We arrived at the pull out parking for Xanadu after 3 miles of gravel road just after 10am, upon which time we discover Sergei’s old Maxxis tire has blistered. It would fail on the downhill part of the trail. Hmm… What to do… Fortunately, Das Rad Haus is open in Leavenworth (10 miles away). Sergei pays the most he has ever paid for a replacement tire (and it’s not even a Maxxis). The shop has a handy outdoor bike workstand, complete with compressed air to inflate the tubeless tire….
We did look at the Evergreen trail map in the shop, but it was missing trails like Xanadu and Rosey Boa, and we were told there’s a brand new trail to be cut in today linking the ski hill (easy ride from town) with the old Freund Canyon trail. There are so many trails around Leavenworth, an updated version of such an overview map would be required to select the rides you’d want in a weekend at Leavenworth.
Sergei’s new house (with a garage) let him quickly load his bike
box and bike to the car with long-sought-after-convenience. Unfortunately, he discovers he forgot his
backpack, and water. No matter, I had
just installed a bottle cage last night, and could carry water for both of
us. Time to buy some bars and gels at
Das Rad Haus.
Anyway, an hour later we’re riding up the forest road for
Xanadu. It’s blue skies, but the sun
hasn’t raised the temperature to 80, yet.
Half way up, Sergei’s new tubeless is slowly leaking. Grrr! We
try to push on. About ½ a mile from the top
of Xanadu, we have to try to use one of my CO2 cartridges. I figured we should use all of it, and hope
it finishes seating the new tubeless ready tire. But, my 10 yr old CO2 adapter fails. It’s an identical model to the one I had used
2 weeks ago to inflate an abandoned girl’s flat tire at Tiger Mtn (529 team to
the rescue!), and identical to Sergei’s (which was in his aforementioned
backpack). Total failure. Unscrewing the canister releases the
air. What the hell: Try the 2nd
and last CO2 cartridge. Total
failure. What's trying to stop us from riding? Surely not karma? Sigh. Sergei decides he better coast down the
forest road with my 650b tube back to his car (which had a floor pump). I decide to continue up alone and ride down carefully to
scope out Xanadu, and we’d go back up Xanadu together after he fixed the flat. Yeah, I was selfish after that long climb.
Fortunately, Sergei quickly runs into 3 riders on the way
down, who have a proper hand pump, that lets Sergei ride to the top with
them. I’m still busy taking 360 panos at the top (http://360.io/6yKRuM hmm... works better in Chrome or Safari or IOS with gyros!). These riders save Sergei’s day! The local, Rex, gives Sergei a tube (which he
uses at the car), but the handpump tops off his tubeless tire enough to get
Sergei all the way down (perhaps because he stopped taking the bigger drops on
his lame tire).
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| The Canadians that saved Sergei's day |
Rex was going to lead his 2 friends (visiting from BC) down
Xanadu, and doesn’t mind us tagging along.
Yes! We are guided down this
amazing ridge ride by a local! He keeps
us from flying off the few big drops, and inspires us to "feel out" the massive, steep rock
roller. The ridge trail starts softly like a "sound of
music" hilltop (very round but less green), but then sharpens to a jagged knife
edge. There’s probably lots of traction
on those tilted spiky flakes of strata, but the high penalty encourages the wise
to walk over a few parts. It’s over in
just 2.2 miles, but it was as glorious as advertised in that delicious Pinkbike article.
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| It's hard to get lost on the ridgeline. |
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| The start overlooks the ridge that you descend. Imagine it with spring wildflowers... No, wait. Just look at the PinkBike article... |
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| I'm too lazy to get the closer and better angle on Sergei's descent off that rock ridge |
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| I think we discovered the Easter Island of the Cascades. There were several of these weird rocks along the route. [Beta: easy 5.8 mantle with the tree] |
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| I think this is a distant view of the massive rock roller on the peak. Not that scary, right? |
At the cars, Sergei insists on paying Rex for the tube. Rex fetches their bike shuttle truck, and
they leave [with our profuse thanks] for the next trail on Rex’s tour, while
Sergei and I prepare to ride Xanadu AGAIN!
The temperature reaches 86, but the ride up feels shorter when your tire
isn’t deflating, you have jettisoned useless tools, and your water supply is
just enough for the known ride length. At
two times, I meet riders with black and orange Bronsons! That pinkbike article did say a 6” bike was
perfect for Xanadu.
