I’ve linked this blog before, but some of his videos and photography are amazing. If this video doesn’t get you psyched to try new stuff, you should probably check to see if you still have a pulse
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A couple of hours work this morning and the Murderhorn is almost rideable.
It wasn’t what I had set out to do initially, but I had a quick rummage through the build materials at the trail head and found some treated pine sleepers I hadn’t noticed before. So I quickly changed plans for the morning and loaded up the car with wood – only to realize i had left all my tie down straps at home – DOH!
So a long slow drive saw me get to the top of S-bend road where I then had to carry all the wood in – thank god that is over and done with.
So the retaining wall now stretches 70% of the required distance (I didn’t bring along enough timber) and has been benched into a flat, easily rideable section about the width of a mattock handle. When i say easily rideable, what i mean is – there is no off camber gradient across the trail. It is still a punchy and steep climb that is going to be really brutal in a race.
Anyway, pictures or it didn’t happen….
Removing stumps and trees was the main aim of today’s digging session. Fortunately (?), there were lots and lots and lots of them to keep us busy.
Danbot and I became intimately acquainted with our mattocks as we re-directed a section to increase the length of the ‘bowl’ ride and ploughed ahead down a ridgeline to almost reach the bridge site. There is some decision making to be done at this point about where the trail will go so we left it for the minute and continued removing stumps and roots all the way through to the re-connection with the main trail.
I hadn’t realized, but someone else has been hard at work finishing the return leg to frogmouth road. Massive effort whoever it was and thumbs up. So the return leg is almost entirely cut through. It needs lots of loving with rakes to clean it up, a couple of sections need benching, but almost all the back breaking work is done. A single build day should see it finished off.
Speaking of which, book in the 10th of January as the first official club build day of the year. Dallas, Wayne and Dean have set the date and with a good turnout, we can hopefully race this section for the first club round.
It looks like we also have a source of more blocks for finishing the chute and the plan is to get them out there before the new year.
Here are a few photos from today’s digging. I was too buggered to take many photos and the light was bad anyway.
Another mini build day is slated for this sunday. 0730 in the car park. Anyone that is interested in helping out would be greatly apprecitated.
See you there!
1. I appear to be digging trails in my sleep. Mumbling and swearing inchoerently, gesticulating wildly and generally acting inappropriately at 3am. I am suggesting that I spend more time trail building in order to exorcise this…. wifey does not agree.
2. Wifey got lonely while i was building trails and has organized the “hunter women ride” network. Primarily it is a women’s social riding network, however there may be some aspects of world domination if the full extent of her plans come into fruition.
There is a blog here and a facebook group here. You can also email her hunterwomenride@hotmail.com
Driving to Awaba twice in one day? Yes, I am a nut job!
After a relativley early finish to building, there was plenty of time to load up the bikes and take the Wifey for a ride after work. With the Mont starting to loom and her MTB skills needing some honing before she attempts it, these sort of trips really do need to happen a little more regularly. They probably would if I wasn’t out playing with leeches all the time – oops.
I forgot to take the camera out with me (and I am not sure Mrs Pi11wizard would really want her photos appearing on this blog anyways 
).
Suse only balked at one section today – the rock roll over before the long descent which is her best effort yet. She is adament that she will ride it next time so shortly she will be smashing the whole track. Her lap times are coming down ridiculously fast aswell. Her first ever full lap was 39 minutes. Today was 34 minutes.
The swarms of Cicadas were interesting. In several sections of the track, 20-30 of them would take flight from the trunks of trees as we approached and then buzz around like miniature wrecking balls. Flying into your face and arms and generally making things relatively lively. This went on for the whole length of the switchback climb to Mawkes creek but we were moving to fast for them to make a nuisance of themselves on the descents. Riding at dusk has now taken on a whole new set of challenges during the summer months.
Happy trails!
It rained yesterday and last night. As a result, the entrance roads were particularly slippery and were a little bit exciting to get the road tyre shod outback to the top of S-bend road. The walk to the bottom of the chute was even more slippery. Hopefully a few tyres over the soil should pack things down a little as there are a few spots which are like ice.
Today was the day the free range bessa blocks were finally planted in the ground. It was the perfect proof of concept. The blocks are like solid bedrock to walk across and are nicely backfilled with soil to be relatively inconspicuous. The only problem is…… we are 150 blocks short. The 50 blocks we had on hand only did a fraction of the area that needs to be completed and without them, that section of track will become heavily eroded as soon as it sees traffic. I am not looking forward to getting 150 blocks down to the chute though. There was a tremendous amount of labor involved in moving just 50 of them.
Looking down the chute
Looking up the chute
My leech count today was only a single one – inside my glove. Rocky our sight manager even managed to get some leeches on his paws. Bushmans spray sure keeps them off your legs, it is probably mutating my DNA and producing cancerous cells as I write this however. Everything is a trade off isn’t it?
Rocky the site manager. I told you I would make you famous Rocky!
Happily taking photos while the little bugger sneaks up on me. He almost got me too while I was chimping on the camera!
Hopefully this weekend will see the Danbot and myself putting in a few more benches on some of the off camber portions at the start of the trail. It is so close to being opened that I can smell it, we just need to make some more headway on the return leg now.
You think you had a bad day?
Ever noticed how much these little fellows sound like sleigh bells around christmas time?
Today’s mini build day was quite successful. There were four of us wtih Dan, Luke and Ron accompanying me. They spent the morning helping building another bridge and then digging some benches. I carried on solo in the afternoon digging some more benches and planning a possible tabletop jump.
Just after the lads left, I was extremely lucky and got to hold a wild pygmy possum. I think i might have disturbed his daytime slumber when I moved some slats of wood and he was making his way along the creek bed when i noticed him. He didn’t seem to be afraid of me and when I put my hand down towards him, he actually lept onto it then ran up my arm. He eventually sat on my hand for 20 seconds or so before jumping off and gliding to a tree. Simply amazing. i was devastated I didn’t have the camera on me.
The trail photos are pretty average, it was the wrong time of day to be trying to evenly expose with bright patches and deep shadow conspiring to junk up many of the shots.
Oh, and I constructed a trail head notice board during the week out of an old sign I had lying around. I managed to get it installed first thing before the build day started.
My leech count today was only two, however they were both on my abdomen and bled for hours after I took them off. By the end of the afternoon, my shirt was a grimy bloody mess.
Didn’t quite happen unfortunately. A combination of insufficient pallet slats and missing two orange support beams meant the job had to be left unfinished. I did manage to get all the pallets that were available cut to size and taken in to the bridge however.
If anyone is heading down that way, take care. The slats are sitting on top of beams but aren’t secured… no bombing the chute just yet 
B-rad has obviously been out working hard on the pie line. There has been some amazing bench work done through that area. Thumbs up to the pie eater.
I will post some more photos after sundays mini build day.
Happy Trails!
