gorillas in the mist

I don't think my brother Timmy is hairier than me, but his "ape index"
certainly qualifies him for the notion I had for the title of this. He

happened to be in town for Christmas and we got a couple of chances to
ride,
one of the rides on a misty day in the local mountains.

The peaks were shrouded by windblown wisps of moisture the whole ride.
With
temperatures in the 60's at the bottom and 50's at the top, it made for
an
interesting change in what gear was worn where. My base layer was
finally
peeled about three quarters into the climb and my long-sleeved tshirt
was
wringable by the time we finished the hike/ride to the top. The base
layer
was added back for the duration after topping out. Timmy didn't
convert his
gear at all, then again he had proper riding gear on as opposed to my
JSTRM
gear.

The descent was rockier than I remembered it from two weeks ago. I was
on
the same bike, but Timmy had flown in and was borrowing a rigid geared
bike
of mine. That trail has beaten me up on more than one occasion when
the
bike of choice was a rigid singlespeed. I think Timmy was taking a bit
more
of a beating because of the conditions. He did manage a pinch flat
about a
third of the way down, which was quickly remedied. He decided to pick
his
way a little more after the flat with me in tow the rest of the way
down the
steeper parts. Those Continental Diesel tires sure worked well in the
conditions presented, both bikes equipped with one up front.

The "flat" part of the descent had suffered moto damage since we had
ascended it earlier. The noise from them had crept up the mountainside
when
we had neared the top of the climb. Having hoped for the best, what
greeted
us the rest of the way down the singletrack was not the best. Turns
were
blown-out and anything remotely steep had been roto-tilled in both
directions. They must have missed the humungous "CLOSED TO MOTORIZED
VEHICLES" sign at the trailhead. Some people's kids.

The road ride out on a dirt road was somewhat interesting and seemed to
be
full of various dirt claudes. Claude #1 decided his jeep was much
faster
than bicycles and gunned it when we asked to pass, choking us with a
huge
dust cloud. Claude #2 was using 100% of the road and obviously not his

mirrors, almost pinching Timmy against a granite wall on the *left*
side of
the road when we were passing. Claude #3 had slowed to a crawl to pass

another gargantuan SUV going up the road and didn't give us much room
to get
by after his pass. Claude #4 must have thought he was Mickey Thompson
because his little disco wannabe-rockcrawler must have been doing 50
coming
at us when he shut it down and decided to give enough road up. Claude
#5
had a box van full of illegal aliens and almost pulled right out into
us.
Claude #6 decided that he wanted to drive his new disco jeep all over
the
road, even on the left side when traffic was oncoming when we were
attempting to pass. Ending up as hood oranments was not part of the
plan,
so we gunned it past him and hurried to get off of this section before
being
killed. The dirt claude road happened to be much more technical and
dangerous than the singletrack was.

Timmy had to leave town this evening, so I brought him back to our
Mom's
place after the ride. I didn't mind the extra driving because there
was
leftover turkey, ham, apple pie, etc. waiting to be scarfed up. I
drove
home in a tryptophan haze and thought about how cool it was to ride
bikes
with any of my brothers. It's almost a shame that only one of them
rides,
but at the same time is better than none of them riding. It won't be
three
years before these apes get to ride together again.

JD

.

Relevant Pages

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