The Epic Year in Review

The time between Christmas and New Year is usually when all the major news shows summarize the events of the year and of course there is jibjabs comic take which you can see here As I look back at this year myself I realized I had pretty good year with some fun bike adventures.

There was of course the now famous Epic of El Capitain then on the trip to Lake Nockamixon I was very politely told I was a lying bastard for forgetting to mention some of the hills along the way. I did a lot of hilly rides this year and even attempted Fiddlers Elbows and survived. Besides my normal weekend rides I took two bike trips. One to Lake Champlain and another to Gettysburg both of which I really enjoyed and plan to do more of in the future.

Of course it wasn't the steep hills, long miles or new roads that made biking fun this year. It was, as always, the people that joined me on these sometimes crazy rides. So for all of you that road alone with me thanks for making 2012 a fun year. I wish you all a Happy New Year. I will see you on the road in 2013 once the weather gets a little warmer and I promise some more fun rides in the new year.

Unexpected Snowbiking

Its hard to tell what kind of winter it is going to be but we have already had two small snow storms and of course the hurricane. This past Saturday I went up to visit my father who just had  knee replacement surgery. I took the opportunity to do some riding in north jersey where they live. It was too cold ride on the road so I decided to check out Allamuchy State park which has some popular mountain biking trails. I had not been there before but I found a couple maps online and it looked like it would be an interesting place to explore.

When I left my house for the drive up I knew it would be cold but did not expected there to be snow on the ground. There was a brief snow storm on Tuesday but it didn't really stick around here. As I headed north and got closer to to Allamuchy I started to see patches of snow and when I go to the parking lot there was snow over most of the ground although it was not much more than a half inch deep.

Allamuchy has 20 miles of mostly single track runs that go by a couple of lakes. I chose a easy 5 mile route that went past Deer Pond. The riding wasn't too hard although at times between the snow and the leaves it a bit slippery in places. After I made it past the Deer Pond I hit some of the harder single track trails. The terrain here is very rocky which makes it a bumpy ride.

There were a lot of trees down and across the trails so I ended up having to walk around a downed tree every half mile or so. This slowed me down a little and I ended up spending just over an hour on the trails and got a pretty good work out. I only saw a small part of Allamuchy they have a lot of nice trails so if I'm every up this way again I may explore it a little more.