Greyton weekend!

Wow!

What a weekend! On Thursday morning we packed the car for a long weekend in Greyton and oh boy! Did we give it a good go.

With no TV to distract us, we could get a few hours riding in every day and in between we would follow the ABSA Cape Epic feeds on Twitter and the epic website for what must have been the most exciting Epic since inception of the race. Well done to every one that competed and finished, I enjoyed the drama up front and also enjoyed following friends and fellow Tygerberg Mountain Bike Club members via the website.

A quick recognizance ride on Thursday gave us a good perspective on the weekend's riding, so on Saturday we started off with the Green route (with my wife) and proceeded onto the Red route. The climbs were brutal and the views breathtaking. We took a breather at the top and took the exhilarating single track down into the valley. The trail is cut quite narrow ensuring that you never quite get to top speed. This keeps you honest and probably ensures that the trails are not ripped up too quickly either.

Down in the valley a series of fun singletrack sections keeps you entertained all the way back to the tar road heading to Greyton. After less than 100 meters of tar you are on the gravel and jeeptrack roads again. We had a close call just after the old bridge across the Sonderend River with a farmers fence that was erected across the trail with absolutely no markings on it. Fortunately Werner shouted a warning and I managed to stop in time without "clothes lining" myself. On one of our following rides we marked the section with Duct Tape to warn other unsuspecting riders.

The section West of Genadendal would be familiar to Greyton Tour riders. The trail cuts out most of the boring dirt road sections and takes you through a series of jeep and single track sections all the while snaking up.

Eventually we turned towards Voorstekraal and Genandendal and stopped for a Coke at a corner store in Genadendal. It felt like we were really exploring as the town was buzzing with its usual weekday activity while we were out riding. Some more fun sections took us back towards Greyton and we cruised through town back to the cottage we rented. Werner whipped my butt on the ups, the downs and the straights, so I guess that I'll have to step up the training a bit to be able to keep up.

On Saturday we explored the Blue alternative after some early morning rain. The back section followed the trail used on the Greyton Tour first day on the eastern side of the tar road and also cut out some of the bigger climbs through the rest of the western side of the trails.

Sunday we rode the blue again before heading home. We explored what looked like an alternative to the jeep-track and I ended up over the bars on a rocky descent. The first fall on the new bike, so after a bit of a giggle about it we found our way back to the recognized trail.

Thursday we enquired about trail fees and where to get bike boards only to learn that the bike boards were not quite ready and our weekend riding would be for free. As nice as this was, it was evident that the trails are in need of some TLC, and the only way to do that would be from fees generated from trail users. Hopefully the local community can get the admin sorted out so that we can pay to use the trails and ultimately see the trails being looked after to ensure that we can keep on using the trails.

We are already thinking of our next outing to Greyton and hopefully we can get to ride these trails again before we leave for Canada in June.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M2dOVG8Z2XE&feature=youtu.be