Who is free for a Wed night no drop ride ? I am thinking of doing either Richard's ride that he posted up awhile ago or else the Gatineau trail 1 from Champlain again .

Paul might be a little sore :)

My Wednesday nights are booked for the next two weeks.

DAMN!! My Tues is booked , my Thurs got nabbed this morn, and I'm usually quite cooked by Friday night. Tonight would have been good except that it's too late notice. RATS!!!

Ha ha
Actually I feel great ! Only thing a little sore is my pride. You guys are pretty ruthless on the climbs

I am not sure I can get a sitter for Wed. My mom is in TO and she is my usual sitter. She is coming back this week I think. Shes just retired

Tues could work for me as Julie is off. The earlier the better. I am off at 2:50 these days.

I'd prefer the Gat Park ride. I need to work on the climbs

Cheers,
Paul

I am good for wed night. I have another PooperLight to test out that should be even more powerful. Muhahahaha. Oh unless that 70% rain forecast holds true.

CRAP! I thought that you said that Thursday nights were the worst, so I was banking on WED. Just my luck..



70% huh? That sounds like very bad luck to me. Maybe I should make plans to go spinning indoors at lunch instead. I'll just pretend my tires are sliding over crackling leaves into soft gravelly ruts. I'll pretend that the hot fan is actually a cool wind and that the scary noises from the guy on the bike next to me are actually wolves howling at the moon. It could be tough. Let's hope it doesn't rain and that Paul get's a sitter!!

AccuWeather predicts no rain on Wednesday:

http://www.accuweather.com/canada-forecast...ic=1&fday=3

http://www.weatheroffice.gc.ca/city/pages/...8_metric_e.html

I trust environment canada ahead of others...

I trust whoever says the weather is better

I haven't got a sitter at this time,but... (see below). My wife is currently off Tues and every other Mon. She worked yesterday. So free next Mon or Tues for sure.
I said Thursdays work for me if I get a sitter as my wife works til 9 on Thurs. This way she doesn't miss me while I am out for a ride
If my Mom is in town she can pretty much cover for me any evening.

I could swing a Wed ride in the Gats as my wife is off at 5:30 and works by the Alonzo bridge. I could drop off my daughter on the way to a 6:00 ride as it would be on the way.

Enough rambling.

Later,
Paul

Sounds complicated but I'm sure you'll be able to pull it off and still be ready to ride for a good 30min before Kristin pulls into the parking lot.

I'd be up for a ride in the Gats. Do you meet at P7 or the opposite end at Champlain?

We used the lot at Champlain Lookout last time, don't remember the P designation for it. Also last time had we continued on another 10 mins we'd have reached the firetower.

P7 might be good as its a shorter distance to drive and an entirely different section of the 1 to ride.

Yeah, P7 to Champlain is a good climbing ride that takes less than 1.5 hours so if you guys are into meeting there?

That's a good description for the single steepest climb in the park system.

Well the steepest climbs start at the beginning of the ride so we get that out of the way then it's all gravy (with some lumps) after that. I did find an even steeper climb from P17 (Wakefield) ... there is one climb so steep that the hikers had trouble getting up.

Where is P7 ?


Really ? That's a drag.. Ah, if you had only been 20min late instead of 40min late, we might have been able to plant a flag there...

Glad I'm not going - the only thing I like steep(ed) is my tea.

Steep could be fun. I just have to remember to lean forward to keep that front wheel down..

P7 is also known as the kingsmere parking lot, and its near the intersection of Kingsmere road and swamp road. Basically if you're taking the gatineau parkway when coming from ottawa, when you hit the T-intersection instead of taking the left to go to champlain lookout, keep going straight. When you reach the overpasses, you take a left onto Kingsmere road, and the P7 lot is about a kilometer down on the right hand side.

Here is the link from google maps. Look about right ?
http://maps.google.ca/maps?f=q&hl=en&a...p;z=18&om=1

or tiny url
http://tinyurl.com/2qg9xs

Come for a climb Richard. Its not so bad and the downhills are fun ! ! !

