Sherando Oct. 2012

33 miles of dirt. Mostly single track with some fire road climbing and a short stint on the Blue Ridge Parkway. 5k+ feet elevation change. 6k+ calories burned. Awesome ride! We left just after 7am. Me, Carter and Nate were psyched and ready to roll by 9:30. Nate on his 29er, stiff fork, single speed bike. What a beast! Nate destroyed us going up the hills, but I crushed it on the way down. I was loving my long travel on the gnarly descents.

We stopped for "lunch" around 1 after Carter lost a bolt to the cleat in his shoe, but after some jerry-rigging with some twigs, it seemed to work out just fine. That was our only malfunction. No flats, no bent rims, no bent derailleur hangers. Everything worked as it should and nothing needed replacing, refilling or fixing. It was weird, but I'm not complaining. Today you'll have to click a link to see the ride map, as my phone lost GPS signal and didn't capture the second half of our ride. Carters phone worked the whole time though, so here's the link: http://www.endomondo.com/workouts/veuGmVojiXI

At the point where we got on the BRP, we met a lady that was finishing a hike. She had come from PA with her family, as she told us they do every year, and offered us a beer since they were finishing their weekend and had a lot left over. We initially politely declined, and then changed our minds after she told us it was Spaten Oktoberfest. We carried them with us until the finish, and graciously enjoyed a victory beer. We stopped in Charlotesville on the way home for some dinner, and got home around 9:45pm.

Luckily Maddog got to stay at Kaz's house with her dogs and use the doggy door, so he didn't have to wait for me to get back from riding to go out. I promptly went to bed and woke up a solid 10 hrs later. It was awesome!

Fall fun

Maddog's birthday, Kiki's birthday, disc golf, biking, Avett Brothers concert and hanging out on the river with Kaz and the dogs. All in a weekends work. Good stuff.

Pumpkin picking and Folk Festival

Ah, Richmond. You've got some really fun events. The Folk Fest may be the best. 5 outdoor venues playing Friday evening, Saturday and Sunday. All kinds of music, from bluegrass and country to "kosher gospel" to Ethiopian music. Every one being entertaining at worst, or completely captivating. My friend Chris came down for the weekend and joined us for pumpkin picking and the Folk Fest enjoyment.  The weather could not have been more pleasant. Cool, sunny, low humidity. Jeans and long sleeve shirts, and then crisp jacket weather after the sun went down. Absolutely gorgeous! And the clouds were amazing. Jet stream streaks crisscrossing the sky. Great weather and October festivities with the best of people makes for the best of memories. 

Kaz and her pumpkin

Kaz and Chris

No pumpkins were hurt in the making of this picture

Endless pumpkins

Folk fest Sat pano

Folk fest Sun pano

Awesome clouds!

Blue Mtn Disc golf

Friday's Nutritional Biochemistry test was a little tough, but I think I did okay. Then my group members from a different class got together and took some video for our "counseling" project. If it's any good, I'll post it here. It's just to practice being a counselor. A lot of it is pretty common sense stuff, but it's a class and we have to learn it.

After school, I dropped off Maddog at Kaz's place and headed up to Andrew's house in MD. Saturday morning Andrew and I hopped in his new ride and drove up to Blue Mtn Ski area where they have a couple disc golf courses. We've been there before, but not in a couple years. We hadn't ever played the "valley" course, which is at the bottom of the mountain. We played it this time, and it was quite good. Lots of fun, lots of variety. Then we played the "skyline" course, which we'd played before, and was the main reason to go. We rode the ski lift up the hill, and played the course, which winds its way back down, along the ski runs and through the woods. It's really a great time. Watching the disc glide, seemingly forever. It's breathtaking. And with a colorful fall backdrop, it was spectacular!

We got back into town, close to 10pm after the 3.5 hr drive. Our philosophical discussion on Buddhism and all things ethereal made the drive fly by. With our brains and bodies tired, we watched a little SNL and then I slept like a rock. Sunday, the plan was to play some more disc golf, but since it was raining, and we had such a fantastic, and also relatively strenuous... yes, disc golf can be strenuous. Especially when you're hiking a ski slope, and trudging through the woods to find a lost disc. So Sunday we sat around around, ate and played video games, and then watched football. Really manly stuff.

I left around 3 to beat the Redskins traffic, and got home in record time. I went to Kaz's to pick up Maddog and have dinner and catch up on each others weekends. Check out some more pictures from disc golf by clicking on the link below.  I'll post a couple videos soon!

I forgot to mention, all the pictures were taken with the iPhone 5. The panorama feature is pretty sweet as you can see in the one above, and a few more in the photo link. Very cool. 

Blue Mountain Disc golf Oct. 6, 2012

Warrior Dash

Mud run fun! Kiki, Kaz, Jen and I did the Warrior Dash this weekend on Saturday. Since it was wet and muddy, and none of us has any kind of waterproof camera, there are no pictures. But just click on the link above and imagine our faces... covered in mud and smiling! It was a great time. Once we got there. It was a bit of a "cluster" trying to find parking. Peoples cars were stuck in the muddy parking lot. We were all there for the mud, but controlled mud, and we wanted to be in it, we didn't want our cars stuck in it. After some extended traffic wait time, we parked far away from the mess and walked a little ways in. Other than that, it was a good time. The sun came out as we started, and we had a blast. No injuries besides a couple cuts and scrapes and we all finished. That was the goal. Accomplished.

Sunday we did a little car shopping. Kaz's car is on it's way out unfortunately. It's a great car (gotta love the Forrester), but time to be retired. We met up with Kirk and Lisa and Luke and some other friends for dinner and that was awesome! It was great catching up with them, and meeting Luke, and seeing some JMU folks I hadn't seen since well before graduating. Can't wait to do it again. I'll post a couple pictures when I get them. Great weekends abound. This month will include out of town disc golfing, Richmond Folk Festival, Sherando riding and whatever other adventures can be had. Looking forward to it.