Riding Mt Spokane With [Friends]

Due to the lack of snow on Mt Spokane, grooming of the nordic trail system has ceased for the year and the park ranger has opened the trails up to fatbikes.  I got together with a couple of buddies and headed up yesterday morning.  Unfortunately, the buddies shall heretofore not be spoken of, for reasons that shall heretofore not be revealed.  All photographic evidence of their participation has been destroyed.

You still need a Sno-Park Permit to use the trails, and since Patty and I never bought season passes because we never skied this year, I bought a one-day pass, which costs $22.  Which seems like kind of a lot, but in the big picture the cool thing here is that the park ranger is making this opportunity available to bikes, and what kind of oils the whole machine up there is Sno-Park revenue, and if bikes are part of the revenue stream and this enables even some limited access, I am all for it.

Parking was kind of problem, but we, I mean I, eventually found a spot.

 Mystery pal #1 was never here.

 And mystery pal #2 was never here.

 Am I just a lonely, solitary, delusional blogger who has further devolved into conjuring imaginary friends, or did I actually share a ride with substantive beings?  And how weird is this whole secrecy deal, anyway?  All good questions.  Which shall remain unanswered.

 There was a lot of ice on the trails nearest to the parking lot, but once we I got out a ways the trails were really nice.  Mystery pals #1 and #2 both went down on the ice once (allegedly), and I was one iota of going down myself on one occasion.  There was some wind, but there was also some sun, and all in all it was a great ride.  Aside from a handful (as in less than 10) of dedicated skiers, we I had the place to ourselves myself.

 In other news, the Blackborow is such a rad bike.  Man, I dig it.  The more time I spend on it in, and the more surfaces I get it out on, the better it gets.

 The new camera bag is working out pretty well, too.  The one thing doesn't offer me is the ability to reach down with one hand and grab the fancy A600 and shoot while I'm rolling.  I miss my little Canon S95 for this, so I taped it aboard for this trip.  And it gave me what I wanted.  So I may look for a more elegant attachment solution, or I may just freshen up the tape once in a while.  Most likely the latter.

Aside from the nordic trails, there are other winter riding opportunities at Mt Spokane, and considering that the drive is just under an hour for me, I need to get up there more next winter.  I think I'll just plan on buying a season pass at the beginning of next season.  It's too cool of a place not to support and take advantage of once in a while.