Cabin Fever ... Meet Trail

Headache. Is it dehydration, something else? Who knows, but cabin fever is cabin fever. We're going out. Haven't ridden anything outside, or gotten much vitamin D time since Oct. 21. In the scheme of things, that's nothing when one thinks of the disaster conditions afflicting people in this area — still, my Doctor's orders: exercise and continue to lose weight.

G-man: stopping for adjustments, mid-roller coaster.

But I'm not going to deny it — first time in gym in a long while last week, was good, but to get out on the trail today, was magical for the spirit.

Gordo had slipped back into computer zombie mode and I wondered whether he needed to get out of the house even more than I did—except he didn't know it. 

Let's see, the options:

• Windsurfing in sewage contaminated waters — fuhgeddaboudit

* Surfing in really sewage contaminated waters — fuhgeddaboudit

• Paddleboarding in sewage contaminated waters — fuhgeddaboudit

• Golf? — no, my neck discs are way too irritated for that.

• Road biking — too much tree debris from Sandy and the Noreaster

C.L.I.M.B. crew had been hard at work clearing Stillwell, post-Sandy:
Downed trees were everywhere. In places the woods
looked like a bomb hit had hit them. Some of the smaller trees took a
real beating too..

• Mountain biking? Maybe — good weather for it. Let's try that.

With roads blocked by fallen trees, or taped off due to fallen powerlines, it took a few detours from my usual well-worn shortcuts to get to Stillwell. The phone GPS came in handy, there, as it's easy to get disoriented and go in all kinds of directions, if you don't know a few alternate routes, I found some clean main roads.

The soccer fields were incredibly packed with cars and players, and the bike area had plenty of riders in various stages of preparation or de-biking.

Uh oh — lot more moisture on the service road than I expected for snow that had mostly melted at home a while ago.

The trail was muddy in paces for sure, but we'd come too far to go back. Ordinarily I would not ride in this, as it's not good for the single track, but it was borderline. Just a few deepish muddy patches, outright mini-pond/swamplets, and other wet spots. The CLIMB crew had done an amazing job clearing the trail of downed trees.

The first time round we picked our way carefully. By the second trip we knew what to avoid. ... except the unavoidable dog-poop spot somewhere hidden under the leaves. And were there ever leaves.  They made the gravelly, sandy parts easy, and the steeps a lot softer, but more sweetly exhausting to climb. Ek, stinky tyres for a while there.

We cleaned a few tough climbs but failed the rooty switchback from hell. Not even close on that one.

Yep, there were a few spots that screamed out just how much MTB conditioning we'd lost since the Spring. Some tough climbs that revved up the breathing to the most rapid it's been since ... we last were here?

Still...love the learning curve, and the getting fitter curve.