The Monster Van-cycle Xtravaganza

This summer(2010) I went camping by myself. The camping trip was the result of a few things; I love camping but hadn't gone in almost 5 years, I've almost always gone camping in a 1971 VW camper van, and wanted to try something a bit more serious. My brother is an Eagle Scout, and I've always been envious of the weeks long backpacking trips he took with his troop. The few camping trips I took with my girl scout troop were always in a cabin, and not very nature oriented. Of course there were also the endlessly inspiring Xtracycle blogs to give me that final motivational push, I probably wouldn't have gone anywhere without them.

I spent months and months planing this trip, and by planing, I mean imagining how awesome it would be in my head but not actually doing anything to get ready for it. I originally asked a few friends and my brother to go with me, but nobody could get their schedules to match. So at the last minute I put in for a week's vacation, panicked and stuffed my Xtracycle full of gear.



As you can see in this picture I managed to bring everything but the kitchen sink. I brought with me: a hatchet, knife, 5 days of food, camp stove and fuel, the world's crappiest bike light, a 10 year old flashlight(with no extra batteries), 100,000matches, sleeping bag, 2man tent 3 days of clothing, 3 pairs of shoes (sandals, hiking shoes, bike shoes) rope, apples, books(Tom Brown's Field Guide, Zen Bike Maintenance, Origin of Species) , bike tools, bike lock (a big monster of a chain too), water filter, compass, nalgeen bottle, two 2liter camlebacks.... and a million other little things that seemed like a good idea at the time. I probably had 100-150lbs of crap loaded on that bike.

This was the plan: ride the bus to Golden, ride to Golden Gate Canyon, Ride the 13 miles up the canyon(no big deal, I can cover twice that much ground in an hour in the city!), and CAMP!!! This is the true if slightly fuzzy account of what really happened:

First I rode to the bus station downtown...


...And caught the 16L to Golden. This took forever and I left the house about noon. I got to Golden and rode my bike up to the base of the canyon. On the way I met two guys on tall-bikes who told me I was nuts. I laughed and waved them off. For future reference if Mountain Jim and his buddy ride tall bikes and tell you that you're nuts, you should listen to them.

I started up the narrow canyon road, and realized very quickly something that I hadn't taken into account at all: I was in the mountains. Mountains are steep. Very, very, can't-get-out-of-first-gear hill climbing steep. I learned an unexpected but fun fact: City miles, and mountain miles, are not equal. 13 miles in the city might take just over an hour, but in the mountains, it's an all day commitment. Also there are no shoulders on mountain roads, and some people don't give much thought to "share the road" signs.

I'd ridden prehaps a mile up the canyon give or take before I did the smart thing, and rode back down to get back in to cell phone range, and called my mom:

"MOM OMFG this hill is STEEP!!! I am not going to make it to the park on time if I ride the whole way! Can you please give me a ride up?"

And because my mom is an awesome lady, she and my dad drove up in the Subaru to give me a lift. While I was waiting for them I tried a second assault on the canyon road just to see how far I could get.

I managed to get around the first bend in road, and up a huge hill before my parents caught up with me me in the car; I had only managed to ride two miles. It became depressingly clear as we drove up, exactly how far I didn't get on the ride up. The whole ride I just kept repeating some variant of "Holy crap! this is steep and narrow! I can't believe how steep it is!"



We got to the Ranger station just before they closed and I purchased a camping pass for the night. I was the only person camping in the entire park except for the car-campers who would be a few miles from where I was. I made sure to plan a route with my dad so someone would know where I was just in case. We weren't worried though, the map clearly showed that it was only 3 miles to the backpacker campsites, and they were all just off the bike path. piece'o'cake

(if I had died this picture would have been my eulogy)

Finally, I was free and clear and dependent on only myself. If something happened, there was no one but me and the bears around for miles and miles and miles!



I wish it could have all been as beautiful and easy as this picture makes it look. The trail started out easy enough, a bit of meadow, some aspen trees, a few rocks, some meadow, more trees, more rocks, more trees...

