Moab Ride Report

Update: Pictures added for much of the trip. See links inline below.

The Ogre managed to return from Moab and Fruita with only mild injuries and had an absolutely incredible time. Here’s the 30 second summary tour of the place:

Day 1: Wicked Slickrock Trail… a 14 mile ride around an all natural BMX playground. Grunt up a short hill, weee, grunt up, wee, grunt up, weee, grunt up, Oh sh*t… weee? Holy cow you can ride on stuff that off camber. We saw more people on this one trail than on the entire rest of the trip. – Unfortunately no Pictures from this ride. I might have a video later.

Day 2: Poison Spider to Portal: Our “guide” got lost and we wound up rolling around playing on the slickrock on top of the Mesa for 2 hours until we stumbled in to someone who knew the way. By the time we hit the top of the Portal Trail most of us had long since bonked. The Portal Trail was a brutal downhill with a short 500′ descent being to penalty for failure. Lot’s of hike-a-bike for me.

Day 3: Rest day, most of our group were dead. We rolled down a scenic trail called _Gemini Bridges_ which is a hard packed road with little to offer except cool views. Shuttled to the top to pick up the van. Pictures and Video coming soon.

Day 4: Porcupine Rim Trail – Was supposed to be too muddy and snowy to ride but it was a blast. Conditions were perfect and the trail was phenominal. A ripping ride down a technical yee-haw fire road with lots of drops down to a totally incredible section of singletrack at the bottom. One of our crew lost his rear derailer at the top and had to SS it down most of the way. This was my favorite day in Moab!

Day 5: Moving on to Fruita.. Bike shop recommended we start on the _Kokepeli Trails_ area. Moore Fun was some of the best Singletrack on the trip. Tight technical climbing and descending over rocky, brutal terrain. We even got a few flakes of snow near the top. Then we dropped down to some incredible cliff hugging singletrack on Handcuffs and took Mary’s loop to Horsethief Bench where we hit some more killer singletrack. Then I got a pinch flat screaming down Mary’s Loop back to the car.

Day 6: Mutiny !!! Of the 6 of us 4 people decided to go home :( missing the final 2 days of incredible singletrack near Fruita. The excuses varied but it was mostly just exhaustion. The two of us left did the Bookcliffs Trails which were a complete blast. There were a couple trails here which will be perfect for taking the family on, and for more advanced riders are a complete blast. We voted the the Bookcliff Trails the trails most likely to be mistaken for a rollercoaster ride. Absolutely fantastic and as we went from Chutes to Joes to Zippity they just got better.

Day 6 also had a really bizarre – small world – twist. I ran into a fellow helmet cam geek and started talking to him. I thought I recognized the Red Intense Spider and when he says he’s from San Diego I say “Bill?” and he says “Yeah, Mountain Bike Bill, do I know you?”. I had ridden with Bill once before at the Cannell Plunge about 2 years ago and since we are so far apart we had never ridden together since but here in Colorado, 1000 miles from either of our homes we run into each other. We rode together for a short time and then later met for dinner and a couple beers.

Day 7: Western Rim Trail in Rabbit Valley – Had some confusion over where the actual rim trail was but eventually found this great gem. Great canyon views and ripping fast, nearly level singletrack with some small technical stuff mixed in. Really ripped through the trail because I wanted to get most of the way home that night. A quick 15 miles in 3 hours but a very memorable, great day.

Overall, this was an incredible trip. I will definitely be riding varients of it for years to come. Weather was perfect, we got a little snow one night but no rain and only a few little snow flurries one day on the trail. By far some of the best riding I have done ever.

Pictures and videos will follow.