Bad shape...

So my brother and I went for a ride in Whiting Ranch this afternoon. This was the first ride in the park since it was reopened after a 8 month closure following the So Cal fires of late last yet. It was a little disappointing (sorry to ruin any hopes of the 'good 'ole days...)

Most of the entire first 2 miles of the trail, the flat part leading up to the hill climb, was all sand. And not just a little sand, but deeeep sand. It seemed as if just as you were getting up to speed, one of these 20 foot sand "traps" appeared and all the momentum was lost. It was a bummer...that used to be such a cool part of the trail.

Then came the hill climb...It started out ok, and was, for the most part, the same as always. There were still lots of sand traps but most were avoidable, and there were lots of piles of ash or soot mixed in with the sand. There was no shade, and the sun was hot. It was probably due to the time of day, but, there used to be some nice trees and shrubbery along the trail that provided a little relief from the sun...not so today.

Nick and I decided to climb dreaded hill, and then have some awesome downhill sections. Dreaded was good, and the down hill was also good. Some sand, but not bad.

Single track was good. Not nice and shady like it used to be, but it was ok. This was where I had the most fun...for the first time in my riding career, I flipped the bike, almost end-over-end, and flew over the handle bars. How you might ask. This is how...

So I was moving along at a pretty good speed, and then the trail started to take a turn to the right. I naturally applied a little brake, and prepared for the turn. Once I hit the turn, which was nothing but a small sandy downhill drop, my front tire sank in about 6 inches of sand, and the front handle bars pivoted to the right spinning 270 degrees making them backwards from normal. During the process, because I was already applying a little brake, the sliding of the front end caused me to clamp down harder on the brake (not on purpose) and over I went. Fortunately, I was not going very fast or it could have been very ugly. I landed on my wrist, and scuffed up my knee a little, but that was all.

After I got up, reset my front end, and fought my way through a couple dozen more sand traps, I hit the road.

Oh, and to top it all off...my bike was not liking life today. Couldn't shift when I needed to, but was able to shift when I didn't need to, and my clips did not want to me clip in...it was a battle, but I do admit that it was fun.

It wasn't the Whiting Ranch that I once knew though...

Bike Adventure

So Nate and I went for a bike ride tonight.  It was the second ride that we got in in the past 3 days!

We just did the usual ride, the arroyo trail across the street from our place, down into the canyon, and out over by the baseball fields off of Antonio.  In total it was 5.87 miles, and took a total of 36 minutes of solid riding time (just about 45 minutes or so in total time including a few trail fixes along the way).

We got a little bit of a late start so it was a little dark when we were riding through "jungle" part of the trail, which made it a little bit scary considering there could be large cats and other animals down there...but, we braved the danger all in the name of a good ride.  

Here are some photos taken with my crackberry...

The grass, which is all dead now, was so tall that it reached above our heads, and was just lovely as it scratched us all up as we rode through...

The setting sun...

It was a good ride...

(wow...two posts in a row!)

Kings Hockey Game

My brother and I got two tickets to the Kings Hockey game last night at the Staples Center. The tickets belong to a friend of my Dad's who has season tickets and was unable to attend last nights game...score some for us!

The seats are amazing! Five rows back from the glass, right next to the Kings player tunnel that takes them to the locker room. We could "Hi-Five" the players as they went in and out! Hockey is a whole different sport when your that close to the players and the action! The action is supper intense and when they would check each other into the glass...look out! If you weren't paying attention, it would scare the heck out of you! Its a loud "bang" and the whole wall suddenly moves towards you as their face smooches up against the glass. There were also several fights...most of them at the other end of the arena, so we could see them to well...

It was awesome.

Oh, but heads up if you ever sit somewhere where there is open glass, as was the case for these seats...with a minute or so left in the 3rd period, a puck came flying off the ice and smacked a guy on his head, then bounced off him and nailed the guy behind him (who also wasn't paying attention), knocking his glasses off and cutting his forehead. Both of them had to be taken out of the area for medical attention, and the first guy the puck hit might need stitches because he was defiantly bleeding. It was intense.

Here are some photos I took with the CrackBerry...I forgot my little camera...bummer.

Here are all the extra sticks for the players...my brother asked if he could have one, but he was too late and the "stick manager" had already given out 2, and couldn't give out anymore...

