The trail reports coming from the strong armed, jackbooted thugs at Hanson Hills (that’s a joke, they’re completely nice from what I’ve experienced) via Stalkbook and from folks who rode the trail recently (I cannot confirm their niceness or jackbootedness) claimed that the fat bike trail there was in killer shape: firm, packed and fast. So my friend Napper and I headed north early Thursday morning in his Tundra-Ram-Osaurus truck type, four wheel drive thing in the hopes of riding said firm, packed and fast trails.
Then it snowed.
Despite a couple slips and couple slides on what passes for snow removal on Michigan highways we made it to Hanson in one piece and proceeded to unload the fatties, get a couple of trail passes and get changed in the lodge where I was unfortunately serenaded by the amplified explosive, bowl spackling sounds of Napper’s colon while doing so. Must of have been bran muffin Thursday.
Then we were off. Off to break trail, because we were probably two of five people there at 9:15 a.m. on a Thursday, the only people not on skis, and those Hanson thugs hadn’t even thought about grooming the fat bike trail yet. We were up for it though, because I’m stupid and Napper is…. well, Napper and just loves riding bikes.
The first lap we did was a hard one, and I while I wouldn’t say it was as cool as flipping a big tire shirtless in an alley or rocking the Total Gym like Chuck, it was a hell of a workout and it felt great.
Despite the lack of promised “firm, packed and fast trails” we had fun and worked our asses off as we made our way around the trails a couple times; making tracks through the fresh snow, trudging up hills void of traction (as demonstrated by Napper and his beard below) and bombing down the other side with shit eating grins on our faces.
One of these days I’ll time my trips up north just right and get some solid riding in, but there’s little bad I can say about spending a couple of hours goofing off on my bike in the snowy Michigan woods with a buddy.
Later.