One Tree

Mark and I organised a rough local ride last Friday for today.  But we had to put it off till late this afternoon so we would need to cut the ride a bit short, although this didn't detract from the experience. I shovelled and sieved 20 barrows of Terranora soil and drank a litre of soda water before I left.

[caption id="attachment_388" align="aligncenter" width="600" caption="A cloud rising from Mt Warning (cloud Catcher) that didn't do much but it would be nice to break the dry"][/caption]

I rode to meet up with Mark on Watty Bishop Road for the climb to One Tree, it's only 100 meters high but it climbs over a rough cattle turd strewn badly rutted track of about a 1000 meters. In many places you needed to avoid the track as the rut sides would catch the pedals and cranks etc It seems to be a good training climb for fitness as well as having a great outlook to the south, west and north.

I struggled to the summit pushing the last 30 meters and we then rode off along the ridge to the east toward Towners Road. Here the track undulated steeply and the surface varied between loose dusty gravel and leaf and stick strewn single track. I was riding up the second to last climb behind Mark along side of a fairly dry creek bed when I started to hear the pounding of hoofs getting closer and faster. Committed to the climb I couldn't even turn to see if I was about to be run down by a cattle stampede. It turned out to be a small herd of poddy calves playfully spooked by our presence, no harm done!

Next we turned off into the descent to Towners Road via Jim's place, An in places slow, rough, steep ride. Once we hit the main gravel track we were able to commit to some more speed until we reached the climb over to Round Mountain Road. Here we parted ways Mark to a family BBQ at Hastings me to a roast at home.

Might need to try this a few more times to get used to some rough climbing, although during wetter time grass growth might cause some drama with the derailleur. 13 kms total distance.