Day six promised singletrack galore with a ride starting at Trapp Family Lodge above the village of Stowe and east to Morrisville. We started the day feeling like rock stars. Mostly because we were hosted by Trapps for this trip and this place is just out of this world!
Warning: This post lacks a serious amount of pictures but our talented photographer had to drop out early on day 5.
From Trapps, we started on the lodge spur trail to Tap line and then up Growler…. what a great trail name! but I wouldn’t use a 90’s dh bike without a rear shock.
After zipping down bobcat, a xc ski trail, we hit hardy haul for an awesome flowy downhill down to the valley floor. This is the type of trail that makes this trip worthwhile. On the Stowe bike path we stopped over at Manfield cycles to say hi to Dave and get tips for the rest of the ride.
We climbed Edson hill rd and then proceed to ride weeks hill road. On that road we saw many huge properties with very disturbing sculptures on their front lawn. Some were artsy and some where cartoons staight out of hell. Somebody please tell those privileged peoples what to do with their money.
We hopped on some very scenic maple house trails and witness again some great rusting farm tools.
We then rode toward the Sterling valley network. I really enjoy the sterling valley trails, it’s a great mix of old school trails and good new school flow. We rode eight bridges and then met with the shuttle car for beers and sandwich.
Mojo’s paws have been healing so I took him to do a quick lap on split rock. On a big day like this it would have been easy to skip this quick lolly pop but the whole idea behind this trip was to ride as much singletrack as possible. After the split rock trail we used part of the catamount ski trail to reach the mud city trails. Sometimes riding a beautiful and peacefull doubletrack is just as good as any flowy new school singletrack.
The Mud City loop would add a lot more singletracks to a long day but that’s what we are in for. We had to climb quite a bit to reach to top and then rode down. I only rode these trails once and I had forgotten how good and long they are! After poping back up on the road from this white knuckle downhill we rode some dirt roads to the start of Tom G’s. In my mind Tom G’s was mostly downhill…boy was I wrong! Tom G’s is a awesome trail but we were getting very tired. Two thirds of it is climbing a very technical trail and the last dh is a exhilarating ride on slick rocks and ridges. Overall it’s a amazing trail but the end is kind of desparate, trying to squeeze to much trail in too little land. I was ready to take shortcuts because we could always see the other trail a couple feet by. After a love and hate relationship with this trail we got to the road were Isabelle has been waiting for us for a looooooong time. By then some of the crew was ready to quit but something amazing happened: We all drank a Lawson’s beer and somehow found the energy to keep on going.
Matt’s rear derailleur has been more tired than him for a couple of days now. We don’t even know how he managed to keep going with something like this but it was about time we got to our final destination.
The last trail network for this whole trip was ahead of us: Cadys Falls and of course we had to climb to get to it. This sign really made me laught because “Cote” in french is Hill, this sign is basically Hill’s Hill!
We reached the antenna and I was following Ryan’s hand draw map. He did a great job providing us with direction but we screw up anyway. The Cadys Falls network has Hank from Chuck’s Bikes to thank for a lot of work. Hank works so much on these trails and he has everything very clear in is head but we have heard of people going completely mindless crazy lost in this twisted maze. Some of them banged their heads to death on trees while others ate body parts to survive. It was getting dark and the only thing I could think of was that this is not a place you want to be so close to darkness and exhausted. We finally found our way down these cool trails and we knew that we were going to live another day. We then used the Lamoille Valley Rail Trail to reach Lost Nation Brewery, one of our favorite place on earth!
After many deserved Lost Galaxy white IPA and some amazing food, we were ready to ride back on the Rail Trail to Ryan’s house. It’s funny when you have been riding so much for so long, you feel like you can do anything! I know Ryan’s backward pretty good and I rode the singletrack from the Rail Trail to his house, drunk, many times but this time I got lost. At one point I had to call him on his cell phone.
“Hey buddy, I am kind of lost……”
“Where are you he said?” probably thinking about Cadys.
“I am …uh… sort of behind your house but I don’t recognize your singletrack!”
Funny that we found our way for 300km on a new route but got lost in our friends backyard. We had to bushwack back down and use the road.
Finally we were home, we’ve made it. We have linked a lot of VT’s best singletracks over a 6 day trip and it was an awesome adventure.
We have a lot of people to thank for this trip and we tried to do it on each post.
The trails are out there, go and make a adventure of out it!
TODAY’S STATS
Distance Ridden: 63 km\40 miles
Altitude Gain: 1250 M\4100 Feet
TOTAL STATS
Distance Ridden: 277 km\172 miles
Altitude Gain: 5400 M\17716 Feet
Todays Alliances:
Today’s Beers:
Mosaic and Lost Galaxy from Lost Nation Brewing
FULL DIRECTORY OF POSTS FOR THE TRIP
Day 1 – Killington to Pittsfield
Day 2 – Pittsfield to Rochester
Day 3 – Rochester to the Mad River Valley
Day 4 – MRV to Waterbury
Day 5 – Waterbury to Stowe
Day 6 – Stowe to Hyde Park
