# White Memorial - 6/27/11



## bvibert (Jun 27, 2011)

Since no one volunteered to ride with me at Stone this evening I decided to stick closer to home and hit up White Memorial instead.  If some of the trails there were any indication of how things are looking in the forbidden forest then I'm definitely glad I switched venues.  I generally don't worry too much about riding there when it's wet because bikes are restricted to the fire road type trails that they maintain to drive vehicles on to access different parts of the property, and a lot of those are at least partially covered in gravel.  Even so I encountered more mud than I was expecting, and got pretty thoroughly covered as a result.

I was pretty disappointed to find that all of the spots on my route that used to be relatively fun due to being slightly washed out have all been filled with gravel and regraded.  No matter though, I was on a mission to find some old single track that I've read about and seen some maps for online.  At the very least my route would take me on some unimproved dirt roads behind the WM property, that had some washed out sections for a little bit of excitement.  Or so I thought...  These are roads that used to be public roadways, but from what I've seen the towns stopped maintaining them years ago.  Some newer maps don't even show them anyway...  You can imagine my surprise when I came upon what was the first washed out section only to find it to was flatter than a pancake.  This section was so washed out the last time I went through a year or two ago that only 4x4 vehicles with decent ground clearance could travel through it.  I thought WTF; why would they fix this up?  Then I rounded the corner and found my answer.... Much like the NB water dept in Burlington, the Waterbury water dept was having some of their land logged, they regraded to allow easier access to the logging area.  At least that made sense.  My hopes fading I continued onto the next downhill that used to be interesting at least to find it unsurprisingly filled in a flat.  That led down to the area where I thought these long lost trails were supposed to start.  I spotted an opening of sorts in the right area that had some dirt mounts piled in front of it to keep people out.  I couldn't for the life of me find any indication of a trail beyond that though.  I suppose it's been lost to the forest.  Where I thought a second trail should be I found only another entrance to a logging area and a giant mud pit.

Oh well, I guess it wasn't meant to be...  It was on the way back that I realized that I forgot to apply bug spray before I set out, and it was NOT a day to be in the woods without!  When I realized that I was spending more time swatting bugs and scratching the bites that I already got than I was watching the trail in front of me I decided to cut the ride short and head back to the car.  On the way back though I got a pretty up close look at a beaver swimming around gnawing on something, at least that was something interesting.

Really though, the ride wasn't bad, just a little disappointing.  I had a nice pedal and it was good to get out.  I think I got in around 9 miles.


----------



## o3jeff (Jun 28, 2011)

Sounds pretty hard core:wink:


----------



## bvibert (Jun 28, 2011)

o3jeff said:


> Sounds pretty hard core:wink:



It was.  I almost didn't want to post this TR, so I could keep the place all to myself. 

8.9 miles in a bit over an hour.  Average moving speed at just about 9mph.
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msid...ll=41.707683,-73.167615&spn=0.014449,0.038195


----------



## o3jeff (Jun 28, 2011)

When will the GoPro video of this ride be up?


----------



## bvibert (Jun 28, 2011)

Sorry, I'm keeping that for myself..

I almost forgot to mention that I witnessed the laziest thing I've seen in quite a while during the ride.  Shortly after getting on the dirt road I came across a pickup truck facing me but stopped, as I got closer it slowly moved forward, seemingly to get out of my way.  I saw a dog right behind the truck, but didn't think too much of it.  On my way back I came across the same truck moving slowly in the other direction.  Then I noticed the dog was still following behind.  It was then that I realized this guy was walking his dog with his truck.  The guy is either really really lazy (and/or too intoxicated), or has some sort of physical ailment that prevents him from walking well.  Regardless the poor dog didn't appear to be in the best of health itself, and definitely looked tired.  I'm pretty sure it whimpered at me when I rode by.

This isn't the first time I've come across some odd characters back on those roads... It's a bit creepy.


----------



## JimG. (Jun 28, 2011)

bvibert said:


> It was then that I realized this guy was walking his dog with his truck.  The guy is either really really lazy (and/or too intoxicated), or has some sort of physical ailment that prevents him from walking well.



Only in America...if you're too drunk to walk, drive instead.


----------



## bvibert (Jun 28, 2011)

I'm not saying that he was, but he very well could have been.


----------



## powhunter (Jun 28, 2011)

That sucks about the logging up there, but thats happening everywhere...I used to love flying down  those fire roads when I lived near there

Steveo


----------

