This past weekend, several of us from work (me, Beau, Steve, Alex, KC, Tony Allen and others) went to a bachelor’s party for another guy at work (Pete Frank). On Sat., we rode Tahoe’s famous Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride.

It was a blast, but very challenging. We started at 7265′, and climbed for almost 4 miles to 8977′. The altitude and technical quality of the climb (lots of large rocks) gave us plenty of reason to stop and catch our breath. Once at the top, the real fun began.

The descent, to 6410′, was a technical rock-fest. Almost the entire route seemed to be laden with everything from loose, small rocks to granite steps to small boulders. Sometimes very narrow, the trail was treacherous…and lots of fun.

Steve did well until about 3/4 the way down. Then he got a little too confident and crashed in the most spectacular way. He should have been hurt a lot worse, but is just bumped and bruised. Tony spread his falls more consistently over the mountain, but also ended up just scraped and sore. I think all of us were off the bike at some point, but no one else really took a major header.

Our final stats were 1755′ of climbing, 2610′ of descending over a 10.4 mile ride. It took on the order of 4.5 hours.

Here are some pics.

Short version: I now have working DSL that is faster than advertised, and it was the easiest installation I’ve ever experienced with any broadband I’ve ever had.

Longer version: I read about Britsys on DSLReports.com. They had almost completely glowing reviews, so I put in an order for the new place on Aug. 8. They waited until the following Monday to put the order in with the telco since it was a new phone line. I paid a $99 setup fee and no equipment fee. They FedExed a Cisco 678 router to me, preconfigured for their network, and it arrived by Friday the 15th. On Monday the 18th (today), they told me to plug it in. Voila! I’m on the network!

And, get this, it’s faster than they said it would be! They quoted me $45/mo. for 1500 down and 384 up. I just speed tested at 1267 down and 633 up! And I’ve got a static IP! 😃

Since a server is the main reason I wanted a static IP in the first place, it goes without saying that I’m happy. 668 is the expected max, after overhead, of a 768 up line, and I’m super close to that. 1305 is the max for a 1500 line, so I’m sitting pretty there too. Very, very sweet.

While we’ve committed to a regular three-day ride schedule (Tue., Thu., and Sat. mornings), we’ve often added a fourth day. We decided to add Monday as a regular fourth day to our schedule. Today was our first day with the new schedule.

Alex, Steve, KC and I met up at the regular 7am start time to ride Waterdog, but we rode it backwards. It was a nice change of pace, and gave us a chance to see the trail in a new way. Riding it in reverse like this also added quite a bit of climbing to the ride, which was a nice bit of exercise. We climbed up 13 Switchbacks Trail, adding some nice technical climbing, as opposed to the mostly fireroad climbs we do going the normal direction. It was a good day.

Anyone who wants to join up with us is welcome. I’m happy to say that we’ve got a solid regular group, which makes riding much easier since most of us would probably stay in bed a lot of mornings if it weren’t for the rest of the group. We’ve all gotten into reasonably good shape (I’ve personally lost almost 20 pounds) on top of having fun starting the day in a beautiful setting.

For the first time ever, laptops have outsold desktops. Laptops accounted for “more than 54 percent” of computer sales in May. In a related note, LCDs accounted for more than half of all monitors sold for the first time as well.

Nice to see that trends that Apple started well over two years ago are getting mainstream. 😉

The rumors about the new Power Mac G5 were true. From $1999 to $2999, these things look great. The dual 2 GHz machine looks awesome. 1 GHz front-side bus (!), up to 8 GB of PC3200 RAM, independent custom-built bus controllers to reduce contention between subsystems, 64-bit chip with full native 32-bit application compatibility. Very sweet. New case is all-aluminum with a fancy cooling system: 9 independently controlled fans that cool independent parts of the new case design. Sounds like it’d be loud, but they’ve got it down below the latest G4 case design.

They showed off Mac OS X 10.3. This thing looks hot. They’ve focused a lot on performance, which is welcome. The hottest stuff, IMO, is the new navigation stuff, called Expose, which provides better navigation through open windows than the Dock. Fast user switching isn’t a big deal to me, but a lot of people seem to like it. I’m not crazy about the new Finder using the brushed metal look-and-feel, but I trust that the overall experience will be improved: people that have played with it seem to love it. Can’t wait for the new Mail.app. All-in-all looks good. It costs $129. If they keep pushing out hot new stuff, I’m happy to pay $129 a year for it.

