Mabie Forest - 6/1/2007

Having cars, bikes and nice weather, we headed for Mabie Forest, another of the 7 Stanes for an epic day of mountain biking. George and Kathryn led the way. Robie and I followed with the occasionally confused GPS contradicting George's path. Neil and Fraser got ahead fairly early, so we figured we would see them eventually. In the morning, we tackled the blue trail. A bit disappointed, we headed for red after lunch and were absolutely thrilled with Mabie Forest pretty much as soon as we began the first section of red trail.

Where Glentress is sculpted trail, Mabie makes much use of existing trail with occasional sculptured connections between natural trails. The end result is generally a more technical ride and for me, more of a feeling of home. We had more ups and downs together rather than two early epic climbs. We wound through forests and up to sweeping vistas. We zoomed down sculptured berms and rocky, wet stream crossings. As Neil said, that's Mabie, baby!

I rode my first official black feature in one of the wooded sections. After riding the red route around it, it looked no steeper than an oops drop I ran at Land Between the Lakes back home. Didn't see it coming, didn't have time to decide whether or not to run it. Here, the wee black arrow made me detour around it but scouting and watching Neil and Fraser run it a few times brought me back to run it. It was a rocky drop that seemed easily rolled. The approach and I had two disagreements that resulted in me being deposited very gently on the ground. I gave up on the approach and set up with less time to clip in. Robie perched directly in my path. I suggested he choose another location. He said no one else followed that trail. I said that doesn't mean I won't. Good thing he moved. I started the drop, saw a very large stump just at the bottom, wobbled away from it and had barely enough control to stay on the bike. Fraser had to step away to avoid being hit. Robie's former perch was where I finally found control again. George managed to capture my surprised expression at a perfect angle to make me look like I meant to do exactly everything I did. Perfection.

Black feature adventures had us not nearly halfway into the red trail. More fun awaited. Where the payoff for big climbs on blue was not so great, we found bigger climbs on red and far better payoffs, too. We climbed the Descender Bender beyond slightly burning legs to be treated to a gorgeous view around the entire valley. More ups than downs became more downs than ups as we zoomed down the other side. Somewhere before the Burn Splash that got most of us smiling, Kathryn dropped out to find her way back to the car park. After the Scorpion climb that had all of us but Neil walking with legs on fire, Robie dropped out to catch back up with Kathryn.

Fraser's chain seemed to be breaking every 30-60mins and therefore shrinking very very quickly. Just before the Scorpion, it broke again and the end result was an inadvertent singlespeed, only occasionally in the right gear. The group was whittled to four. Neil led the way. George and I followed and Fraser muddled along with his singlespeed, taking over my happy place in the back of the group because he could no longer climb effectively. My legs began complaining more and more overtly, but I did my best to ignore them and continue. I was enjoying the trail too much to yield to fatigue so easily. I ate and drank as much as I could, which wasn't much, and forged on. Occasionally challenging features that would have looked rideable in the morning felt more appropriate for walking near the end of the day.

Fraser tried to shift gears on a gentle climb and his chain broke for good. He seemed generally optimistic about having to push his bike up the rest of the climbs out. He rode every stretch of downhill without the worry of having to pedal, including one very large pile of rocks that George and I both walked in order to not break anything important. We arrived at the last junction, with an easy out to the left or an opportunity for one last hurrah, called Rattle and Hum in the guide book. Trail description read even more like home. I forcefed myself the last bit of flapjack despite the hint of nausea and told Neil I was in. Fraser and George turned left and zoomed toward the cars.

I was not disappointed. For all of the big ups and big downs of the day, peppered with little ups and little downs, Rattle and Hum was all little ups and little downs with lots of tree roots and small rocks to make it a very technical ride. I loved every aching minute of it and Baby Blue never felt sweeter. The trail ended with a red cheater option to the left or a choice of three steep black chutes. I went red but photographed Neil making the black drops look easy. We met up with the others at the very necessary bike wash.

After post-ride faff, including an all-hands swing/drag on the very cool Mabie zipline, we packed ourselves off to Dumfries for a well-earned post-ride meal and beer. Kathryn knew of a vet parking lot where we could be out of sight with bikes, so she got us reasonably organised to there. Our choice of restaurant on the outskirts of town kept us away from ned central, so the five locks and Fraser's well-placed car allowed us to enjoy a very leisurely meal and recap of the day's adventures. Of course, plans for more adventures were hatched, too.