Shinnston,
WV to Wolf Summit (East Terminus of the North Bend Rail Trail) 36 miles of
riding and bike-a-hike for 5:15 hrs, but only 25 miles of forward progress.
Probably
the toughest technical day yet. Judy and I jammed out of the motel this morning
at 8 AM so I could get a quick start to what looked to be a very tough day of
bushwacking and off roading. We drove to the Harrison County WV Rail Trail
trailhead in Clarksburg. My plan was to ride north to bridge up to Shinnston,
and then ride asphalt back to Clarksburg. Then I’d ride south to Wolf Summit to
bridge to the North Bend Rail Trail. Now I used Google Earth to find the
trailhead in Clarksburg. I mean these trailheads are just impossible to find,
and not a bit of signage anywhere to help you out. I zoomed in with Google
Earth down to a scale of 1 inch = 500 feet, and boom, there was the Harrison
County Rail Trail and the start of the trail on the east side of Clarksburg.
I
also scoped out a route last night with the Google Earth to find out if the old
rail beds still exist. Now it indicated that the one to Shinnston did not in
it’s entirety, and the one to Wolf Summit did. So I jotted down directions for
each ride and hoped it would fly. So anyway, we got to the Harrison County RT
in Clarksburg, and I’ll tell you: had I tried to find this thing without doing
my homework last night – freaking NEVER would we have found this place. It’s a
dead end street and no parking area at all. And there’s just this little
dilapidated sign telling of the trail. I got out of the car, looked it over,
and it was asphalt with chest high weeds on both the earthen berms. Wonderful!!
Judy and I checked out phones to make sure we had coverage – we did – and then
I packed up and headed out. I was thinking that this would be pure misery
riding through high weeds and prickers, shrubbery, and junk. Could even be the
day just to make it to Shinnston. But to my luck, I just had to ride the crap
for about ¼ mile and then the trail turned to old rail bed.
I
wouldn’t even call it rail trail, it’s more like ATV trail, with thumb sized
gravel, dips, moguls, mud holes and deadfall. But it was trail nonetheless. I
could see some poor rec rider coming here to do some relaxing rail trail ride
along the West Fork river and being greeted with this friggin mess. I mean
honestly, it was pure ATV track. And the further along I went north, the worse
this thing got. It went from bad, to worse to downright gnarly. I dodged
several really big mud puddles, and then when I came to one that went all the
way across the trail I tried to ride through it very gingerly. But my wheels
went so deep into the water and muck that I had to disengage my shoes in knee
deep water and lunge for the mud, brush lined shoreline. Got a total soaker in
both feet with that one. Problem with the shorelines of these puddles – and
there were a series of like 4-5 of them that I had to walk the bike around –
was that they were lined with hawthorn trees, with nice big thorns on the
branches. So I had to be careful not to get raked on the arms and legs by
thorny branches. My right arm looks like it was used for a cat scratcher right
now!
At
that point I called Judy on the cell and asked her to drive back up to
Shinnston because I would be working my ass off on this stretch and didn’t
really want to ride back south on Rt 19 to Clarksburg after thrashing my way
though the quagmire. Got her on the phone and she said she’d be on her way.
About 5 min after that I hit this quicksand area that I had to walk across. It
was just a mess. Then I came to a fence across the trail. There were no “No
Trespassing” signs. Big decision: do I go around the fence, or do I go WAY, WAY
back on the trail – and through all the crap that I was now 1 hr into? Easy
choice – around the fence! Don’t know what was being fenced off, but the riding
was on a kind of gravel service road. Now I knew that the rail trail ended at a
road called Lambert. Crossed Lambert and took a chance on seeing if the trail
continued as ATV again, but this was a no-go. Turned into a maze of ATV loops
and whoopty do’s over all these hummocks, so I rode back to jcn with Rt 19 and
rode about a mile of gravel berm up to a bridge that went over the West Fork
River. Saw that there was a barely discernable ATV track along the river, so I
crossed the road and rode down this steep gravel, gullied track down to the
trail.
And
this pup with a total bushwhack mess. Half the time I had to ride huddled
forward so branches wouldn’t take my head off. Again, my arms were getting
raked by branches and thorn bushes despite my trying to keep them close to my
sides. At times I’d one hand the bars so as to not get raked by these massive
rose bushes. Stopped too many times to count to walk the bike across these big
deadfalls that I couldn’t bunny hop. Were I to try to hop some of these I
feared that I’d be on my ass in seconds. Came to a barrier of this pile of
trees bulldozed in front of the track, and to my right was this coal depot with
bulldozers, steam shovels and dump trucks. Climbed over the first pile, rode
like hell for the ¼ mile, and then climbed over a second barrier of trees.
