BLM has 2013 $ and is funding trails. The local newly formed IMBA chapter sponsored the event.

Afterwards I drove up to Mary’s Peak up high in the coastal range. I walked to the top in the fog then above it right @ peak at  4097′ high. I camped in the FS wet XG for $5. Some rain fell.

Sat I drove down to Alpine for the TCC session. The morning was instruction on sustainable trails. Afterwards we car pooled out to Alsea Falls where we were going to apply our learned skills to reconstruct a piece of trail. Deep wet forest cover, lots of vegetation on the ground supplied by lots of roots under ground.

Visible is brown dirt of new tread carved out of the green. Jesse organized us into 2 teams and created team leaders and job functions. Your function determined what tool you used. I chose to protect my body by being the final operation of packing and gardening. This vegetation was thicker than what I dug fire line in back in ’70 when I was on a fire fighting crew.

Helping was Shane from IMBA Trail Solutions. I shared rides out and back w/ him. Jesse and Lori were staying w/ club members back in Corvallis. Shane lives in HR. All 4 of us drove back to Corvallis for dinner. I left b4 too dark to drive back to Alsea TH for the night.

Today  a group ride met @ 10:00 lead by Mike who I remembered from the Cream Puff 2 years ago. He is a race promoter also but he provided the timing @ the Puff. He is local. He stated several times in good faith that getting these trails built will be great for him as they are almost in his back yard.

Our group:

Park of our ride took us over what we constructed the day b4. Pleasant. Trails here are deep woods old hand built riding on hemlock needles and roots. Dense and dark.

Jason from the group invited a bunch of us to dinner @ his house tonight.  He had read about me in the Bike mag article.

My plan is to drive down towards Oakridge tonight then ride there till Thurs AM then meet Jesse for 3 days of riding the North Umpqua River Trail (NUT). Need to return to Bend to pick up my new dropper and a few days of riding there. Then go back west and north to ride Black Rock then on to Sandy Ridge.

Whew. Back to living on the road.

One rider helped build the trail @ Lincoln Parish park in Ruston, LA that I rode. A woman was from WVa and we shared names of places we rode there.

Yesterday I washed my van, washing away the road construction dirt I picked up on the way out way route from Redding to Redway. Yesterday afternoon heavy sprinkles fell. I stayed out of the dirt morphing into mud and stayed clean.

On Tues’ big ride before I started I “pulled” muscles in my right calf that went right to the knee. Today the knee is almost pain free w/ lingering soreness in my calf. I should be good to ride on Sat. I forced my body to a 4 1/2 hour ride on a hampered right leg.

On Monday I found a carpet cleaning service. For $40 I have a clean living, dining, kitchen, and bedroom carpet. Wonder if I took advantage of the cleaning specials for 3 rooms.

I decided to rest again today. Rain fell starting @ lunch so I stayed dry and mud free. I picked up my new PI shoes.

I did my wash @ a new to me laundromat. I included my riding gloves in the wash. As I pull clothes out of the washer I separate what goes into the drier and what gets air dried in the van. I came up a glove short. I searched the clothes drying in the dryer, I searched all the dried clothes as I folded them, I checked hither and yon but found that the right glove did a break away LEAVING NO FORWARDING ADDRESS. In al my years of living I had never lost a sock or glove.  I walked across the street to Hutch’s and bought a new pair of gloves. Ouch.

Shortly I am driving over towards Corvallis to attend an IMBA school on Fri out @ Aslea Falls, more stuff out in the coastal range. On the wet side.

Plan is to attend the trail care school on Sat and help on a trail project then ride w/ locals on Sunday. Jesse of IMBA suggested the NUT on Mon and more. We have 2 rigs so we can shuttle which will allow more miles of riding per day. Trail is expected to be cleared by end of this week per a FS person @ Toketee.

I made the Santiam Pass area on rt 20.Back in ’78 there was a church camp in a CCC lodge at the pass. The PCT guide book told about it: a bunk, hot shower, and like $1.50 a meal. Four of us were hiking together… in the rain. We made the lodge populated by junior high kids. We spent the night planning on leaving the next AM. rain was still falling making the decision to stay another day very easy. In the afternoon 3 of us hitch hiked to Sisters where we drank beers. I forget the hitch hikes either way as we did make it back for dinner. The next morning moisture was falling form the sky but the kids pushed us out. The lodge is now vacant and boarded up hiding my one piece of graffiti. A fire has since burned thru the area.