It is worth noting, in a lifetime of adventures and misadventures, I have achieved a new low point in the outdoors. Danny pointed out that he did gallantly offer to shuttle me to the top of one of the more popular mountain bike rides outside of Crested Butte, Doctor Park, and I declined. It seemed too short, only 10 miles descent, and then he was going to make me climb in blistering hot sun. In retrospect, that would have been preferable. I instead found an extension that started 24 miles away, met up with the “Five Star” Doctor Park trail, and ended in our campground. So Danny kindly drove me to the start, which was past a remote reservoir and down a dirt road where a small encampment of RVs and dirt bike trailers was based.
This should have been my first clue that this ride might not be enjoyable. There were no other cyclists around and all you could hear were motorists tearing around on the trails. The trail description on the app Mountain Bike Project (MTB Project with whom I have a bone to pick) said “A rowdy and ever-changing trail” and the trail received 3.6 Stars. That should have been my second clue. In food reviews, 3.6 stars would be day old sushi, or voluminous greasy Chinese food, or thousands of ratings at a local chain where a good percentage said the waiter spit in their food or they found a hair or a stray finger. But the boys were headed to a Mountain Man Rendezvous and I figured this would be more enjoyable, even if it was rated “Black”, though I’d just told my girlfriend the week before I solidly preferred Blue Trails. In reality, the grading is highly variable, as I would soon find out.
I biked across the first bridge and started up the hill. The route description said there would be three “brutal” climbs. Given the state of this trail, which in this section was shared with motorcycles, the description should have said “unbikable” climbs. It was only a few hundred yards from the bridge that I spun out in the deep sand of the rutted out trail. Being positively naive having never biked on a trail with dirt bikes, I figured it would get better, so I started walking. The hill steepened and the ruts got deeper. As I climbed Hike-a-Bike style, many of the ruts came up to my shoulders and my stiff biking shoes slipped and slid through the deep sand and rolling rocks. Because the sides were steep, it was almost impossible to turn my pedals as they kept getting caught. The highly damaged trail was basically a small avalanche gully with all manner of debris congregating at the apex of the chute, where I was supposed to ride. Every mile or so a cordial dirt biker would come up the trail, I would climb with my bike out of the gully to get out of the way, and the motorist would zip past me or stop to comment on my good effort. Apparently they rarely saw mountain bikers on this trail, though signs everywhere said dirt bikes, hikers and cyclists were allowed. As it turned out, I only saw two other cyclists all day, and they appeared lost and grumpy and would likely soon be divorcing each other.
About five miles in I bonked. This is the colloquial way to say “I ran out of available calories and could not go further”. I had been drinking water with electrolytes and had gobbled two pancakes at the campsite and a protein drink so I thought I’d be set for a while, but I apparently underestimated the exertion required to push a bike uphill in a 3 foot deep sandbox with rolling boulders in it. I started to wonder at this point if hateful reviewers had boosted the 3.6 star rating for a giggle and why MTB project doesn’t allow negative star ratings. I vowed to make my first review ever when back in range.
Had Danny not dropped me off at the remote trailhead, I would have biked back at this point and tried to get cellphone coverage and call him, or hitch a ride back to our campsite down valley. I knew the chances were low of encountering a predator, but I didn’t fancy getting lured into one of the trailers at the trailhead, so I decided to go up. I had prudently brought three bottles of water and a backpack full of high calorie snacks, but the altitude was also probably getting to me. Though we’d slept for two nights at almost 9,000 feet, I was climbing to 11,500 ft, which I discovered on our two 7-day bike packing trips 200 miles from Durango to Moab then Telluride to Moab over multiple mountain passes, can make you quite woozy. Our first bike packing day, in fact, started at 10,000 feet on the Colorado Trail at Molas Pass outside of Durango, and we underestimated calories required, and only brought several fig bars, since we would reach food at the hut some 25 miles away. Half way through the ride, Danny lay down on the side of the trail and said he just needed a little sleep. Since it was 85 degrees, I figured he wasn’t suffering from hypothermia, which is another reason people lay down at random Intervals while recreating in the wilderness. I started pushing our bikes uphill after he had a rest and several hours later we pulled into the first cabin, while dodging lighting strikes followed by heavy rain. We brought plenty of food for all bike packing days that followed.
