Another Way into the Lantzville Foothills

Paul and I were going to head out towards Rhododendron Lake today and explore some of the roads we pass out that way.  Unfortunately he wrenched his back waving his English flag just as the winning Italian goal was scored.  ("Was that the ball going in off the post?"  "No it was Paul's back").  Next time Paul!  Really am sorry to hear about your back...  Honest! 

I decided instead to see if I could enter the Lantzville foothills from the entrance off of Aulds Rd/Old Logging Rd.  The entrance is well gated, but a small trail has been made 100m before the gate on the left.  I entered on this trail and so, I was unable to read the sign on the yellow gate.  It was probably some kind of "Welcome to the Lantzville Foothills," sort of thing.

 Here's today's route:

And... here's the day in brief:
 
1.  Entered through left trail off Old Logging Rd.  (Left turn off Aulds Rd.  See photo two above).
2.  Explored many of the Lantzville Foothills trails.  Great climbs!  Great wildlife from snakes to 1" baby  quails with FRANTIC parents.  Quite overgrown in some parts.
3.  Lantzville F.H. gate open again.
4.  Took a right off Bonnell Main that I've often passed.  It's the turn right before the road that goes to the NE side of Kidney Lake, (when heading SW).
5.  Quite overgrown towards the end.  Stopped at an extremely steep section and returned to 142.
6.  Out towards Boomerang Lake.  I had a plan to make GPS tracks of a couple of new roads out past the lake, but it started to rain.  I'm wanting at least five unrecorded roads to upload to my map provider, so I can get the next upgrade for free.  Next time, I guess!
7.  Stopped off at the open area just past the Doumont Trail's "tank traps" to see what's out there.  I never look in this area because usually I'm enroute to some other spot.  What a horror story:  It's a shotgun shell graveyard with targets of all types hanging off trees, logs and various other bits and pieces.  I left when two cowboys and a hot blonde arrived with a truck load of guns and a few full boxes of shells.  Good thing lead pellets are a thing of the past!  What bothers me about this spot most of all is the location of targets right next to a walking/cycling trail.   
8.  Zipped into the Nanaimo Motocross Assoc. to watch a few bikes fly over the track.  Really great!  Too bad the gate was locked shut when I tried to leave!  Five minute wait... no prob.

Up high in the foothills

Looking East towards Gabriola Island from high in the foothills

A small sample of the plethora of shotgun shell casings left near the Doumont Trail

The GPS track "walk through":

Google Earth "Flyover" of today's trails:

      

iPod Time lapse movie of some trails in the Lantzville Foothills:

So, we can ride the foothills without having to worry about a locked gate on the other side stopping us from getting out.  There's one short steeper section coming in from the "Aulds" entrance that might give a bit of grief going the other way.  Easy downhill in a loose packed clay coming in, but you'd need to belt up it pretty fast to get out without spinning the rear tire.  Probably do-able.

37.3km of logging roads today.

Westwood Lake Trail

I took a short ride out to the Westwood Lake Trail yesterday.  I tried reaching this trail some time ago from the NW end, off of Jingle Pot Rd.  It was winter time and the steep trails leading in were too slick to get down the hill from that side.  This time I entered from the Nanaimo Lakes Road end.... Much easier.

It's a nice little trail.  Nothing too exciting, but a fun, quick ride all the same.

 
Here's an iPod time lapse movie from the NW end back to the gate, (4x speed). Sorry about the bumps!

I'd like to try it again sometime.  It looks like it might go all the way through on Google Earth.

Roads Near Okay Mountain and Okay Lake

I've been thinking back to when I went out to explore the roads around Okay Lake and the NE side of the Okay Mountain Valley and returned home with a loose GPS battery and a massive grey cloud over my head.  Well I headed back out there again this evening after work and had a terrific short ride.

I entered through the Doumont Trail, turned left towards Boomerang Lake and started my track at the next intersection, (what I call "Intersection B").  Here's the track on Google Earth:

Below:  A YouTube video retracing the route.  I hope it's visible here...  You might need to bring it up full screen and crank the res. up to 720p. 

 

I made a stop in at Okay Lake to snap off a photo.  You can see from the yellow track above that the road in towards the lake now extends further around the south side of the lake.  Lots of active logging in this area.