...then some trees, rocks, meadow and cliff; more rocks, a ravine, more trees and rocks, potholes you could bury a baby in, horse shit everywhere...

Very quickly my life went from pleasantly difficult, to "what the hell was I thinking?". But at this point there was no giving in. I had already gone this far! I had spent far too much money at REI! I wasn't going to let this end in failure! Most importantly I was out of cellphone range, and my ride was already halfway down the mountain.

At that point I realized was just being a city-soft crybaby, because I came around a bend to find the first switchback. I had already forgotten my first lesson, "Elevation Hurts", and now I was about to learn my next lesson: "Switchbacks are a Brutal Bitch".

This is a typical switch back:


Think about this picture for a moment. I am standing at the bottom of the turn, with the camera in front me, and the top is even with my face. That's 4-5 feet of elevation gained in 3 foot turning area. Which is easy for a pedestrian, fine on a horse, difficult on a mountain bike and freaking impossible on a longtail bike!!! I had to walk my bike up the last few feet to the turn, LIFT the bike around 175 degrees, PUSH it up the first five or six feet of trail, and then attempt to ride the over stuffed monster another 50ft of trail. Then I got to do it over again. And then again, and again and again.

WHAT THE HELL WAS I THINKING????

(in this picture you can clearly see my craptastic bike light)

Oh right, this is fun.
The entire trail looked like this. It was ridicules, especially the way I kept thinking "oh this will be the last bit'o'rock, I'll be single trekking across meadow soon!"

Somewhere in this insane hill climb, I intersected another trail loop. A few minutes after I passed the intersection I heard talking behind me. I paused on the side of the trail, and watched with ironic shock as 6 people walked past me. They all had prosthetic legs. I was in the middle of freaking nowhere dragging my overloaded bike up a hill and being passed by a group of people with no legs. Insane.

Eventually this:

(hey they don't call them the Rockies for nothing!)

gave way to this:



I started to make better time, riding my bike more than I was pushing it. Unfortunately I had started this insanity after 4pm, and it was now nearly 9pm and getting dark. I knew I was near the campsites, but I had no idea what I was looking for.

Darkness fell. There was no moon that night, and the stars were blocked out by huge ponderosa pines that loomed over me in every direction. The wind blew through the trees, every gale sounding more ominous than the last. I turned off the main path, following a single crooked sign with an arrow and a tent painted on it. Somewhere down this dark narrow path lay my campsite.

I could only glimpse the trail through the weak light reflected by my bike light; the stones worn bare by hundreds of footsteps, glowing like bleached skulls on the road to hell. On and on and on I rode, further and further, away from the main path. Fear began to creep into my heart.

But then, in the distance, something flashed and flickered in the light! A tiny marker signalizing a camping spot! HUZZAH! At long last my journey was over!!

I was fairly sure that this wasn't the exact camp ground I had picked out, but at this point who cared? I pitched the tent and unfurled my sleeping bag in record time. I was starving at this point having eaten the sandwiches that I'd packed for dinner hours earlier, and Cliff Bars just weren't cutting it anymore. I wanted to cook dinner, but I decided I should set up my bear bag before I did anything else. I had never hung a bear bag before and had confidence that the only hard part would be finding a suitable tree.

I walked a suitable distance from my campsite, and in the pitch black night was able to differentiate between navy-black sky and the black-black tree branches. The Nalgeen bottle made an excellent rope weight, and I got it over my first chosen branch after a few dozen tries. I secured the end of the rope and chucked the other end over a second tree branch after another dozen tries. Then I clipped the food onto the center of the rope and pulled the loose end taught. Hooray! Ghetto pulleys are simple machines!!

I was too exhausted to take pictures by this point, but here's an accurate depiction of my success:



Thus began a hour of ever more creative rope tying. I tried adding a third anchor tree, more knots, sticks tied in the rope, using a second rope to hoist the stuff up on the first rope, untying the whole fraking thing and starting from scratch. The more I tried to get the damn food off the ground, the harder it became.