I felt it prudent, since traveling alone, that I bring some cash, since a friend and I had forgotten our cards one ride over Rollins Pass and some concerned citizens donated to our pity fund so we could purchase one bowl of soup, one side of fries, and one hot chocolate when we arrived in Winter Park. I also for this ride brought a warm jacket, My ID, and a note that said “In emergency, call Danny Inman”. We are camped at North Bank Campground, site 9.” I added “My name is Erin Newton” should someone find me incapacitated, but I’m not sure why that would be relevant. Finally, I was wearing my Garmin watch that purportedly sends an emergency signal to my emergency contacts and my location, if an accident is detected. This would probably not save me if I encountered the mysterious situation a local fit 50 year old woman who set out for a ride last May encountered and never returned and whose smiling beautiful face is plastered in all the windows of the businesses within two hundred miles of her starting point. It would also not save me from the risk of being stalked on my own backyard ride, where a woman was recently assaulted in broad daylight. But if the Steamboat man who broke his leg skiing on Rabbit Ears Pass, who was only a mile from the well traveled main trail, had been wearing a tracking device, and his colleagues had noticed before a week went by that he had not shown up to work, he might have been tracked using an emergency signal and not had to eat granola bars for 7 days (this was the second time he’s been marooned while hiking so he was well stocked). And finally, I had my well charged phone with my maps downloaded and my location tracked. It would be hard to make a wrong turn if I was paying attention.
I continued to push my bike uphill, blisters developing on my toes and heels, as the trail conditions worsened. I suspected the extensive damage was due to high volume trail use during Covid quarantining, but it was also clear motorcycles tear the ever living shit out of the backcountry. Often the trail split into six trails or the entire hillside was a maze of dust and dead vegetation. At one point, the steep hillside was so eroded, unstable and the path unclear, I considered throwing my bike down and sliding down on my ass, until I remembered I had no back up shorts and no underwear on so that might not end well.
I was reminded of all the self powered activities my parents introduced me to in wilderness areas as a child including backpacking and back country skiing, and I could see very clearly now why they chose trails with wilderness designations that did not allow motorized vehicles. Danny and I were both raised with the ethic, “a little suffering builds character” but In my 20s I moved to the mountain ski town Steamboat for a few years and enjoyed getting towed by friends on snowmobiles into pristine remote aspen glades to get fresh ski tracks. It didn’t take long sucking fumes behind a “brat brat” to get a massive headache. I prefer now to work for my turns by climbing up using skins and I love the quiet meditative centering process of crunching into fresh snow and putting one foot in front of the other. Plus, you see wildlife. I hadn’t seen a single bird or squirrel in ten miles of travel.
To keep myself distracted from the misery of slipping uphill, I tried to appreciate the sexy manliness of all the padded dirt biking armor. It seemed entirely possible that any one of these considerate well mannered men wearing colorful padded armor and helmets with full visors, might be soon flexing their muscles back at the foundry, doing a little welding or race car assembly. Unfortunately after getting dusted and breathing gasoline fumes for a mile after each one passed, the armor lost its appeal.
Though I had done a mountain ride only a week before with several thousand feet of gain and felt fine, it was not so on this day. I drank a bottle and a half in the first six miles, ate a granola bar, a Stinger waffle, and a bag of chock blocks, more than I ate or drank on the entire ride the week before, and it was probably only around 75 degrees F on this day. Though I’d biked longer, faster, harder, hotter and higher on other rides, I started to feel funny, my right arm went numb, and I wondered if I was having a mini-stroke. My heart hurt, but I figured maybe it was heartburn. I tried to keep walking but I started dry heaving. I took a rest and then tried to walk again, but the numbness came back. I figured it might be from awkwardly pushing my bike so I switched sides but I got nauseated again. After resting a little longer I decided it was just the altitude, and if it was a mini-stroke, I couldn’t do much about it now.
Altitude is a funny thing. While I get light headed and spacey and sometimes get headaches like most people, I’ve never had significant problems. They say women tend to do a little better at altitude. In college when I was studying a volcano in Mexico that also happened to be the highest in North America at 19,000 feet, I was determined to climb it. I was worried about HAPE (swelling of the lungs) and HACE (swelling of the brain) which can be deadly and can only be remedied by going lower, but often people are too incapacitated to get down. I ate garlic, took aspirin and slept at the highest hut, as I’d heard those approaches help. And as I reached the summit the next day, counting my slow steps in groups of twenty, then ten forwards and backwards in Spanish, I didn’t get a headache. I surmised I had acclimatized well, and went on to lead partners up Mt Blanc (15k ft), Denali (20k ft) and Aconcagua (22k ft). In my internal deliberation, I reminded myself acclimatization only lasts for two weeks. Regardless, I would soon be descending some 5,000 feet and I was banking on the Five Star rating of the descent trail to indicate it wouldn’t suck like this one.
