Just in case you were confused, the above picture is not in fact a picture of a goose. Rather it is a picture of a bear sitting on the Goose. Big G as opposed to little g.
Now that we got that overly important detail cleared up, we can get back to your regularly scheduled nonsense.
I’ve found in the past few weeks that my tolerance for spending time in doors in comparison to spending time out of doors is starting to wane. I used to be able to go about a month before I would get twitchy and my eyes would be fogged with thoughts of the being, well, outside. Now Tuesday hits and if there isn’t some sort of plan for the weekend a deep depression sets in. My coffee isn’t dark enough and the beer isn’t strong enough.
(Takes sip of black as night coffee)
I consulted with WebMD and as I suspected, the only cure for my depression was a weekend of sleeping outside and riding bikes (this is absolutely true, WebMD is the best place to find solutions to all your health issues). Being one that always follows the advice of my automated web doctor, we loaded up the stuffs and headed for the hills pretty much as soon as we could on Friday night.
First stop was Three Peaks.
Three Peaks was a nice warm up. We had the Revival Course Preview which meant I needed to learn the course so I could take some peeps around it. KB and I were treated to an awesome sunrise which we enjoyed whilst sipping some black coffee. We then rode the course, missing turns, having to back track and eventually getting back just in time for Banana Pancakes made by the pancake master Joey Dye.
And then we headed out for another lap.
We rolled up the Mooseknucklermobile and headed back to SG where naps and beers were enjoyed in preparation of the main event of the weekend, Goose.
We met Kenny, Heather and Sir Prattipus (I don’t remember why we knighted Bryce, but we did. Long live Sir Prattipus) on the edge of the North Rim sipping beers and watching the sunset. This slowly turned into sitting around a campfire and sipping beers and then turned into sleeping in the cool air of the late summer night.
Repeat the cycle. Wake up, coffee, sunrise watching, ride bikes.
What can I say about the Goose that I haven’t said before? Not much. It wasn’t something that I realized until after the fact and wasn’t discussed during the ride, but it has now been 15 years that Sir Prattipus and I have been rocking the Goose together. On one of those first trips in 2002, I remember sitting at the top of the Bitch defeated after multiply tries. ProZac was next to me in a similar state with our hardtails laying on the edge next to us. Bryce was on a Big Hit with flat pedals. He cleaned it…
Interestingly enough, this was his first time riding the mesa on a hardtail in a lot of years (he told me how many years it had been, but then I drank beer and forgot most of what happened that day). Truth be told everyone but Mama Bear was on a hardtail with big, fat tires. Anything smaller than a 2.8 is basically a road tire. At this point, I’m pretty sure that 6Fatties are the official tire size of the Alliance until they aren’t.
After said ride, we spent a couple of hours chasing shade, drinking beers and eating Doritos (which are guaranteed to make you a faster rider, trust me we’ve done extensive testing).
And that my friends, is what you do when your tolerance for life in general is getting low. You go enjoy being outside, riding bikes, getting rad and spending time with good friends.
P. L. and R.
