If one of 3 wishes to a genie coming out of a bottle was to organize the perfect long weekend of riding he could not have done it better.
John(echo), Mike (Tweek), Isa and me when down to Ellicottville, 1 hour south of buffalo, to ride and camp in the state forests of McCarty Hill, Rock City and Golden Hill.
This year we started up all the way up from the tower behind the top of the chairlifts. From the tower we jumped on the FLT (Finger lake trail), the start of the FLT is technical with 3 or 4 rock gardens in a row that could really discourage you if you think that your 15 miles ride will all be like that.
But as soon as you wish for more flow in the trail, the genie just makes it smooth, wavy and fast.
As soon as we could we connected with our favorite trails, the Pale Ales: North, Middle and South.
The Pale Ales are just the perfect mix of twisty and fast singletrack with a couple of rock gardens and logs to hop to keep you on your toes. They are so much fun. Most of the time you are pedalling as hard as you can because you are enjoying yourself so much but it does not take long until you realise that you are burning your batteries way too fast and you should calm down a little bit.
At the end of the pale ales, we decided to climb back up using the FLT. Since the FLT is a hiking trail, it was a tough but very challenging climb. Near the middle there is a long rock garden that looked almost unridable (well for me). You know some days when everything does not work like you want to, well for a couple of thoses there is a day when everything is working great and this was one of those days for me. I was riding thru and over the big rocks and after each one I could not believe that I was still riding until I reached the end. Thanks Genie!
At the top of that part of the FLT we reached little rock city. Little rock city is a pretty cool place full of gigantic and impressive rocks.
Some of theses rocks splited a long time ago creating canyons between them.
You could spend quite a bit of time playing around these rocks but on the maps there is a warning that says "no bike
thru rocks" wich we asumed meant not to fool around. It's a very popular place for hikers so it might not be a good idea to freeride on the rocks and give bikers a bad rep. We are thankfull enough that we can ride all the trails in this state forest.
After FLT we went on to ride a trail that we never rode before, Bent Rim. All I could say is YEAH! It's a very technical trail full of puzzles to solve. Puzzles being crazy rock gardens modified just enough for a expert line in them.
This is a sumary of our saturday ride: Tower, FLT, North, middle and south pale ales, FLT up, Bent Rim, Rim, some roads, middle pale ale and more road back.
After the satisfying ride we drove down to Ellicottville for food and beers and the Ellicottville brewery.
Who's eating who's I ask?
After a great dinner and good beers, we filled the genie's growler with pale ale before going in search of a place to camp.
We camped just next to the tower and used the rocks to block atv as a table and extra chair. Total bliss I say
Echo and Me meditating to thank the genie in the growler
The next morning, Isa cooked up a quick breakfast while we waited for Mike(Tweek) and his girlfriend to come and meet us for the day.
We don't have much pictures of the sunday ride because we did not stop much. The ride we did was faster, more flowy and less technical than the saturday. We rode: Growler, Connector, Yukon lunch, Porcupine, Big Merlin, Dead Dog, Sidewinder, Rain, Race, FLT and took some xc skiing trail down to ................. you guested it, Ellicottville Brewery!
The next day we went to another state forest 15 minutes from where we camped: Golden Hill State forest.
The trails are not as "mature" as in the other state forest and they give a different challenge.
There was a real sketchy stunt that I had to try. A rock drop to a very narrow sidewalk of flaky stones. Well what meant to happen, happened and the stones moved and I crashed hard with my seat in the ribs. I bruised them pretty good, a sacrifice to the genie perhaps?. Before it started to hurt to much I hoped back on the bike, replaced the rocks and conquered the stunt.
Let me explained why I called the trails "unmature", some of the trails were open by removing only the leaves and branches out of the way(but leaving fallen trees) and they have not yet seen enough traffic for a thread to get created. It makes for some challenging ridings, tight and tough sections with log up to 2 feet to hop and some parts where you say, where the hell am I supposed to go? We loved them.
THe rest of the ride was faster with more flow. THe last trail was a screaming downhill dancing throught the trees with a huge smile on our faces *(E/**(//"((&&?"?!urghh sorry I just ate a bug!
After a quick picnic in the parking lot, it was time to head back for the 9 hour drive back to Montréal. What a perfect weekend of riding and camping with great friends, great trails and a pretty cool Genie!