They released a few things today. iChat AV Beta is an upgrade to iChat that leverages the AOL IM framework to add real-time, configuration-free video conferencing. It looks marvelous. I’ve downloaded it, and there are small, nice fixed to the regular IM capability, but I haven’t had time to really play with the new features. I’ll make another post about them. To go along with it, a stylish, high quality web conference camera with built-in noise-cancelling mic called iSight is also out today.

Safari is out of beta, at version 1.0. It includes the new WebKit framework for OS X, which allows programmers of third-party tools to use the Safari web rendering capabilities inside their programs. Very cool. It comes with API documentation and examples, so prepare to see every program with a need handling complex HTML and JS natively.

All great stuff. The only rumored item missing was the new 15″ PowerBook. Maybe MacWorld next month will get that, since there were a lot of announcements already. If it’s a G5, /hooboy/, will that be news. We know they’re making new cases, so there’s got to be something in the works.

Normal 7 AM ride. This time, Steve joined us. He’s never really mountain biked before, and he did well considering. WD isn’t an easy course for someone just getting on a bike, and he managed to do the whole thing without biting it (no Crash Cam action today 😉).

Alex and Beau went ahead of us. They rode the new trail (I didn’t take Steve on it since he was in deep enough for a newbie) and Alex did his best Superman impression after hitting the logover wrong.

Weather started out cold and misty, but cleared up nicely by the end of the ride.

This past Sat., there was a ride and BBQ thrown by and for people who worked on the new trail at Water Dog. I went for that ride instead of our normal Sat. morning ride.

Boy, it was a lot of climbing. We started at the normal spot at the end of Carlmont, but instead of riding around to the top of the fire road, we started up the eastern slope, to the street above the park. We then rode up that street to another trailhead on the southeastern side of the park. There’s a singletrack I’d never ridden before that leads to the 13 switchbacks. We rode up those (actually not as hard as you’d think), and around until we connected to the new trail. We rode the new trail forward, and eventually ended back down at Carlmont again. We rode up the car trail (the singletrack we usually ride down) up to the point where we normally fork down, and instead took another option down, which is a pretty technical singletrack descent to the lake. At some point, we rode up culvert drop and down the CCC trail (that’s the one with the 3 steep singletrack climbs we usually do).

In any case, we rode every piece of singletrack in the park, sometimes twice, and did almost everything we usually do in the opposite direction we usually do it. There were at least 2 new singletracks I hadn’t seen before. Lots of fun, and my legs held out. Took 2-2.5 hours to do. We’ll have to get out for some exploring with these folks some time.

The BBQ after was pretty good. Turns out that the woman who I took an intermediate skills class from with Erik a few years back was there (she’s the former coach of the Stanford MTB team). Turns out she’s married to the guy who fitted me for my bike at Trail Head Cyclery (who also showed up to the BBQ). Small world.

Today’s ride was a blast. The weather was a complete contrast to Saturday’s ride; it was sunny and warm, with blue skies. What a good day to be on a bike. 🙂

Beau, KC and Penny met Alex and I at WD a little after 7am, and we hit the trail about 7:20 or so. This was Penny’s first mountain bike ride, and she only planned to ride the opening fireroad. She had a little spill, but no big deal.

There were plenty of firsts on this ride besides Penny’s first ride. Alex was riding his new Stumpjumper FSR on dirt for the first time. It was also his first ride on clipless pedals. While they didn’t cause a fall, he managed to get the bike good and dirty after auguring in on a corner (just after Mount Rajmore). First ride, first wreck, same day. 😉

KC, who normally cleans WD, took time to inspect the dirt on the hillside of Culvert Drop. He took another soil sample after going over-the-bars on the nice dip before the singletrack section. It’s a new bike, he’s still working out the kinks.

Why don’t I have pictures of all this, you might be asking? I left the Crash Cam at home (with my whole bag >:() this morning, and Beau’s pics came out really badly, so we’ll have to live with it in our memories only. 😉

No real injuries, though, and a good time had by all.

This was our first morning ride. We started about 6:45 or so. It was foggy, damp and cold. Once we got going, the cold wasn’t bad, but the damp kept us wet and muddy (not always a bad thing, but I wasn’t looking for that this morning).

