My weekend started Thursday evening. I drove up to NOVA to a buddy's house. We got some dinner and packed up my new car to get ready for friday. Friday morning we got up early and headed for Seven Springs, PA for some downhill mountain biking. The staff were very helpful and one was quite attractive. But once we went to get on the lift we realized this wasn't going to be as good as some of the other places we've been.
We had to hold onto our own bikes as we rode up the lift. You had to sit on the lift while your bike was literally in your lap. Tires were on either side of you while you essentially sat under the bike. Annoying if not dangerous.
The trails were okay. The green (beginner) trail had absolutely no features and was almost hard to follow since it just went through the grass and almost nobody used it. There was basically one blue (intermediate) trail that was fun but obviously had been heavily used as the berms were chattery and lots of washed out areas, especially towards the bottom.
Some of the black trails (expert) were unridable. Insanely steep or huge (8+ feet) drops. At the top there were a couple fun obstacles. A ramp to a bridge and a big rainbow. So we mainly rode the few black trails that weren't totally nuts and the blue trail.
There was a 24hr cross country race going on the next day, but the trail had already been marked and set up, so we decided to try that out too. It was 11 miles and after about 5 we decided we'd had enough and went back to the downhilling. While the race course was fun, we did the majority of the part that went mostly down and then bailed out on a fire road as the course headed back up the mountain.
We went to dinner at a place called the Pine Grill, which was recommended to us by the attractive staff at the bike park. The food was actually quite good, and I'm not just saying that because we were starving. We also had some entertainment from the table next to us. A group of girl friends were out for their Friday night, having a good time. We ended up sharing a huge dessert with them.
After dinner and dessert we camped out under the clouds in our hammocks. Scott had a rain fly, but seeing how I didn't, I set up a back-up-plan-bed in the back of the Subaru. Luckily I didn't need it, but I slept a little better knowing I could run for cover if the sky opened up.
The original plan was to ride Seven Springs both days, but after the trails were just okay, and talking to some other trail riders, we decided we try out Wisp in McHenry, MD, which was just about an hour south of where we were. Wisp is very close to Deep Creek Park, MD. We could see the lake from the chair lift.
Wisp was considerably better than Seven Springs. First, someone else took your bike at the bottom and hung it from the chair lift, so we could just sit and rest. The trails were longer and a little better maintained and more our style. Some fun jumps and more flowy trails. We rode from 10am until 5pm with a lunch break and another distraction. They had a "Mountain Coaster" ride as well as other entertainment like a ropes course with zip lines and such. We took a ride on the coaster which was a single person roller coaster that you could control the speed. It was spectacular.
By 5pm our hands were toast. Blisters, a couple cuts and scrapes, and totally exhausted, we headed back to Scott's house. We got some Indian food and watched the new Tron. Sunday I came home and did a thorough bike cleaning and maintenance and got some new brakes. The brakes should be much more effective with less effort and less noisy. The squealing on the old ones was getting very irritating. We're off to ride again in two weeks at Snowshoe, WV.
P.S. Here's a couple
more pictures and videos from Scotts camera. Who needs a helmet cam? We need a helmet cam.