Look out and to the left...

An FSN West Game report after the first period...

The players coming out of the tunnel...

Note the open glass straight through...Heads up!

It was an awesome game. They also had this number you could text messages into from your phone and they would display on the jumbo-tron at then end of each period, so my brother and I tried to text in "GO DUCKS!" (you know, since all the Kings fans HATE the ducks)...but we couldn't get the message to send...oh well...it probably would have started a riot anyway.

Kings won 4 to 2 over Vancouver.

Boat Races!

So my family and I went to Disneyland on Sunday to see all the Christmas decorations, and just to enjoy the holidays. The park was a little crowded, but for being the Christmas season, it was not bad at all.

We did the usual rides, Indian Jones and The Temple of Doom, The Haunted Mansion/Nightmare Before Christmas, Buzz Lightyear.

It was a cold day...maybe in the mid 50's all day, but my brother and I had the bright idea to ride Splash Mountain. In fact, there was no wait for the ride at all...and this is the ride that usually has a 45 minute wait all year long. Perhaps the cold weather scared everyone away...but not us! Well, we got in line and walked all the way to the loading docks where they asked for two riders. That was us, so they pulled us out of line and told us to go the lane number 1...yep...the front of the boat! Well my brother didn't want to sit in the very front, but neither did I, so I assured him that the people in the back will get the wettest, but I don't think he bought that...so we sat down and away we went. Did I mention how cold it was that day?

Anyway, long story short, we got soaked. I thought the ride was "Splash Mountain", not "Soak Mountain"...

Ah, and now to the title of the post...Boat Races...

So we decided that we wanted to go on "It's A Small World" since it was all decked out for the holidays, so we waited in line for maybe 25 minutes or so which I thought was supper fast for that ride. Well we got on, my bother and I again sitting in the front, and proceeded to enter the ride, got through maybe the first room of the ride when I noticed the boat was moving extremely slow...in fact...too slow. Pretty soon we were stopped dead in the water. Well we proceeded to drift along for a few moments as the electronic puppets continued to sing that oh so wonderful song! We were even going slow enough to fish out a FujiFilm digital camera from the water. Now, I'm not quite sure how you drop your camera on a ride that has a top speed of a half mile an hour...it's not like the owner of the camera got started from a large drop, or some crazy fast action...but perhaps they were frightened by the small electronic creatures singing...Well, the camera was a little rusted so it was obvious that it had been in there for a while, so I just gave it to the ride attendant when we got off...I told him we found it floating. (He didn't seem surprised that a heavy camera could float, but hey)

So by this point we are not moving anymore, and the ride operator had come over the loud speaker and told us to stay seated, the ride needed to be rebooted. (I have never heard of a water ride needing to be rebooted, have you?) So my bother and I decided we would rock the boat...you know...see if we could send anyone launching...it didn't work. So instead we grabbed on to the sides of the water track and pulled our boat forward, ramming the boat in front of us. Then we tried to push all of us forward...there were maybe 6 boats in front of us, but we weren't able to move us all out. So we backed our boat up, and rammed the boats in front of us again...not luck. (By "ramming" I mean we bumped into the boats at a whopping speed of 100 feet and hour...so no harm done) we had probably been sitting in the same spot for maybe 10 minutes or so and people were going anxious to get out. The music had stopped, but all the puppets were still singing and dancing like nothing had happened. Then the races broke out! Now the boat behind us was in a mad rush to back all the way out of the ride back to the future...er...the beginning, so we joined in, as did the boat in front of us. Man, that boat behind his pealed rubber and split! They were gone faster than we knew! So now it was a race to catch up with them...

Well we passed backwards in time through all the same 2 and a half rooms we had just gone forward in, meanwhile all the puppets kept on singing and dancing...

Half way through the race, and almost free, the ride was finished rebooting and we gradually started moving forward again. Here is where our plan back fired...we had backed up all the way to the beginning, and now had to ride the whole thing again! 30 minutes is way too long to spend on that ride...

He is a shot of the ride taken with my BlackBerry...

This is a stock photo...

Here is the Castle at night when it "snows" (Sorry...bad photos...its what to expect with a camera phone...)

All in all, it was a fun day at D-Land! (Wow...that was along post!)