Travel posts.
Re Wikstrom and Shaun Raskin take in the view over Brian Head, Utah. Mountain bikes got us there and mountain bikes got us back… but not before the storm hit. Muddy rides are worth enjoying.
This overlook is a classic stop on this particular ride. Some days it’s overcast, some days it’s sunny, and some days you get a powerful mix of weather. Re and Shaun provide the perfect amount of scale for this photo.
|| At Fisher Creek, miles of singletrack mountain bike trails weave in and out of these burned trees. Although the initial pedal is a churner, the ride back to the trailhead is an all-time affair. ||
|| Sebago, Maine is a blip on the radar to most people. At the outskirts of town you’re an hour away from the nearest city, and when you’re in town you’re forty minutes from the nearest highway. Stop signs exist only when roads cross in a way that necessitates legal signage and stoplights are non-existant. Houses are spaced far apart and yards are given room to breathe. Really, living in Sebago is about living in a certain amount of solitude. Solitude is rare and replenishing; these days it isn’t often that you’re treated to clear skies, quiet nights, and unpolluted horizons. ||
|| Small hills wind endlessly beside the highway that stretches from Utah to Idaho. You see nothing but rolling hills for hours and hours. Sometimes, in the fading light, a contour pops out or a horizon line defines itself in a way that makes a photo shine. ||
|| I shot this series of photos from the passenger seat of my girlfriend’s car. California isn’t my favorite place in the world, but we were in town for a wedding so I did my best to seize the moment. The wedding was perfect and the day after we visited Point Reyes lighthouse. Anyone in the area of Point Reyes should visit; I highly recommend it. ||
|| We left Salt Lake City and its light-polluted sky and found something better in Stanley, Idaho. Just outside of Stanley there’s a particular campsite on a particular hill; it’s hard to reach but worth the effort. You can see a full 360 degrees of clear sky from this campsite. A faint glimmer of light shines into the sky from town; it’s hardly enough to distract from the stars that fill the sky.
Nights like this remind me of Maine. ||
|| Twenty-percent rain was what the forecast read. Really, this translated into about twenty, full minutes of rain–at two AM. I’ll take that.
We took Friday off from work with the hope of bagging a ride or two on the trails around Stanley before it rained. Luckily, we beat the rain. And after the clouds rolled in and rolled out at night, we were left with this incredible sunrise.
An incredible view awaited us at this campsite off the Nip Tuck road. Hunters rolled up and down the dirt road all morning, checking for deer and signs of a chance to earn an early tag. We left during the day, rode Fischer Creek, hit the hot springs near town, and then made dinner as a blast of frigid air rolled through camp. Clear nights bring cold temperatures, but that might be the only problem with being able to see the stars so clearly.
Without a blanket of clouds to warm the land, your toes turn cold in a hurry. ||
|| Light spills up and onto the branches of a tree at a campsite in Stanley, Idaho. This particular campsite is located at a hard-to-reach location on top of a hill. The hill overlooks the town of Stanley at night, and provides an incredible view of the Sawtooth mountains in the morning.
At night it’s easy to see the stars and pick out constellations. Salt Lake suffers from a massive amount of light pollution, and traveling to a place like Stanley drives that point home in spades. During the fall it can be downright frigid at night. Take a zero degree sleeping bag, a warm hat, and a down jacket. You’ll need all three.
High fire danger had skunked our campfire dreams all summer, until the ban was lifted the previous week. We built a toasty fire, heated some soup, and swapped stories until it was too late to think about anything other than bed. Although it might be different for some, I sleep like a rock when I’m camping. Back home there’s just too many distractions, but in a tent it’s just you and your heavy eyes. ||
|| Although I picked the spot and did the riding, I have to give the shutter props to photographer Re Wikstrom. Re snagged this photograph while we were ripping along the McKenzie River Trail in Oregon. Although the trail starts in a mass of volcano rock, it slowly snakes its way down to the river.
Despite the fact that you shuttle this trail (drive to the top, leave a car at the bottom), there’s lots of pedal time. A downhill bike would be fun for a few sections, but a mid-travel trail bike is definitely the way to go. My Santa Cruz Heckler held its own* through twisty forest sections, slick roots, and the technical bits of rock at the beginning.
No one mentions the bridges you have to cross during this ride. Some are wide enough to ride across, some have railings on both sides, and some are so skinny your bars barely creep through from start to finish. The rhythm goes: ride, ride, ride, pedal, pedal, pedal, StairMaster, and repeat.
Ride this trail, it’s one for the bucket list.||
|| Photos like this take me back to my love of the ocean and the coast. Here, photographer Re Wikstrom navigates a pile of Oregon’s oversized logs. This beach was somewhere off the Oregon trail. I’m sure someone could pick it out, but having only visited once I haven’t developed a name-to-place association.
Both coasts breed a hardy version of human being. Proof can be found in the number of thick-suit surfers milking every last ounce of energy out of the waves in this bitterly cold water. Water that’s this particular temperature drives away the protein-and-bleach-blond crowd. Not a bad way to go about surfing. ||