John(echo), Mike (Tweek), Isa and me when down to Ellicottville, 1 hour south of buffalo, to ride and camp in the state forests of McCarty Hill, Rock City and Golden Hill.
This year we started up all the way up from the tower behind the top of the chairlifts. From the tower we jumped on the FLT (Finger lake trail), the start of the FLT is technical with 3 or 4 rock gardens in a row that could really discourage you if you think that your 15 miles ride will all be like that.
But as soon as you wish for more flow in the trail, the genie just makes it smooth, wavy and fast.
As soon as we could we connected with our favorite trails, the Pale Ales: North, Middle and South.
The Pale Ales are just the perfect mix of twisty and fast singletrack with a couple of rock gardens and logs to hop to keep you on your toes. They are so much fun. Most of the time you are pedalling as hard as you can because you are enjoying yourself so much but it does not take long until you realise that you are burning your batteries way too fast and you should calm down a little bit.
At the end of the pale ales, we decided to climb back up using the FLT. Since the FLT is a hiking trail, it was a tough but very challenging climb. Near the middle there is a long rock garden that looked almost unridable (well for me). You know some days when everything does not work like you want to, well for a couple of thoses there is a day when everything is working great and this was one of those days for me. I was riding thru and over the big rocks and after each one I could not believe that I was still riding until I reached the end. Thanks Genie!
At the top of that part of the FLT we reached little rock city. Little rock city is a pretty cool place full of gigantic and impressive rocks.
Some of theses rocks splited a long time ago creating canyons between them.
You could spend quite a bit of time playing around these rocks but on the maps there is a warning that says "no bike
thru rocks" wich we asumed meant not to fool around. It's a very popular place for hikers so it might not be a good idea to freeride on the rocks and give bikers a bad rep. We are thankfull enough that we can ride all the trails in this state forest.
After FLT we went on to ride a trail that we never rode before, Bent Rim. All I could say is YEAH! It's a very technical trail full of puzzles to solve. Puzzles being crazy rock gardens modified just enough for a expert line in them.
This is a sumary of our saturday ride: Tower, FLT, North, middle and south pale ales, FLT up, Bent Rim, Rim, some roads, middle pale ale and more road back.
After the satisfying ride we drove down to Ellicottville for food and beers and the Ellicottville brewery.
Who's eating who's I ask?
After a great dinner and good beers, we filled the genie's growler with pale ale before going in search of a place to camp.
We camped just next to the tower and used the rocks to block atv as a table and extra chair. Total bliss I say
Echo and Me meditating to thank the genie in the growler
The next morning, Isa cooked up a quick breakfast while we waited for Mike(Tweek) and his girlfriend to come and meet us for the day.
We don't have much pictures of the sunday ride because we did not stop much. The ride we did was faster, more flowy and less technical than the saturday. We rode: Growler, Connector, Yukon lunch, Porcupine, Big Merlin, Dead Dog, Sidewinder, Rain, Race, FLT and took some xc skiing trail down to ................. you guested it, Ellicottville Brewery!
The next day we went to another state forest 15 minutes from where we camped: Golden Hill State forest.
The trails are not as "mature" as in the other state forest and they give a different challenge.
There was a real sketchy stunt that I had to try. A rock drop to a very narrow sidewalk of flaky stones. Well what meant to happen, happened and the stones moved and I crashed hard with my seat in the ribs. I bruised them pretty good, a sacrifice to the genie perhaps?. Before it started to hurt to much I hoped back on the bike, replaced the rocks and conquered the stunt.
Let me explained why I called the trails "unmature", some of the trails were open by removing only the leaves and branches out of the way(but leaving fallen trees) and they have not yet seen enough traffic for a thread to get created. It makes for some challenging ridings, tight and tough sections with log up to 2 feet to hop and some parts where you say, where the hell am I supposed to go? We loved them.
THe rest of the ride was faster with more flow. THe last trail was a screaming downhill dancing throught the trees with a huge smile on our faces *(E/**(//"((&&?"?!urghh sorry I just ate a bug!
After a quick picnic in the parking lot, it was time to head back for the 9 hour drive back to Montréal. What a perfect weekend of riding and camping with great friends, great trails and a pretty cool Genie!
We REALLY have to make this weekend next year!!!
