Home.

Good ride with good company deserves an icecream! We made it up all the hills and had a few laughs. This must be repeated!

More speed...

... More fun, untill someone has an off. Sorry J, it just happened to be you, but nothing broken and just smeared mud and a grazed arm to show off on monday. We decided to cut the ride short due to me still recovering from last weekend's ride and rode home along the road.

Trail ride with J.

Finally J has moved back to Norway and even more finallyer we've had time to ride together! It's been at least 6 years since last time, so long, in fact, that neither of us could remember. Anyway J came round our place and I took him to my local singletrack... Unbeknowest to me that he'd not been on a bike for 3 years. Sorry J. My trail was a bit overgrown and quite technical, but J managed really well. After a bit the trail opens out onto a tractor, er, track. More speed, more fun...

5 hours home.

And my poor bike will be hung off the back of fil's car all the way. Tomorrow tlc.

Next morning (today)

I was too tired to write this all yesterday. Today we go home. My bike is good. Dirty and tired and still looking brilliant. But I suspect it will be used for xc and trails instead of marathons from now on.

Finally.

After a bit of faffing about looking for signs and riding around the Olympic ski jump arena like a tourist, I was in Lillehammer. Anette met me and helped me up to our room where peeled off sweaty, wet, gritty clothes, had a long hot shower and collapsed on the bed. Tired x 1000.

I forgot to mention.

That the weather got steadily worse. Down in Rena it was warm, but up near the top it got cold and I got my jacket on. Then it dribbled. And then it rained. Thanks a lot. By this time I was tired to the point of walking up the hills so with the rain my misery was almost complete. All I needed was a puncture or mechanical failure. But my bike (yes it is titanium) delivered and held it's own through the punishment. Good bike. Very good bike.

Sweet!

Some places the trail turned like I likes it. Narrow, fast and, well to be honest, interesting. I get bored just riding along a grit motorway. This bit was great!

Lunch.

We started at 11 and I usually have lunch at 12 ish, but I stopped after about 40 k and had me a Snickers and some nuts. The road had varied from smooth dirt to ballbearing type gravel and I was tired. Almost half way now.

More grit road.

Did I mention that it was 90 k? It can't all be fun... Hang on, why not? Norway is one of the most beautiful countries in the world. Sparsly populated and full of lovely fiords, valleys and mountains, and we're riding here?!

Shawn the...

There were a fair many sheep along the way. Some in the way too, but mostly staring in disdain at idiots on bikes.

Suddenly interesting!

The trail pointed downwards! And suddenly I was having fun. This is what I do, and even though I was on my hardtale (yes it's titanium) with a 90mm fork I totally hooned! But then I thought my fil isn't used to this type of trail and stopped to see if he was ok. He was, so we continued and got down to a long grit road decent, where I also pulled ahead. At the bottom was another sign so we followed that on some singletrack and then had to accend on this! Riding was nigh on impossible so I hicked it with the bike on my back.

Follow the, uh, grey grit road.

My fil would stop and wait, then just burn off again. It was more annoying than helpfull really. I love the guy, but he was psyching me out. By this time I had given up and was just riding at my own pace.

First sign.

I was pretty relieved to see this as we didn't know the way. This is the first sign we saw at 10 k, only 80 to go!

Omen?

We set off at 11, the weather was nice and warm, but in my backpack I had a wind jacket and a fleece just in case. Also 2 Snickers and 2 packs of salted nuts, about 3 litres of water and an energy drink. After about 10 minutes I gave up trying to ride with the fil, so turned on the pod and listened to some Foo. I saw this skull at the side of the road and had to share. Nice omen!

Today I ride 90k

So it's important to get a good breakfast inside. I'll be trying the Birk trail from Rena to Lillehammer. I haven't done a ride of this length for over a decade, but I think its doable. My father in law is also doing the ride, but has been training for ages so I doubt we'll be riding together. This is my breakfast at the hotel at Hamar, and Anette and her mum are driving to Lill. and meeting us there.

Random workshop.

This from last weekend, I parked up in Oslo to fix someone's bike. I just love being able to do that!

Hafjell.

A weekend at the mountains. Lots of friends good weather and great trails... Only way too hot! Today the temperature has broken and there are clouds, and I loath to say, but I am enjoying that! It's 12 and this is my first lift of the day. But only because I've been selling stuff.