This last December I had the opportunity of a lifetime, an all expense paid trip to Nicaragua for 10 days to GPS map current mountain bike trails and give a site analysis for building new trails on a 2700 acre resort on the pacific coast. I'm fortunate enough to be good friends with a retired World Champion mountain biker and was asked to assist her husband to the resort and help map and consult for their trail building company.
I was lucky enough to bring my own trail bike, but I did get a little nervous when our driver showed up and said we were going to have to put the bikes on the roof. The ride from the airport in Managua to the resort on the coast was over 100km, up and down some volcano roads, 120km speeds, and some very bumpy unpaved rutted roads.
Thankfully they stayed on the whole trip.
The driver stopped a couple km from the airport so we could get some road beers.
Prix, The Nicaraguan 7-11
Many a Tona were drank during the trip, especially at 75 cents a beer
To enter the Resort, Rancho Santana, you crest a huge hill that gives you your first view of the Pacific.
We got settled into our villa and walked over to the club house and grabbed a beer just in time to watch the sun set. It was pretty cool to leave the east coast at 4am and get there just in time to see the sun set over the pacific. I'm not usually a sentimental person but the sunsets were awesome.
The parent company that owns the resort is based in Baltimore so I met a lot of gringos from my hometown. One of which is a huge cyclist and sponsor of various clubs and trail building groups here in MD, he owns a villa and a lot in at Rancho Santana and travels there so often he has 2 high end mountain bikes that he leaves at the resort. He and a local Nica that rides showed me some of the existing trails (which weren't very good by US trail standards). He has a vested interest in seeing this trail project come to fruition so he was more than helpful.
The highest point in RS
Only the steepest roads in the resort were "paved" so cars can get up them during the rainy season. This picture doesn't do justice to how steep this road is, my limited 1x10 gearing was no match for some of the climbs in Nicaragua.
In addition to having mountain bikes at the resort, our friend also let us use his Rhino for the week. It was a huge help to Map the more tedious parts of the resort, all the main roads, service roads etc.
We used the Rhino for play as well
The surfing was awesome.
More on the next post...
I was lucky enough to bring my own trail bike, but I did get a little nervous when our driver showed up and said we were going to have to put the bikes on the roof. The ride from the airport in Managua to the resort on the coast was over 100km, up and down some volcano roads, 120km speeds, and some very bumpy unpaved rutted roads.
Thankfully they stayed on the whole trip.
The driver stopped a couple km from the airport so we could get some road beers.
Prix, The Nicaraguan 7-11
Many a Tona were drank during the trip, especially at 75 cents a beer
To enter the Resort, Rancho Santana, you crest a huge hill that gives you your first view of the Pacific.
We got settled into our villa and walked over to the club house and grabbed a beer just in time to watch the sun set. It was pretty cool to leave the east coast at 4am and get there just in time to see the sun set over the pacific. I'm not usually a sentimental person but the sunsets were awesome.
The parent company that owns the resort is based in Baltimore so I met a lot of gringos from my hometown. One of which is a huge cyclist and sponsor of various clubs and trail building groups here in MD, he owns a villa and a lot in at Rancho Santana and travels there so often he has 2 high end mountain bikes that he leaves at the resort. He and a local Nica that rides showed me some of the existing trails (which weren't very good by US trail standards). He has a vested interest in seeing this trail project come to fruition so he was more than helpful.
The highest point in RS
Only the steepest roads in the resort were "paved" so cars can get up them during the rainy season. This picture doesn't do justice to how steep this road is, my limited 1x10 gearing was no match for some of the climbs in Nicaragua.
In addition to having mountain bikes at the resort, our friend also let us use his Rhino for the week. It was a huge help to Map the more tedious parts of the resort, all the main roads, service roads etc.
We used the Rhino for play as well
The surfing was awesome.
More on the next post...