Finally I gave up. If the bears wanted to come raid my damn campsite and leave me starving, fine! As long as I could get some damn sleep!! I crawled into my sleeping bag and turned off my pathetic excuse for a flashlight.

It took more than a little while to get comfortable. Amongst all the crap I had packed, I managed to forget a sleeping pad despite everyone I know reminding me to bring it. I rolled around the tent floor looking for an area without too many rocks. No sooner had I closed my eyes when I heard something near by.

Schrich Scrich Scrich!

Something was in the bushes!! What was it?? A bear? Some deer? Bunnies? Chipmunks? I listened hard, unable to sleep with adrenalin flooding my system(and rocks digging into my hip). Slowly I relaxed. Whatever had made the sound was gone now. My eyes fluttered shut...

Schrich! Schrich scrich!

My eyes were once again wide open straining in the gloom of my tent. This time I had definitely heard something!! Slowly I climbed up out of my tent and examined my campsite. Nothing seemed to be around, but I could also see no more than a few feet into the darkness. A shiver rand down my spin, and the hair rose on my neck, I knew what the noise was. It was Bigfoot.

I dove back into the tent as fast as I could, pulling the zippers close with fervor, and pulled the sleeping bag over my head. As if see-through nylon would some how save me from being dragged through the forest by a mythical ape.

Mythical ape! I told myself; It's not real! Chill out!

But what if it was the Hatchet Lady waiting for me to sleep so she could chop me up and scatter my body throughout the park? What it was a lunatic escaped from an insane asylum with a hook for a hand?

No that was all stupid, it was definitely bigfoot.

Schrich schrich shcirh

And so passed the first half of the worst night of my life, until finally I ran out of adrenalin, and passed out with a dozen rocks digging into my spine.

But it wasn't long before I woke up again. This time it was the awful sensation of being covered in cold sweat and freezing, while simultaneously over heating. I tossed and turned, every tiny pebble reaching up to dig into my bones, the tent freezing cold, and the sleeping bag unbearably warm.

In the middle of this, I somehow reached the conclusion that I had brain fever and was going to die from it. In a bid to save myself I finished drinking all the water I had left, but was still thirsty. I toyed with the idea of hiking to a freshwater spring I had passed just before dark. It wasn't too far away by bike, but I wasn't sure how that translated to walking. In any case the mind numbing terror of Bigfoot far outweighed any fear of dehydration or aneurysms. I fell into a fitful slumber, terrified I wouldn't wake (or that I would because bigfoot was dragging me out of the tent by my feet). I hoped the park rangers would find my body.

After an eternity, dawn came and I got up, alive and ready to face down anything!!! First mission, water for coffee and oatmeal! I was much more confidant about hiking to the fresh water spring in day time, and wasted no time in setting off down the trail.

It was a wonderful little hike, the morning was cool and misty. Everything was shades of gray and blue and green, warmed by flecks of yellow flowers and red rocks. I kept out a sharp eye for animals, but I didn't even so much as a flash of tail feather. But I did see little trails breaking off of mine. And each one lead to a little camp site just like mine, only closer to the spring, and therefor better than mine.

At last I reached the main trail, having passed more than a dozen campsites including the one I had originally intended to stay at. I was now a little discouraged. It was a little less than a mile to the main trail, but that was hundreds of feet that I wouldn't have had to walk now if only I'd been able to see the campsites!

The spring its self was infuriating, because the trail doubled back parallel to the campsites, but was separated from them by boggy ground that I was loath to cut across. So instead I stuck to the trails, and took nearly an hour to pump the water and walk back to my campsite.

Now it was time for some hot water! Only here I ran into one of the stupidest obstacles of the trip. I had no idea how to work the camp stove. Sure I could figure out what plugged in where, and which side was up, but no matter how I tried I could not get the flame to stay alight for more than a minute. Upon returning home my brother would explain to me that I needed to merely pump the fuel tank a few thousand times to get it working. Unfortunately I didn't know that when I was stuck alone in the wilderness starving for breakfast; ironically I was terrified of over pumping it and blowing my hands off. In the end I had more cliff bars, apples and cold water for breakfast.

