Eagle, ID — Heather and I decided to do a mountain bike ride after church today. The weather had been somewhat dry lately so it was a good time to go checkout the trails by Hidden Springs. Heather wasn’t feeling good so we took it real easy on the ride out there. They were also doing some construction on the bridge on Cartwright Rd. This is good news since this will complete the paving of Cartwright road, which used to have about 2 miles of dirt. This expands road ride options near town.

We went through the woods and I hooked up with the town trail that now has a plank bridge crossing the creek. I wasn’t feeling good today and probably reflected it in my attitude. So Heather decided she’d just ride home at that point. No sense riding with a pooh-head! I rode up Red Tail and was happy to see most of it was dry. I went up all the way to the benchmark at the top of the hill and there was only one short section of semi-dry mud.

On the way down, I decided to take the turn-off my friend Dan showed me. It’s a double-track, jeep road that forks off of to the right coming down the main trail before the powerline tower. It’s a pretty fun trail because it roller coasters up and down and spills you out further west on N McFarland Creek Rd. I thought it may have been too muddy, but it wasn’t too bad. Towards the end of the downhill, there are a bunch of forks in the road. I took the one that I thought I took last time and started cresting a small hump that turns into a really steep downhill which spills out into a large parking area. As I was cresting the hump at a pretty good clip, I noticed there were metal fence posts up…the kind that you see on barbed-wire fences!

I thought surely there was an opening where the trail goes through so I didn’t start slowing down right away. Due to the overcast day, it was hard to see the two thin silver wires crossing the trail! When I did, I immediately slammed on the brakes. Since the ground I was on was concrete-hard dirt with thin layer of sand on top, you can guess what happened next: My front wheel washed out sending me and my elbow, straight down onto the ground. Due to the slope, after I hit I just kept sliding and prayed I wouldn’t go into the fence. Fortunately I stopped in time, but I could feel that I really banged up my elbow.

I dusted myself off to find that I totally ruined my new Intermountain Orthopaedics arm warmers on their first outing! This ticked me off more than my elbow. My elbow will heal, the arm warmers won’t. Note to self: Don’t wear your new race kit when mountain biking! That’s what last year’s uniforms are for! I picked my bike up and put it over the other side of the fence. Upon close inspection I realized that it wasn’t a barbed wire fence, it was just a wire fence without the barbs. So I just pressed down on the top wire and straddled the fence to get over it. There was a new sign facing the parking lot saying “Private Property”. I noticed that all the trailheads from the parking area had a fence across them and the same signage. I respect the owner’s right to put up fences to protect their property, but if they actually thought through how people use this trail, they should have also placed a sign at the top of the turn-off leading down the trail! The fences down here may prevent the teenage, jeeper mentalities from going up the trail, but they left the most common trail mountain bikers use unmarked at the top.

I rode home at an easy pace and could feel my elbow throbbing as I did. When I got home I cleaned up the wound and it wasn’t as bad as it felt. It was already starting to swell but there were a couple small spots a road rash. I think this was a learning experience: Take things slow the first time you ride the trail that season, in case it has changed since last year. Sometimes it’s hard to not go fast when you essentially have a downhill bike (my Yeti-ASX).