RAW: Spring Riding in Winter

I rode Tuesday thinking I wouldn't be able to ride Wednesday prior to the CT NEMBA monthly chapter meeting in Middletown, only to find that my afternoon suddenly freed up so I popped smoke, swung by the house to pick up my bike and drive north! I hate having to stop by the house on my way to a ride to pick stuff up because the kids automatically think Daddy's home to play and feel so bad that I will be leaving again. I will make it up to them tonight, thought. My darling wife did hook me up and brave the desolate wasteland that is my home office and charge up the battery on my camera for me! Thanks Dear!

The other day I went to the doctor because I thought a past leg injury of mine had resurfaced after snowboarding two weeks ago but I got it all checked out Tuesday and it appears that I might have pulled a few muscles or even pinched a nerve somewhere. The doctor said to take it easy so that is why I rode the 'Horse yesterday and I was planning on riding it again on Wednesday but when I pulled it down from the rack, the back tire was flat! That is the last time I am riding that bike at Dingle Brook! So, I went with the single speed.

It was a nice little turn out for an impromptu ride before the Chapter Meeting. Barry Burke and his friend Bill (rides a blue Raleigh XXIX rigid), Paula, Glenn, and myself. We rode about four and half miles in the waning daylight. The trails at Wadsworth Falls State Park are fantastic for a fun ride with variable terrain. There is no insane climbing or and for that matter nothing terribly technical, either. So if you are just starting out, I would highly recommend to everyone to try this place! Surprisingly, there was not one mechanical during the entire ride! That is atypical for a CT NEMBA ride.

This house at the edge of the park got our attention. It looked like a Mexican Restaurant. It would have been nice for a little mid-ride pick me up with a cold Corona and few tacos. There was, however, a casualty, myself. I tried to bunny hop over a log that was on an angle and got stuck between my front wheel and bash guard, didn't unclip in time and my thigh and forearm bared the brunt of my weight on the log. Needless to say, I got a nice bump on my leg and arm but it didn't hinder my ability to ride.

Garmin, Garmin, Garmin!

What were you thinking? Did you actually think you could rush to market your Basecamp application and hope you would stand a chance to compete against Topofusion? I think you still have Dorothy's red slippers on and you are still chanting: "We will beat Topofusion; we will beat Topofusion!" Ahhh, when? The only thing you have going for you is that the 24K Topo maps are wonderfully detailed! Just look at the existing trails at Upper Paugussett, with the exception of the Gussy Trail, they are all there!

The 3D effect isn't that great, the max height it will allow is 200% which is what you see in the shot above. Topo Fusion can go what appears to be 500%. Other things that are lacking are better editing tools and file control. I am really surprised that they do such great maps but have such crappy software to accompany it.

A RAW Eight Miler

If I had more time (daylight) this ride could have been a ten miler by doing a round tripper on the Gussy but all I was able to do was one way and loop at Dinglebrook. Next week, now that Daylight savings kicks in this weekend, things could be different. The Gussy is still soft in some places and it looks like a big, rotten limb came down in the technical section up from the the big Up-and-Over, that somebody cleared already.

As for the Dinglebrook trails, bad news. The dual track lead in off of Lake George is really wet and muddy. Riding down to the bench is OK but coming back up is not. Seeing that the Lake George ROW was too wet I rode out through the horse trails in Newtown but between the blowdowns and the soft ground it was no joy until I got back to Pond Brook Road.

Garmin Edge 705 Ride Report

Hiking earlier today was a good test for the Edge, but what it really needed was a test ride. Fortunately, I was able to do just that at the tail end of the day. Sunday was gloriously warm for a late winter's day. While on the calendar it's still winter it seems like winter in Connecticut ends in mid February, when the days start getting longer and the deeply, cold winter nights mellow out.

I pulled the Dillinger from the stable as the first bike to test it out on, not that one bike or the other would really matter. Like my previous Garmin bike computers the only safe spot to mount it and still keeping it visible is on the stem. I know one person that mounted his Edge 305 on his top tube but he rides a road bike and another guy that mounted his on the seatpost. While those are great alternatives to mounting it cuts off the visual aspect for the Edge, especially since the 705 has a map view.

Operating the 705 is a little quirky. You can't turn it on with it plugged in to your commuter because it automatically thinks you are in data transfer mode. When you use the wall plug, it starts up with the screen in which it's trying to acquire satellites and it's very dark. There is no way to adjust the brightness, only the back lighting. Inside, you have to turn on the back lighting, but outside it's not needed at all. Also, there is no way to tell it to turn off looking for satellites, but once it can't establish enough satellites it will ask to operate without looking for them.

The big screen is really nice and having maps is good but the one thing I don't like is it doesn't work like my other Garmin GPSs, where if you want to follow a particular trail, it wont let you display it on the screen unless you create it as a workout and the workout display comes in the form of a highlighted route. That's fine I suppose but I guess they assume most people using this feature are following roads. I am going to try it out on the next time I ride. I think that was a feature on the 305 as well but since it didn't have maps all it showed you was a line.

No change in riding with the larger to speak of, except for the bigger display. Size wise, it's bigger than the Edge 205/305 but a little bit smaller than the GPSMAP60s. My quick ride up and down the Gussy trail was sloppy, in the sense that I was riding sloppy. Bike is was making some more noises along the way. I had it up on the rack playing with the EBB because I thought to chain was too tight. I loosened the tension so that there is 1/8 to 1/4 inch of play in the chain but the sag isn't that noticeable and thus I don't think I have worry about the chain dropping. I probably should have lubed the chain, though. I found that you can effect your chain line by sliding the EBB left or right. I thought it would be grooved to prevent any lateral movement.

A Taste of ...

You could say spring but in this case, my Garmin Edge 705. I used it today to recon some local new trails and it was really accurate. The Pole Bridge trail network as it's shown below isn't a huge riding area. Once all four loops are done and connected you are looking at a 3 to 4 mile ride if you were just riding everything once.

This place has the potential for some fantastic riding and while the basic network will be 3 to 4 miles, riding each trail segment in both directions will double that distance and provide some fun, challenging singletrack.

The parking area will accommodate 4 or 5 cars parked on the shoulder.

The entrance is still a big mess and this access road goes all the up into the center of the property. It is terribly washed out further up the hill.

Of course these things aren't allowed here. This trail system will be a great test at ATV proofing a trail system.