Getting Lost :-)

Heading to the Deep Dark Woods

It had been long enough, the rains stopped & I decided that it would be better all-round if I squeaked in the time for a ride.  After all the rain, I planned to stick to the roads, but got distracted by a trail that I thought would be pretty solid.  It ended up being more like a slippery slide - so we took it easy & sloshed through.  The camera on my smartphone can not focus in heavy woods.  I've tried different settings, using the flash - which I did in the photo above - but I think it's sensors are overwhelmed with the data.

As we worked our way around the mountain, we started the climb for the top.  Farah now really likes to come around the corner off the single track trail & start her gallop.  After five days off, she was feeling very fresh!  I let her go, our top speed to date had been about 23 mph.  Today - less that 1/2 way up she took the bit & dug in for another surge.   It's always so amazing to feel the horsepower.  I knew that we'd broken through that earlier set-point & moved up a notch.   I asked her to start slowing down early enough that if something was going on up there - we'd have space to stop.  After the logging a year ago, I'd hoped things would stay quiet, but seeing all the rock going down etc.,  bodes no good for another section of trees on the ridge... 

We took a short break at the Monument, then started down.  I decided on the spur of the moment to go all the way down - to the bottom & see what traffic looked like on Hwy 9.  Not surprisingly - there was a steady stream both directions, though there was a lull when I took the photo. 

Gate at Hwy 9

My GPS registered over 11-miles at this point, I was thinking that I'd watch to see how far it was to make the climb back to the top.  Sounds good, but when we got to the lower level I'd forgotten which turn that we'd come down on & took the wrong one.

Looking back at the top of the mountain & ridge

We ended up sloshing through lots of water & along a road/trail that hadn't been used in a long time.  For a while it seemed to be going the right direction, but then made a turn & headed south.  Continuing on - thinking I might find something interesting - we finally came to a spot where there was no more going forward.  The only thing to do was turn around & slosh back.

Once on the lower road again, we found the correct turn & started back up!  By the time we were back at the trailer I had 19-miles on my GPS.  Linda was there, she & Del had been scouting to see where to send the trail work parties for tomorrow.  I told her that if she'd ridden with me, I wouldn't have gotten lost!  That will teach her!  :-)  Looking forward to seeing how we do at the beach!