Continued on the track and it was just a total jungle and tangle of brush and
shrubbery. Went through muck pits and finally came to the end of the line –
ahead of me the old track went into a Nuclear Power Plant with “No Trespassing”
signs posted.
No
messing with that one! No fence hopping, no stealthing around that stuff. Got
on berm of Rt 19 and rode that pup the final couple miles to the West Fork
Trailhead in Shinnston. Man I was gassed, and that stint took me like 2.5 hrs!
Was really looking forward to riding back to where I started in the van with an
ice cold coke in my hand. But when I pulled into the Trailhead – no Judy! That
had me pretty worried, so I got the phone out and saw she had two messages for
me. Just called straight away without listening to the messages. Got her on the
phone and she told me that I had both our sets of keys – she couldn’t go
anywhere. And that’s when it hit me – I had put her keys in my jersey pocket
when I took my bike out of the van that morning. And I forgot to take them out
to give back to here. SHIT!!!!!!!
Ok,
now I had to ride back on Rt 19 with all the freaking truck traffic. I’d gotten
to love not dealing with traffic, and this was a big bummer. For about 10 min I
tried to hitchhike, but that was useless. On the bike and back I rode to
Clarksbug – 10 miles by way of Rt 19. When I got into town I had a big problem:
Judy and I had taken I-50 to get to the trailhead. I could not ride on the
interstate, so I had to ride almost all the way around town, ask umpteen people
directions to get to West Va Ave, and then ride down to Judy. Made, but that
little gaunt took a total of 3.5 hrs. Yup, Judy waited on that little dead end
road for nearly 4 hrs. She was totally good with it and with that I’m very
grateful. I felt like a total idiot for sure.
Had
2 ice cold cokes and asked her if I could scout out the next mile of two of the
second “stage” of the day – Clarksburg to Wolf Summit. She was cool, so off I
went on the next gaunt. First I tried to find the old rail line to see if it
went under I-50 and over the West Fork River – no luck. It was totally gone. So
I had to bike-a-hike up and under I-50 to a set of RR tracks. Got on the tracks
and crossed West Fork River, and then took the branch of RR line to the left
once I crossed the river. And this was just the track I was looking for.
Checked it out with my phone’s GPS, and I was dead on. This was the same old RR
line that is the North Bend Trail. It’s just that this was an ATV track that
was nothing but RR ballast.
The
stuff was like many inches thick, and it was just brutal to try to stay upright
on the bike through some of this. Managed to biff it once, but I caught myself
as the bike skidded out from under me. Hey, maybe it was all those balance ball
squats I did in the winter!!
Washed the
front wheel countless times. But I kept chugging away. There were times where I
just had to walk the bike through these tunnels of bruch, head down, ducking
and bobbing to stay away from the prickers. Finally, I figured that I was just
going to finish this thing out for the day rather than ride back on that crap
to Judy. Called her in the middle of nowhere and gave her direction out of
Clarksburg and to Wolf Summit. Done. Time to finish the day. There were points
where the trail actually changed to a more earthen type, which let me pick the pace up to like 9 mph
instead of the piddly 5-6 in the deep ballast.
Ran into a couple of surveyors on the track and asked them
how far I had to get to Wolf Summit, to which they told me 1.5 miles, with much
better track conditions. And they were right. Finished the track right up to
the Eastern terminus of the North Bend Trail. Had a slight slip up with Judy on
where to meet me, but we got that fixed within a few minutes and I was in the
van and done for the day. This morning Judy had secured a motel, Red Roof in
Fairmont, at a great price, so we’re doing that tonight. There is just zero
camping here, so we’re yet again in a motel. Can’t say I’m bummed seeing that I
was a total mess today. My legs were blackened from the cinder and mud. My arms
and legs are a bit bloodied from the thorns and prickers, and I was a sweaty
stinking mess. Got to the motel, and borrowed a hose to clean my bike, then
took a shower and I feel great. It will be a much deserved “beer thirty” in
about 1 hr – 6 PM.
On to 1-2 days of easy riding on the North Bend trail. I’ll
either split it into 2 days, or jam it for a long one-day ride. We’ll see how
we both feel. I’d like Judy to get a chance to ride tomorrow since she blew the
whole day doing support for me. So there it is, another day of American Dirt.
At this rate I will NEVER reach the west coast, not
on 25-30 miles/day. And it won’t get any easier when I reach Ohio – tomorrow or
Wed - because I have to ride and bike-a-hike the Buckeye Trail. That could be a
major trek. Heck, I’ll worry about that when we get to it. Late………Pete
No comments:
Post a Comment