Wednesday, May 31, 2017

Mucky Wednesday Jettison

Nelson picked me up from my place, and as Jet hasn't had a good run for a few days we dragged him out too. Parked on Parkridge Pl and headed up Britten. I got the wheeze, sounding like a flock of Canada geese. Jet had a lovely time roaming off after rabbit smells and then coming back to a whistle, then settled in nicely between us, Nelson out front and me slowly dragging further behind, wheezing, even after a blast of inhaler.  A couple of quite sloppy bits on the way up, but easily avoidable.  Realised at the top there that I'd forgotten to turn on the MapMyRide, so did that here.  Around the front of Britten and then along to the road and across, resting just over the fence up here, watching a bunch of lights rounding under the gondola and up the road towards us.  Turned out to be mtnbikers, on the road.  We took off up the hill and they watched as we ambled slowly upwards.  Up in the zig zaggy bits the trail got REALLY greasy, with no traction on the flatter bits, so we walked a bit, then it got okay and on over the top to the gate.

Over the fence here and across the sort of new bit to the usual trail and over the rocks to the A frame stile, then downwards.  Not so bad to start, but the back face above Lyttelton had some slop so I was taking it pretty easy.  Then lower down through the tussocks was better, but still taking it pretty easy in the greasy, and keeping an eye on Jet behind.  Nelson was awaiting us at the bottom of this section, and we saw a newly sprayed (and slightly ridden-in) new line from here, bypassing the 4wd section, so off down around it's curves across above the trees and then coming into the top of Greenwood right where the newby trail starts (above the ruins).  Decided here that Greenwood would be diabolical so we headed off down the newby, finding a bit of drift and not a lot of traction.  Fun, tho splecky, and rolled it through to the big pines and around onto the climb.  Here we stopped and cleaned up our drivetrains a bit for the climb.  Onwards up, good climbing, plenty of traction bar one or two spots, and through up to the top of Greenwood entrance. 

Up the road, bunnyhopping off a bit of muck, and then into Britten for to descend.  Slowish going for me, not trusting the slop or grease (and post-crash of last week).  Jetty had a nice sprint behind me, cutting the corners to catch up, then under the pylons and across the slope and into the fun descent back to the end.  Good doggy had fun and so did a couple of mucky boys.

My ride from part way up, vs Nelson's...  so, we did just under10kms and around 300m climbed.

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