Alex brought his beater bike along, and we had to pump his tires up along the way, and just after finishing, my bike pump broke.

Despite the negatives, the ride was good. Hardly anyone was out there, and the singletrack was nice, as usual.

We had to start from the top of the trailhead, since the lower parking lot area was all coned off. I found out later that the area was blocked off due to a big fire at a retirement home on that block caught fire through the night.

At least Water Dog didn’t burn. 😉

KC, despite a new fancy bike that has yet to be ridden, flaked. That left me and Alex (on Raj’s bike) to hit the trail. It was colder and windier than Weather.com had us expect, but it wasn’t too bad. The fork pump for Raj’s bike (my old Stumpy that I sold him) broke, leaving the fork empty and bottoming out on any little thing. That meant a harsh, twitchy ride for Alex, who took the opportunity for a dirt bath on more than one occasion. No injuries, and we finished in under an hour.

I rode Beau’s bike to try and troubleshoot a problem with it, but it worked fine the whole time. Definitely had some leg and lung burn at various points. Gotta do this more often….

As for the trail, the first steep singletrack climb seemed more washed out. That made it steeper and the exposed rocks were more of a challenge. I managed to make it, but it was definitely harder. The culvert downhill also seemed a little more washed out and challenging, but not as different as the climb. The trail is pretty overgrown, thanks to the recent rains. Overall, it’s still in pretty nice shape and the singletrack is fab.

Yeah, you have to register. But if you do, NYT has a pretty good overall article on TiVo.

It’s mostly about Moab’s push to rejuvenate itself by building new trails, now that tourism has competition from Fruita, et. al. Good stuff. I didn’t know about the new beginner-level route, or I’d probably have taken Val there instead of Klondike Bluffs. I’m sure it’ll be on the maps by the next trip.

Day Twelve (4/9/03)

Fruita rocks! We went to the local bike shop, bought a map and asked for a good “Intro to Fruita” ride, keeping Val’s skills in mind. He suggested Rustler’s Loop, simply stating if that was too hard, we were in the wrong place. Happily, it was not too hard, but seemed just right. It had a little bit of everything and a lot of singletrack. Easy enough for Val, pretty and interesting enough for me. Now that I’ve had the opportunity to do some recon, a real bike trip to Fruita is a must-do.

Not knowing how hard the rest of Fruita would be, we decided to move on to Moab, about an hour-and-a-half from Fruita. We threw up a tent at the Moab KOA, our first camping of the trip. Weather in Moab was beautiful: mid-70s during the day and blue skies. We got in mid-afternoon, and after lunch at the Moab Brewery, made the pilgrimage to Delicate Arch at Arches National Park.

The night was chilly, but liveable.

Day Thirteen (4/10/03)

After breakfast at a new place called Breakfast at Tiffany’s (pretty good), I took Val out for the beginner’s rite of Moab passage: Klondike Bluffs. As we prepared for the ride at the trailhead, Val pointed out a leggy blonde pedaling around the area. She was on this super expensive bike (a brand-new red Specialized S-Works Epic and decked out in the latest garb, but didn’t seem too sure of herself. We started our way up the trail.

Val wasn’t happy about this trail like she had been in Fruita, but wouldn’t turn around when I suggested a retreat. Almost to the top, she decided to find shelter from the sun while I finished. I came back down after climbing the last bit of the trail, and met up with her and three other women who had just ridden to the point where Val had camped out. Turns out that the group of women had sent their “men-folk” on ahead unencumbered, and they were slowly catching up.

The women were interested in the details of the rest of the trail, so I told them about it. One of the women was the blonde with the expensive bike from the beginning. Her name was Marina. She had a thick accent and not-great English. Turns out that she’s an MTB newbie (no shock there), and her fiancee had bought her the bike, and he had the same one. Ginger was the group’s spiritual leader—younger and easily the strongest biker in the bunch. Caroline was the oldest (and apparently Ginger’s mother).

Luckily Val decided that the girl power thing was just enough to get her to finish to the top of the ride, so I turned around and joined them on the way back up.