Cheers,
Paul

Thanks for the link. Actually, I should have asked the other non-mtbk riders if they mind hills. I have a feeling that Phil won't want to ride the hills. So maybe I just won't tell him.

And I'll be riding my brakes coming back as usual!

emeca coming?

That is the first Gatineau Park ride I tried about two years ago - starts at the bottom of the steep hill. I got half way up and quit figuring if this is what the whole trail is like - no way I can handle it. I've matured since then and realized it is OK to walk up the hills. But I'm still not keen on that particular hill.

Anyway if my new warranty replacement pedals are in and installed in time I will be riding SMH tomorrow night.

Looks like rain. Are we doing a rain or shine? or are we canceling if it rains?

Cheers,

Paul

Yes, Emeka was planning on coming. It would be cool if you brought lights for him and Phil. Phil still wanted to go even after I told him about the hill!




Unfortunately, I can't go after all!!!! My daughter's daycare has a meeting which I thought was optional but it turns out that it is not optional after all. No riding for me!

E bailed.

forecast....60% chance of drizzle... i can live with drizzle.

Me too, will bring my rain jacket to the car and check the clouds at that point :)

See ya there,

Cheers,

Paul

So ? How was the ride ?

And how about if we try for another moderately hilly Gat ride this Monday coming up ? We just have to find a way of getting Richard to come out with us!

Moderately hilly? That's easy. Park at the visitors center/parking lot at the base of the park (or in the parking lot behind Asticou) and bike up to mackenzie king estate and back.

Ride recap . . .
There were the Three Musketeers there yesterday. DeeEight, Peter (hope this is correct ) and myself.
Peter and I were there first and strapped on our lights. Peter had a new set of dual Halogens. I think they were a BLT set or something like that.
At about 6:15 we headed off with DeeEight not there yet. We knew he knew my car and would try catch us later. Since this was an out and back route he would eventually find us, which he did not that far from Champlain Lookout where we turned around.

For those of you who have new lights and want to try night riding these rides are a great chance to do this. The ride is not too technical but there are fast enough downhill sections which good lights really help.
I know some people would say when you get a new light you should make sure it works before you go but this is not true for this ride because we always have extra lights with us in case there is a problem with your new light. Right Peter
Peters lights started out not as bright as he hoped and turned to "these lights SUCK ! ! !" (direct quote from Peter) Seems like the battery was not charged very much. Said he had it charge over night so there was a problem with the battery and/or charger.
On the plus side I had extra lights with me plus had lent him a 1 watt light from MEC as a back-up. So at the Lookout we re-arranged the lights we had with us and headed back with Peter being able to see much better than the ride out there
It wasn't long after this that a train came towards us. Oh actucally it was DeeEight with all his over volted lights . They were pretty bright. He'll have to tell his side for what lights he was torturing at 200% over-voltage.
I left my GPS at home but I think the total ride was around 17 kms and took 2 hours. Was a good pace but nothing crazy. I think Peter took a bad bounce in the dark with his lights with no battery, lost traction and had to walk 30 seconds up the top of on steep section. Other than that we all had little trouble at all doing the climbs. Richard, I know you could do them The first one was a bit steep and long but after that was not so hard.
Once back at the lot we sorted out the lights with who had what. Peter packed up and left and DeeEight and I chatted for about 15 minutes do calculations on what parts to get for my bike to lighten it up

As far as Monday goes I can make another Gatineau Park ride. I think I liked the ride we did farther up from the Lookout better. Was a little more technical, if you can call it that :) This should be do-able by all. If there is the odd section that you have to push up thats no problem as we always go at the slowest riders pace anyhow. I'd be surprised if anyone had to walk more than 5-6 minutes total on the combined steepest sections. I think its worth it as the downhills are fun Also this is probably less walking than we do on any of our rides that have some more technical sections in them IMHO.

