Water Crossings!

Did a club organized mountain bike ride up the other side of Mount Diablo this morning. It was a bit a warm, but pretty clear, so some nice scenery. The first 2.5 miles you roll along through a valley. My map shows 11 water crossings! Only seven or so actually had water in them. They were my first so that was kind of exciting. After the last one the road “tilts sharply upward” as Paul and Phil would say if this were a Grand Tour. The climb goes on for 2.7 miles. The first section is under the trees so really quite pleasant. The second half you are on an exposed ridge. This part was a bit of a bear. I was hot and a little hungry. I was very happy to get to the top. At this point we were up about 2000 feet.

We then rolled along on the asphalt for a little bit to get to our next trail. Knobby tires sound so peculiar on the road. We took a little single track trail over to main trail called Wall Point. I’m very happy we were going down this, not up! This trail has some fairly steep sections with exposed rock and a few off camber turns. Some of those tightened up as you went into them. The ride leader had warned us about this – so no mishaps. There were a couple of sections were I felt really good and just let go. Naturally I almost missed a turn.

Once we were down off the steep, fun section the rest of the ride had mostly rollers. Of course the ride couldn’t be totally uneventful. I managed to break my chain about a mile and a half from the end. Thom came back down and I helped him fix it. We took out a link since I had bent it so badly. He thinks I did it on purpose to make a case for getting a new bike.

It was a really scenic, challenging but enjoyable ride. It was my first experience with both single track and water crossings. Definitely a ride I will repeat.

Total mileage: approx. 13.9
Total time: 2 hr. 58 min.

Veronica

Quote:

---

After the last one the road “tilts sharply upward” as Paul and Phil would say if this were a Grand Tour.

---

Is that where the ride began in earnest?

- Jo, who watches entirely too much OLN

Yes and I had to do something special to make it to the top. :p

V.

waitaminute!

You title the post "Water Crossings!", you say the water crossings were exciting, and then -- no mention of how the water crossings went =/

I feel cheated!

Sorry - I meant to talk more about them, but then got into describing the whole ride and didn't change the title. There were about seven water crossings, ranging in depth from an inch or so to about 8 inches. All of them were about 4 - 6 feet across. The water wasn't running very fast in any of them. Most of the approaches and exits were pretty obvious. There was one where you had to zigzag a little bit. A couple had some big rocks hidden just beneath the surface, but the ride leaders pointed those out ahead of time. My feet got pretty wet and my back on a couple of them - but that was cool since it was above 80 degrees. I was so excited about them since they were the first ones I had done.

This is the view we had near the top. It's a little flat since it was midday. The trail we went down got closer to that big rock and I thought about stopping to get more pics, but it was such a rocking descent I didn't. Maybe next time.

V.

http://www.tandemhearts.com/view.jpg

nice!

The only water crossings I've had to do were maybe 3 inches deep max, and it was totally non-technical as it was the dirt road between some pastures. They were long enough, though, that I was terrified of having to stop for some reason -- nowhere to put my feet without being in water to my ankles!

Of course, my feet got wet anyway from the spray. One of the many reasons I like shoes porous enough to let water back out after it gets in.