Dirt owls two nighter

This weekend was the first big Oakland Dirt Owls trip. It was so awesome! Two nights on the dirt in the Eden of MTbs, Marin County. We ended up only having two vintage Mtbs on the ride, and they performed admirably. All the other bikes were touring rigs kinda monster cross style. I could probably write about it until you got bored but I'll just post the pics instead.

Burrito's eye view at the first camp:

The cold, cold fog rolls in

In an attempt to go light most of us tried the "tarp taco" technique with mixed results. Mark brought that crazy hunk of Tyvek, to clinch the title of most unnatural sounding squeaky tarp taco.

Just the tip of the Golden Gate Bridge

Descending at the start of day two.

And climbing back out of the valley, fog on our heels.

Just a better look at Brian's new Hunqapillar. This is a really excellent bike, plus it's always nice to see how people deal with the load for off road riding.

And on that subject here's Marks front bag he's been working on. Seems like this is the final phase of the design. He sews them himself, and I guess they're called Mark Bags. Also of note the bag is sitting on one of Matt Feeney's incredible/ beautiful/super useful Pass and Stow front racks.

Tamar in the 'nar

Fog still chasing us...

This was an awesome little ridge descent.

Breaking the law.

Turing the corner after lunch, popping out on the road, and coming down fast. This was the view waiting for us.

The trail head

A minute before Tamar's small wipe out!

Stoked Mark

Stoked Gabe

I love this shot. How rad is it to get to cruise with 5 friends down a trail like this?

Trail side

Entering the meadow.

The crew again.

This is everyone all spread out snaking their way across.

So killer!

Nearing the end, jiggle fest.

Kinda like that Andrew Wyeth paining.

At one point on the ride I was just one little hill behind Sam. Coming over the rise I see Sam's foot flying through the air; this was the result.

Tamar at the end of the ride, so tough! Another Pass and Stow here, product test?

The full crew. We were joined by Joe and Fay for the camping portion on Saturday night. Stoked that they rode out and met us on their way the the Russian River.

True to form, this blog will show some vintage MTBs! We ran into this killer Fisher at the grocery in Fairfax. I'm guessing its a Mt Tam model, but that's just a left field guess. It's a fillet brazed model, and what looked like pressed-in bottom bracket cups.

The details:

Curious if these are still available...

Looks mighty close to a Ritchey. I was inside taking a leak when the owner emerged and rode off, so no small talk about the bike. My buddies outside managed to say "nice bike" to the old guy in a Hawaiian shirt and I guess he smiled and rode off. Hopefully we were both finishing off a killer weekend!

Chain Spaghetti

This is why you shouldn't bike drunk...

CoEvolution quarterly

CoEvolution quarterly had the first article ever published about mountain biking in 1978. I was lucky enough to find a copy at Book Zoo recently. Read the article for yourself on Charlie Kelly's website here
These old mags are so good!

Berry gets new rubber

Slowly getting Emma's rig in shape. I'm obsessed with the Uff Das. I thought they wouldn't fit but I tried mine out on her frame last week and they fit! I tried to get a pic or two showing the clearance. Even though bullmoose bars are cool on this bike I think I'm gonna change them out. They have a bunch of rise, way more than most bullmoose bars I've seen. Emma agrees and isn't comfy on them.

Carradice Bagman

I just bought a Carradice Bagman saddle bag support for my cheapie Origin8 longflap knock off. I'm planning a little two-nighter camping trip soon and needed some more support for the bag. When I've used the bag in the past with out a support it's just flying around like crazy on the trail. Here it is:



It works out pretty well. I've only tested it on two dirt rides so far, and it is certainly better than nothing at all. My only criticism would be that the set screws that hold the stainless rod into the aluminum mount came loose while I was riding and one of the struts came out. That was kind of a bummer to fix on the trail, and even when it is properly set up it still wiggles a bit and will probably come undone again in the future. I liked the simple clean design at first but for off road riding a welded support would probably be much better, like the clunky Viva.

Not a bike

I know it's not a bike, but in some of my favorite bike publications there are often articles about other random stuff of interest. The Rivendell reader would be the most obvious example; lot's of bike info and sometimes an article about fly fishing or guys who maintain trails in the back country. At any rate I just made this chicken coop for a friend out of scrap wood from a remodel. It's funky but it was pretty fun to make something quick and dirty for some undiscerning feathered clients. More bikes later...