This time we catch up with 3 other riders at the top of the massive rock roller. One of the ladies, H, asks how I’m liking my
Bronson. My reply is curt, as my pride
has shrunk to the boredom of that common question. We’re confident, having ridden this slickrock
just earlier, but we want to watch how they take it. After two gingerly find their way down, H
decides we better go first. OK. When we
get to the bottom, H isn’t too keen on any of our beta. I ask her friends if Sergei and I should
leave, to relieve pressure on H. But
then, H shouts out for us to video tape her descent! I capture her in this 360 panorama. http://360.io/ZSb743
Then H introduces Sergei and me to her friends. Hmm! I don’t remember giving her my name at
the top – maybe Sergei mentioned it. I
ask her if she has an email address I can send the picture to, and she says well,
yeah, Heather@KirklandBike.
Headslap! She sold me my
Bronson. J
Hey, she was wearing a full face helmet! We really picked the right place today!
After the second epic ride down Xanadu, Sergei and I head
back into Leavenworth for a late lunch of some house-made sausage and not-beer (because we wanted to do a sunset ride of Rosey Boa!). After much Google terrain map analysis with
the scattered trail websites, we find there are 3 possible routes to the top.
Two are probably boring forest roads.
The third may not get us all the way there (in hindsight it would have
lead us to the bottom of the Leavenworth XC race route). We refill my backpack and a single bike
bottle for water, and drive up to scout the base of the mountains to find that
new trail that would lead us to Rosey Boa. We park at the base of Ski Hill (where they are playing Sound of Music in the outdoor amphitheatre; Leavenworth's consistent bavarian flavor).
We find one of the forest roads, and a phone call to Das Rad Haus confirms
to us that the new trail may not be what we want (it’s brand new; no one’s
ridden it and can’t advise). OK, boring “Ranger”
forest road it is.
Ranger Rd proves to be much steeper than the Xanadu
grind. At least it is in the cool shade
of the mountain. After 25 minutes, I
felt like I do at the end of the East Tiger Mtn fireroad climb (my knees were starting to complain). Sergei had to tune his misbehaving rear
derailleur; his bike didn’t like to be neglected for a summer. Then a big black
truck pulls up to us!
Rex: Want a ride?
Larry: How far are we from the top?Rex: About halfway…
Sergei and Larry: Yes Please!
Rex: I thought you might.
Rex (yes, the same one) shuttles us up in the back of his 4x4. It's my
first time ever being shuttled up a sketchy forest road (multiple sharp uphill hairpin
turns, very narrow roads, with edges to exposed cliffs). Thrilling, and the easiest way to the
top. I’d do it again!
Also with Rex and his Canadians (sorry, I’m forgetting the couple’s
names), is a Steven’s Pass bike park trailbuilder who should be working on the
new advanced DH trail (PBR!), or riding with us, but had crashed hard in a manmade
rock garden a few days ago. So, today he
would be driving the truck back down. [Hey, he looks a lot like Tim Wesley in that PinkBike article.]
Rex had decided to lead his visitors down Rosey Boa. We scored a local guide for another trail! Rosey Boa was not the downhill part of the
Leavenworth XC race (as Sergei had once feared). It is this advanced ridgeline trail with
glorious Cascade views, wild flowers, brown pow singletrack, and grey dust
powder skiing. You have to try it!
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| Rex hucked the ramp over that log. The rest of us walked under it without crouching. |
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| Over Sergei's right shoulder is "The Spine". My only opportunity to stop and snap a real ridgeline trail. |
Rosey Boa ends at the intersection of a brand new
double-wide trail that Evergreen just cut to connect Freund Canyon with Ski Hill. So we took the new trail to get us back to the
car parked at Ski Hill. Because his bike
sensed the end of the ride was near, Sergei’s chain decides to break slowly (it
did after 15 more minutes). It was almost all
downhill from here, so rather than test my chainlink tool and masterlink
compatibility. Sergei coasted the rest
of the way. Our new friends kept guiding
us down the confusing fireroad switchbacks, by waiting (we told them to go
ahead; we could see the town in the valley below), or drawing arrows in the
dirt. When we got to the car, there was no
sign of Rex+. I was disappointed we couldn’t
properly thank Sergei’s Saviors. We will
have to just keep paying it forward.
It was a glorious day full of new trails with alpine views, bike mechanical
problems, new and old friends. An epic
way to Save Sergei’s Summer.
