More great weather on Saturday with clear skies; however a Chinook came to town & it was super windy.  Here are some of many yellow leaves around town – this taken from our driveway.

Straight after lunch it was time for Finnian’s first ex utero hike up Ha Ling.  The road up to the Goat Creek parking lot seemed markedly better than the previous week & we were hiking by five to one.  All the snow that I hiked through last week was all gone & there were heaps of people & dogs on the trail.  As we got above the tree line the wind started to get up a bit.

Megan, Finn hiding, Gill & Alex – looking down Goat Creek (Banff is around the corner to the right)

We started the last zag of all the zig-zags up to the summit as we layered up a bit.  The wind kept getting stronger & stronger.  About a hundred metres from the top there were some really big gusts that came close to blowing some of us over.  The biggest of all the gusts ripped my sunnies off my face & I last saw them disappearing towards the edge of the cliff.  None of us valued getting to the top over not-being blown a few hundred metres down to Canmore, so we decided to turn around.

Playing Crouching Tiger, Hidden Finn – isn’t the summit close?

A short photo stop on the edge of the ridge – the wind had great fun messing up the girls’ hair.

As was the case last Saturday, after getting home after the hike/stroll I was still itching for a ride in the sun.  This time I went up to the Nordic Center & was pleased to get all around the Orange Trail, Coal Chutes & the exit trails without unclipping.  The trails were in sublime condition & being early evening there was no-one around – the only life I had to share the trail with was a curious deer.

Alex bailed on our planned Sunday epic to do a Jumpingpound loop, claiming sickness.  Thankfully I had a back up plan – free shuttles at Moose Mountain.  The drive down was fantastic – there are even more yellow trees down beside the highway near the Cochrane turnoff & around Bragg Creek.  Arriving around eleven, I got on the first shuttle up the hill with five or six others – I definitely had the most puny bike.  I followed them all down Race of Spades – it wasn’t too steep & I could easily ride all of the trail & keep up with the group.  There were some pretty big structures & I didn’t hit any of the gaps, but could ride most of the rest – there was a neat bridge up two metres in the trees that wound its way around for a while.  Halfway down there was a really steep climb that had all in front off & pushing straight away – I waited for quite some time at the top.  Moving off, the second half back to the parking lot was just as fun – if not quite as rocky & rooty.  I decided to do one more run to see if I could go any faster – we had a smaller group & it was faster.  I rode a few more structures than the first time – one I was told was rollable, it sort of was – but a lot steeper & taller than I was expecting.  It was the first time I remember bottoming out my forks so conclusively – quite a loud thunk.

I was too busy having fun riding down to take many photos – here is some typical trail.

Back at the car, it was time for lunch before heading out to do a XC loop.  The shuttle driver gave me some good tips on how to find the new Ridgeback trail.  Once I found the trailhead, it wasn’t too difficult as the signage was superb.

This was a one-trail, ridden there & back mostly climbing out.  The first section, being so new was really muddy & I met a couple of younger guys riding up.  One was on a rather large Scott Ransom while the other was on a hardtail with a broken derailleur (enforced singlespeeding) – this guy was rather strangely riding in white socks & sandals.  They showed me the way & half way up we ditched the Ridgeback for the older Tom Snow trail – it turned out that there were some massive mud bogs in.  The only consolation of having an almost bald XC tyre on the rear was that I got very little mud up my back – mud seemed to go almost everywhere else.  The other guys had to turn around at three o’clock to get back to Calgary to work – so I continued up to the end of the trail to get a bit more climbing in & of course more downhill.

Riding through the beech trees

Looking out from the top of the ride

On the way down I chose the parts of the two trails that I hadn’t already been on.  For the first half this was the Ridgeback – & it was fantastic (& mostly dry) & flowy.  There was a nice big climb for a while, before riding along the ridge & more great down.  I was, & still am,  quite tired after such a great day’s riding.

It’s been a couple weeks & it’s been the usual mix of working heaps & riding. The riding has been curtailed a little in the last week due to the inclement weather. Summer has well & truly ended with some determination – it’s been cold & it’s snowed a few times in town. The highlight ride for the last two weeks has been a new trail called Razor’s Edge that word of mouth told us about. It starts near the end of the downhill from the Barrier Lookout (a ride Alex & I have done quite a few times now) & apparently comes out on the TransCanada. Friday before last was reasonably nice & I was keen to explore – so Alex & I parked on the side of the highway after work & rode up Quaite to the top of Jewell Pass. This is Mt Barrier (just right of centre) taken from high up at the cement plant.

We had to ride & push up the downhill trail for a few hundred metres before finally spying the trail branching off to the left. As the trail was quite newly cut, the traverse around to the next pass was quite soft & slippery (thankfully there were not too many roots). Before long we were at the pass – which we had to go along, not over for a change. It was pretty rocky & we appropriately spent quite a while riding along the Razor’s Edge. There were some good slippery drops of which we could do some, & some we weren’t going to attempt knowing that we didn’t really know how long it would be before we got off the trail. It’s always quite neat riding along big slabs of rock. We lost the trail proper at the other end of the pass, but with a bit of bush bashing following various coloured ribbons we were back on the trail climbing up & then around the next peak (the one on the left of the photo above, I think). The descent through the trees (we were by this stage on the reverse of the unknown peak) started off really step & slippery & not all rideable for us – it flattened out a bit, & became really fun before climbing a little & then dropping on to the final descent to the highway. We were a long way above the highway & the trail soon turned to being completely big slabs of rock. It was little hard to know exactly where the trail was, but there were sufficient cairns to make our way down eventually. There were some neat little rollovers & chutes to zoom down. One just had to be careful to stop & take the left turn twenty metres from the highway – or else some poor motorist would have had a MTBer flying off the cliff & landing on their hood. It turned out to be a two hour ride to do only ten kilometres, & it was a little epic in places (hence the slow pace) – but the downhill sections were both rewarding & challenging.

While I’ve got them here, here are a couple more pics taken from the cement plant – looking up the Bow Valley (Canmore is further up there, around the corner a little). It may even be a more scenic setting than NZ Steel; actually, it’s much nicer than the Manukau Harbour & dairy farms.

It was pretty wet in general last week, so not too many outdoor activities. Friday morning there was a good few centimetres of snow in town & even more out at Exshaw – when it cleared that afternoon, leaving work was really beautiful (even more so as it was the weekend). Saturday was unexpectedly clear – so I took the opportunity to pop up Ha Ling to get a good view over the Bow Valley & up the Spray Valley. I hadn’t been up there since February, when there was bit more snow around. It’s the easiest summit around here (about an hour up & just under an hour down – the descent time does tend to depend a bit on how slippery it is). The snow was melting by now, but there was still quite a bit around – out of the trees there was about twenty centimetres in some places – & a few chipmunks scurrying around. Nice to have some blue skies & a view for a change.

A nice ride after the hike around the G8 & that was Saturday afternoon. Sunday was a good day for watching TV programs & chocolate chai. The weekend ended on an unexpectedly expensive note after Alex spied a nice pair of alpine touring skis, bindings, boots & skins. They turned out to be in really good condition – so now I have a nice pair of K2s & it doesn’t really matter so much now if the snow comes in a hurry, as I want to go & try them out.