We caught up with the men in their group and hiked to the Klondike Bluffs (no bikes allowed) after reaching the top of the MTB trail. For those who know the ride, they’ve put a metal rack up there to lock your bike to, instead of just leaning it on the tree. The day was nice, and the views were great. We chit-chatted with a new couple who took our picture after Marina and co. decided to hike further out onto the Bluffs. The new couple were from Minnesota, and we spent a half-hour or so there before heading back. Val hadn’t believed me that the way back down was much easier than the way up, but agreed later that it was.

We had dinner at a Mexican restaurant I had never eaten at before (La Hacienda, attached to the Inca Inn that I’ve stayed at in the past), which was OK, but not great. After dinner drinks at Eddie McStiff’s, followed by pool and pseudo-gambling. McStiff’s had this new thing upstairs where there was a craps table and a blackjack table, but it wasn’t really gambling, since Utah law prohibits it. Basically, you pay $10 for $100 worth of chips and they teach you to play. I had been telling Val that I wanted to re-learn to play craps before we go to Vegas, so this was a fun way to do it. All-in-all, a good evening.

Day Fourteen (4/11/03)

We decided to head home, given that Moab was too intense a riding venue for Val, and we were both ready to get home anyway. Looking at a map, it always seemed to me that Highway 50 was a smaller road, but a more direct Reno-Moab route, so I decided that we should go home that way. Bottom line: more direct, but not really faster, and way more high-maintenance and fewer places to stop if needed. Its nickname is “The Lonliest Road in America,” and it felt like it. Highway 80 will remain the route of choice for me in the future. We made it all the way home, leaving about 9:30 AM Mountain Time and arriving in Castro Valley at midnight Pacific Time.

Trip Summary

Total Mileage: 4750 Miles

States Visited: 8 (NV, UT, WY, SD, IA, NE, MO, CO)

National Parks and Monuments: 4 (Jewel Cave, Mt. Rushmore, Badlands, Arches)

MTB Rides: 3

Day Ten (4/7/03)

Well, not quite snowed in, but there’s certainly a lot of snow and ice, and conditions are pretty nasty. Val wanted to spend some more time with the fam, so we decided to stay an extra day. Mostly hanging around. Val and her mom went to do some thrift store shopping, while her dad and I watched the war on CNN. Later, Val and I walked to a used book store, and she got mad at me for pelting her with snowballs. (Hey, no snow for me growing up! >:)

We all went for dinner at a steak buffet in Council Bluffs (across the Missouri River, which puts it in Iowa, but it’s only a 10 minute drive). The steaks weren’t big, but they were pretty good, cooked to order, fast, and you get as many returns as you like. I ate 3, which apparently is more than most people that go with Val’s family. 😉

Day Eleven (4/8/03)

Driving day. We left Omaha (and Val’s crying mom) in the late morning and started for Colorado. I drove the first leg, which was a few hundred miles from Omaha to just outside Denver, CO. We had originally planned to stop in Denver, but it was early and we felt good. So, we pressed on and arrived here at mountain bike mecca, Fruita, CO. There’s a nice, cheap motel called Balanced Rock that has the best room we’ve stayed in yet, for $35. The big bike shop is close at hand. We’ll investigate the riding here tomorrow. We plan to ride here tomorrow, and either stay one more night here, or move to Moab, (<150 miles away) for riding the next day. It all depends on if I want to have a day of rest at home before going back to work next Mon. We’ll see. It’s good to be in a warm place with mountain bikes atop every car! 😃

Day Eight

I forgot to mention the change in weather over the last few days. It’s been beautiful the entire trip up until now. Omaha tied record highs, with an 86 degree day when we went biking. It turned cold the next day, and is now snowing. It’s the most amazing and dramatic switch in weather I’ve seen. From hot weather that had us in shorts to sleet and hail to snow, in the span of two days.

The snow let up for the wedding on day eight. I had a minor scare when the cleaners didn’t have my suit when they said they did. But it turned out it just needed to be pressed, which they did while I ate lunch.

The wedding was nice. It gave me a good chance to get used to the new camera, which will come in handy for Beau’s wedding a week after we get back.

Day Nine

The day after the wedding was mostly packing up and traveling. Snow increased, and we had to drive through some nastiness to get to Val’s grandmother’s place in Falls City. We visited with her for a few hours and then headed back towards Omaha and visited with a friend of hers who recently had a baby.

We made it back to Val’s parents with the plan to leave for Colorado the next day (Monday). Little did we know that we were about to get snowed in…