I tool less than an hour to break down my pathetic camp. I would have lingered, but I thought that I might choose a better camp site closer to the spring. As I passed the last camp on the trail I thought about ditching the bike and walking down to the ranger station for my next night's camp-pass, but I was worried about leaving the food unprotected in bear country. I thought I might prehaps get to the ranger station, and ask someone how to properly hang one, and prehaps how to work my stove.


I knew only one thing for sure, and that was what lay behind me. There was no way in hell I was going to try to ride the bike down that. So onward and forward and ever upward I went.

Almost immediately smooth level valleys gave way to steep slopes of shale. The only advantage was that the trail had widened from a shoulder-width to a few feet; meaning that branches weren't smacking me in the face, and there were no switchbacks to battle with the bike. Just unrelenting ever steeper hills.

This is about when I realized that once again, I might be in over my head. I stopped for a breather, ate another cliff bar and apple and took some pictures.

This picture is of where I am going to:



...and below is the picture of where I just was. It took at least 5 minuets to push the bike that far. Actually riding up this was impossible for a number of reasons, starting with the sheer amount of weight on the bike, and ending with my 10year old stock tires. Even more disheartening, was the even steeper hill before me.


Once again, the further I went the worse it got. The mountain got steeper, the rocks bigger and looser, and there was even more horse shit.

It was somewhere around here that I saw the first person of the day, a guy on a proper mountain bike with suspension and knobby tires. He shot by me and was up the steep hill in just seconds. I was so ashamed of clawing my way up that mountain half dead, I didn't even wave. I just kept putting one foot in font of the other cursing and swearing the whole way.

Eventually my perseverance was worth it. After a few hours of this I finally came across another flat zone, complete with giant mud puddles that were a perfect excuse for going off trail:



And a wonderful bit of forest and fields that were pure joy to ride through.




Soon after this, I hit a little downhill slope.

Then another.

And another!

Before I knew it I was looking up the back of the mountain, having ridden the whole way down laughing like a loon. Turns out all the weight on the back is really good for getting you down hill fast.

(This is just beyond the car campground. I actually camped here as a child, up the stairs there is an amphitheater, toilets and showers.)

After this point, I learned about the whole new frustration of sharing a steep dirt road with cars. The road its self was a mixture of insanely steep uphills and disappointingly short downhills. I was able to ride most of the way, dismounting only when the slopes were absolutely too steep for my monster van-cycle.

At the end of the dirt road was asphalt that swept down and around the mountain in a gloriously smooth uninterrupted river. It took prehaps a half hour to breeze down the mountain that had taken me 7+ hours to climb (not counting sleeping and getting there in the first place!)

I was the most rewarding downhill I have ever had the privilege of coasting down.

At the bottom, I ate lunch and fell into an easy, mosquito infested sleep on top of a picnic table. Hours later I tried and failed to work up the energy to do the whole thing again, or else try another campground that was possibly easier.

Instead I called home for another ride, and had Jack-in-the-Box for dinner.

I can't wait to do it again next year! This time I'll know what NOT to do, but I can't wait to discover entirely new stupid problems!

I hope this inspires a few of you to get out and ride a bike, even if it's just up to the store. I hope novice campers take this as a warning, and expert backpackers are banging their heads on their keyboards in incredulity. I hope this made you laugh, and that you share it with a friend.
Noclaf.


A map of the camp area. Red is where I rode my bike.



I hope this inspires a few of you to get out and ride a bike, even if it's just up to the store. I hope novice campers take this as a warning, and expert backpackers are banging their heads on their keyboards in incredulity. I hope this made you laugh, and that you share it with a friend.
Noclaf.

Special thanks to my mom and dad for supporting me in this!
Times and distances might not be 100% accurate, I wasn't exactly paying attention
please email me about any spelling/grammatical errors so I can fix them, thanks!