Steve's Mountain Bike Page
Turlock, California

New Melones (GH) Recreation Area, CA

Night Ride, March 7, 2004

Several months ago Jim asked me to do a night ride. However, since I can only ride once a week I wanted to wait for an appropriate weekend night. The TROGS do a monthly full moon ride and since it happened to fall on a weekend, Jim and I decided to join them. However, I'd been nursing a cold for nearly 10 days and I only finally decided to go because, with the time change next month, this would be the last night ride opportunity for quite some time. Jim and I got there early so we could do about an hour of riding to warm-up. The day had been fairly warm but as the sun began to set it cooled down a bit and I was a little cold until we got moving for a while.

About seven TROGS showed up right on time at 7 pm and we headed out the Frontier Trail. Although I'd ridden New Melones (GH) at least 100 times, this was an entirely new experience, to say the least. Even on my best day I couldn't keep up with these guys, but my cold and the new night riding experience caused me to go quite a bit slower than the group. Regardless, it was a blast! They occasionally waited for me, we regrouped and then we headed out into the darkness. Unfortunately, the heat rising from my sick and overtaxed body, coupled with increased night humidity meant that every time we stopped my glasses totally fogged up. Every time we restarted I had to ride blind for 20-30 seconds waiting for the wind to clear up my glasses. So the group really got ahead of me fairly quickly. I occasionally kept up on the flatter sections, but I was not confident enough to zoom down the hills like I normally do out there. I probably went at least half my usual speed. 

At one point they stopped for a mechanical breakdown so I headed out the Buckbrush Loop on my own, knowing they would catch me. My light had a very narrow beam and when I was alone, which was most of the time, I could not see very well. If I didn't know New Melones (GH) so well I probably would have been moving at a snails pace. While on the Buckbrush Loop I couldn't stop thinking of Mountain Lions, which have occasionally been spotted out there. Somehow I pulled the cord off my light and it went out, forcing me to plod along in the dark for a bit until I met up with the group. Jim fixed the light but he noted that it didn't have much time left on the battery. About that time the full moon came out so he and I went back to the top of the Tower Climb via the pavement, using just moon light.

We regrouped at the top of the Tower Climb and then headed down the switchbacks. I had only mastered going down the switchbacks in the light about six weeks ago so the group left me pretty quickly and I just went at my own pace. However,  I made 7 of the 8 switchbacks. The beam from my light was extremely narrow so I found it a bit unnerving on some of the narrow sections of the downhill. By then the full moon provided a good bit of light so it was easy to see the steep drop-offs to the side. At the bottom of the Tower Climb we turned off our lights and finished off the Carson Creek Trail using just moonlight. It was pretty cool! We then turned our lights on and zoomed around the short Peninsula Loop and then went back to the parking lot. 

With the full moon, and the sounds of frogs, crickets and some loud bird (or who knows what) in the background, the ride was a blast! When I buy my own light I'll look for one with a much broader beam. I only got a few minutes of people in front of me but that's most of what I put in the video. The last 30 seconds of the video will give you an idea of how the trail looked to me most of the time.

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