As I topped out on the ridge, I remembered tips from my Lady Magazines I ordered in lieu of using air miles of late. One said “Fast Carbs are sometimes ok when doing strenuous activity”. So I dug out some pretzels and shoved them in my mouth. They were quickly stuck to the roof of my mouth and as I started gagging, I remembered thinking myself generous for feeding my pet rat Clover a spoonful of peanut butter. She loved it so much, she took several large bites, and then started choking. I had to pry open her tiny jaws, dig out the peanut butter and give her mouth to mouth (not really the last part). On a spacey tangent, I remembered the Shel Silverstein poem about a King whose mouth was glued shut by eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and I thought it would be apt if my epitaph read, “Choked on dry pretzels when she had a perfectly well hydrated Bobo bar in her pack. There’s no accounting for Natural Selection”.
As I grabbed some water, and started coughing, I wondered if maybe I had contracted Covid during my solo Hike-a-Bike and then I (a little too slowly) reasoned the more likely scenario was I was coughing up pretzels and dirt from the dusty walk/ride. I was rationing my water now so I sipped just enough to get them down. On our last bike ride Julian, not understanding the scarcity of our carried water, had dumped the whole bottle on his head to cool off. We’d all biked back with dry mouths. I wasn’t about to do that again.
Those of you who have enjoyed the pleasure or pain of adventuring with me, know I ritualistically select my break spots. If it’s hot, I’ll only stop in the shade. If it’s cold, I’ll only stop in the sun. If it’s windy, I’ll only stop when a sheltered place presents itself. And if it’s ugly, I won’t stop until it improves. The first ten miles were decidedly ugly (and not to be all judgy judgy, but between beetle kill and forest fires, climate change has done a number on our wilderness areas). Some 70 percent of the trees were dead with layers of downed trees everywhere, and somehow there were still few views. Most bark-beetle-killed trees across the trail had been chainsawed, but there were still plenty blocking the path that had to be navigated. In my weakened reasoning state, I thought Fourty is a good age to start learning to Bunny Hop trees and get more air on the bumps and ruts created by constant dirt bike braking. Like most average Colorado bikers, I am capable of descending fast over medium sized rocks and roots and small trees. But as the third spiky dead branch sticking out into the unmaintained trail whipped me in the face, I remembered a story from another Lady Magazine (which is supposed to serve as light reading in the midst of pandemic and political chaos) in which a mother and news reporter was blinded for a year when her three year old poked her in the eye and detached her cornea. While debating with myself whether I’d prefer to be blinded by my three year old or a beetle-killed tree branch on a crappy trail, I decided I may be past my prime for bunny hopping over large logs. Plus Danny said I wasn’t allowed to hurt myself while biking alone.
Having listened to meditations on compassion, mindfulness, self compassion, positive self talk, empathy, coping with anxiety, and the four pillars of Buddhism on the five hour drive to Crested Butte, I was practicing acknowledging my discomforts without judgement and detaching from my urge to be comfortable. After about 14 miles of wallowing in small dirt avalanche gullies, I felt the Grumpies sneaking in. I tried my usual positive self talk: “You got this Momma. You’ve suffered through way worse than this, like raising two ornery three year olds!” Or “You never appreciate what you have until it’s gone. Isn’t it a beautiful day to be out using this new hip?” But then my right glute started spasming, as if on cue, and I rolled my ankle that was still sore from spraining it badly three months ago. This painful ankle rolling persisted for the next five miles.
It seemed I was teetering sideways more than going uphill at this point, and instead of gently leaning my only mode of reliable long distance transport on a tree, I would throw it into a bush and slither down another tree for a rest every few miles. As I started to reason it certainly wouldn’t get too cold tonight and maybe I could just lie there till morning, I tried some new motivational techniques. I remembered having a morning at the climbing crag when I could have written the children’s book on suffering. I had complained about it being Too Cold, then Too Hot, then Too Sharp, then Too Overhanging, then Too Bright, and Too Sweaty, and Too Birdy, because this bird kept flying in and out of this key pocket hold I was trying to use. Just then a young woman wearing a cutesy tank top and jeans roped up, “walked” the warm up we hung all over, and proceeded to methodically climb every hard route on the wall. As she lowered down, I noticed what her tank top said in Braided Rope letters held by a saucy cowgirl: “Don’t be a little Bi$ch”. My resolve to make it to our campground before nightfall renewed, I leaped back on my bike with new vigor and proceeded to traverse the high alpine hillside.