Come on guys, lets get a gang out! The season is winding down, at least for those that put the bike away for the winter. But thats another story, which I have extra studded tires I could lone for a ride for people wanting to try Ice-biking

Cheers,

Paul

To tell the truth I am really not keen on doing a Gats night ride, primarily because of the distance. I know, Paul, I shouldn't complain.

I really would like the group to do at least one weekend, perhaps "epic", ride before the end of the season. Maybe an Epic Greenbelt ride including most of the connected trails, or something non technical like my 120 km hybrid ride from Kanata to the Aylmer Marina to the Gatineaus to Lac Leamy to the Locks, along the canal, through the Experimental farm and back to Kanata. It would be a bit shorter as we would have to detour past the Queensway underpass. Or explore the Marlborough Forest gravel roads. Or perhaps the Gatineaus.

The one Gatineau ride I did this summer involved walking a few hills. The route was P11 at O"brien - 36 to 0 to the beach at the close end of Lac Phillipe and back.

Both my bikes are available now. My MTB has shiny new Axiom Road Gap IIs.

Yeah, the ride was nice except for my crappy lights. I think I'll just return them and get something higher end. With the leaves all over the path it makes for a nice riding surface covering most of the annoying gravel.

There is a great route starting from P17 going around Lac Phillipe and it has some technical (although light) sections and one climb that will bust your legs. It's a longer ride so it might take 2+ hours in the dark. There is also the trail from O'brien parking lot up to the Western Lodge.

Lemme guess... they were on sale at Full Tilt ? Problem with BLT's were they tended to use SLA batteries for many systems, and if you leave BLT's sitting around for a long time without a full charge first, they lose capacity and eventually become a useless battery. Cyclepower has one in the case they had to order a replacement battery for because it had sat there so long it wouldn't take a charge. Lord knows what shape the replacement battery is in by now (its been there yet another couple years).

As to my own lights... just a 6V-5W MR11 overvolted 100%, a 12V-20W MR11 overvolted 20%,, a 12V-20W MR16 overvolted 20% and a 12V-10W MR11 overvolted 20%. If it hadn't been for one of my battery packs not being properly charged (and thus it was effectively undervolted instead of overvolted) I'd have a combined output in the neighbourhood of 3400 lumens. To put that in perspective, your typical HID is 675 lumens.

I'm probably gonna put one of my overvolted light systems up for sale in the classifieds in a day or so.

Man D8 ... your lights were like car lights and helped alot when mine burnt out. I just picked up a PlanetBike Alias SC from MEC (on sale) and they seem very bright for a 15watt so I'll keep the BLT15 watt and mount it on my helmet. Looking forward to another night ride.

Which light might you be selling D?

One of my PooperLight customs.

used in outhouses the world over

As long as it burns bright ... don't care if it smells so bad.

Sounds like I missed a good ride and I'm looking forward to the next one.

And..can anyone from out in Richard's end of town drive him to/from the Gats next time?

It's not being able to drive there - it's the timing. But maybe if I get inspired.

Inspiration should come easily for you. You haven't cycled the Gats too much so think of it as another conquest for the year. You'll do very well on the big climbs.

I have to drive around 30 kms to the Gats and around 35 ish to Greenbelt rides, but I understand that the bridges are crazier coming into Quebec in the evening than going the other way. I am just east of the Gats but due to the Gatineau river I have to drive south to the bridge then back up again into the park. Anyhow the driving part is not the best part of the ride for sure.

Anyone want to start a new thread for the next ride? also anyone firm up a location ?
I vote for Champlain Lookout but you know I would probably drive to Brockville to ride if I could make it in time

If its a night I don't have a sitter with the wife working til 5:30 I can only make it to the Gats for a 6:00 ride. Would never make it into Ottawa for 6:00 as I would have to drop of the little monster at the wifes work on the way.

Cheers,
Paul