  

 All those stretches of roads running N to S are in great shape and it's possible to maintain speeds well over 50km/h for most of it.  I must have seen no less than twenty elk in three separate herds today.  The crazy things take off so quickly that it's near impossible to have a camera ready in time to snap off a photo.  At one point, I came around a corner to find them blocking the road and damned nearly joined the herd as they clattered into the bush.  Fantastic head rush!  Here are a few of the ladies off the road.

I encountered this "bridge out" while heading south.  You can see the location on the YouTube movie above:  The arrow, (which acts like a house fly walking on your lunch), stops and turns around on the southern facing stretch after encountering the missing bridge.  I return to the same spot heading north after taking a detour south on the usual road that skirts Okay Mt.

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Ahhhh, the view from the other side after attacking it from the south.

Really nice creek view where the bridge used to span across.

There, a nice big truck to offset the beautiful creek.

   

Wow... Logged Out.  These people need to smarten up and change their messed-up logging methods.  :( 

Terrific local road to do again... really liked it.

GPX track file 
KMZ track file

Okay Mountain... FAIL!

Tried to get up Okay Mountain again today.  This is one of four rides that I'm really keen to get at this summer, but it's too early yet...  I was skunked once again by fairly deep snow and a downed log.  I'm sure that it would be easy to get over that pesky log if it weren't for the snow around it!  Also, I heard a strange sound after stopping at the log that I could have sworn was a cougar...  Anyway, it spooked the shit out of me!  I revved the engine half a dozen times quite loudly to make as much noise as I could before turning back.  It was pretty clear that today's ride was going to be on more familiar roads.  I decided at one point to explore a few spur roads.  My Garmin decided to start turning off repeatedly once I got deep into unknown territory and ruined the fun completely.  Nothing like having an expensive tool that gets you deep into the woods and then decides to pack it in, expecting you to find your own way out.  Thanks Garmin!  I managed to find my own way back, but my sense of direction has never been that good.  I rely heavily on that GPS!

I recopied Garmin's firmware into my GPS and it stopped the constant turning off, but I'm not happy.  How can I trust a GPS that won't show you the way.  They get another chance and then I go to work getting a refund while producing "Garmin Sucks" YouTube videos .

Here's another nasty video of the Tank Traps section of Doumont Road, (real time).  This is the way heading out of our local logging roads.  Very bumpy!  The video actually makes me a bit motion sick because of the jumping about.  I think I need to body mount this camera somehow...  Right now it's in a bumbag around the headlight.

It POURED coming home and so I decided to give the bike a quick spray at the local car wash and spent ten minutes watching the rain come down in stair rods.  After deciding it wasn't stopping any time soon, I finally bit the bullet and rode home.  I've got stuff hanging up to dry everywhere.  :)

Fun ride, but I'm pretty cheesed off with Garmin!

Triumph Thruxton Race (U.S.) & IOM TT Race Footage

There hasn't been much time for riding in the last couple of days.  I started off back to work after getting the summer off.  At least now I've taken the plunge into the world of dual-sport riding, I can ride local trails on the way home.  (I'm sure that will get a bit boring very soon)!  The last one I mapped out from Jameson Rd. is on my way home and I zipped along it today for a bit of fun.  It's a great way to blow off some stress when your heading for home. 

I rode my Triumph yesterday after quite a few days of riding the dual-sport.  I'm sharing the time out between the two bikes.  It was weird as hell!  I remember Paul telling me that the feel of his street bike was very "linear" after riding his dual-sport.  I knew what he meant right off, but after a couple of days on the dual-sport I really knew what he was talking about.  The difference between them is blatantly obvious.  The change from one to the other really gets you thinking about the physics of the whole riding thing.  (It also reminded me pretty quickly that the Triumph is a formidable machine with plenty of power.  It's got a tad more ooomffph than a 250). 


So, that reminded me of a great Triumph Thruxton race in the States that I discovered on YouTube fairly recently.  The first two minutes is quite boring, unless you enjoy hearing all the different after-market exhausts these guys have installed, (which is fun the first time around if you're into that sort of thing).

Watch the way these guys shift their body weight into the corners.  Great riders these guys:

I just got the movie below in my email.  Ryan sent me some really great footage from the Isle of Man TT races.  These riders are seriously MENTAL!