Just as I was beginning to enjoy myself and recognize the scenery was improving, A great whooshing sound came in front of me, and as I tried to brake, I realized in slow motion, I was likely being eaten by a mountain lion. Danny had just mentioned most people don’t know they’re being attacked until it’s too late. I thought it might be possible, due to the adrenaline and my heart racing, that I hadn’t noticed it had already ripped out my juggular. I quickly realized after coming to a stop, it was just a mountain lion sized grouse who flew at my face, and rightly so. He was just quietly enjoying his sunny afternoon when I came tearing through. Mountain bikes used to be, after all, not allowed on any trails. They were thought to damage hiking trails, disturb wildlife, and be an unnatural way to travel through wilderness. How the early naturalists would roll in their graves now seeing electric bikes and motorcycles all over the trails.
Nearly out of water, I started to imagine myself a Tour du France rider who had lost the pack. I could just hear the announcers saying, “Oh look how she’s suffering. Yes, it’s all over now. She’s certainly lost her form. I don’t even know if she’s going to finish this stage vertically oriented!” Six hours later, after mostly pushing my bike up 3,500 feet, my watch recorded that I was traveling at only 2.5 miles per hour for 16 miles and my heart rate averaged 150 beats per minute, which is quite high. I topped out on a mountain with surround views and looked forward to meeting up soon with an actual mountain bike trail! Surely I was only a couple hours at this point from the campground and I might soon even be able to continuously ride my bike for a spell!
As the sun got low, I started to notice the mesmerizing glassiness of the perfectly round red berries whose name I couldn’t recall, the dazzling evenness of the stripes on cicadas’ legs, and the sun shining through butterfly wings perched lightly on purple flowers that were either always shaped like delicate little gourds, or had decided, I thought prematurely, to close up shop for the evening. As I weaved my way to the intersection with the “Five Star” descent I noted a sign indicating there was a bonus side loop. I checked my map and it said it was graded Blue (my favorite grade!) so I continued on it across the the tops of green hillsides, the tall grasses glistening at their tips with the last light of day. The Ace of Base song “It’s a Wonderful Life” came on and I started crying, maybe from the altitude, or the magnificent mountain surround views, or probably because I realized the “bonus” loop was slightly longer. When a second fat grouse flew up, I casually pulled over and watched him awkwardly fly away. I descended the valley and ascended the final “brutal” climb walking the whole way. Several dudes came tearing through the trees and seeing me in his direct sights, turned course in mid air at the last minute. I leaped further out of the way as one yelled “Raaaad! You’re rockin it!” I realized then that my internal self dialog had changed about ten miles back to my favorite well loved kiwi saying, “For Fu@$’s sake!” It turns out it works well for all occasions.
I checked my watch gps at the trail intersection and it had stopped recording my mileage. I’m guessing it tried to send an emergency message to my contact when I had the mountain-lion-like grouse encounter. There were other screeching halts that might have inspired my watch to report an emergency. I started hallucinating that every tree root was a snake, and I also thought I saw another grouse and then a bear, which both turned out to be whimsical stumps. The only other times I remember hallucinating on past outings, were during the Fifty Mile team hike with the Dartmouth Outing Club when I started seeing rescue cars and little men sitting on stumps everywhere in the dark of night. The other time was when we got caught in a storm on Mount Cook and it took us two days to descend to the nearest hut. On the second day in a whiteout, I kept hallucinating the hut in the distance through the snow and when it finally appeared I almost walked right past it.
I also suspected a second mountain lion was stalking me when I heard some large branches cracking, and then decided upon closer inspection, it was just another dead tree taking aim. It should be noted here I don’t normally concern myself with snakes, which I rarely see at altitude, or bears, who normally keep to themselves, or mountain lions, which I put in the category with lightening, and falling dead trees: if it gets you, it was probably your time.
I weaved through the rocks down the final “Black” graded descent (which was really mostly Blue). When I had only five miles left, I took my last sip of water, having been careful each time to screw the cap on tight. I learned that painful lesson our first day on Denali when we we dropped onto the Kahiltna Glacier to base camp by plane. We were in such a hurry to fill our gas bottles and make it to the next camp by nightfall, we screwed a lid on wonky and the gas leaked all over our food and clothes. We spent the next nine days burping gas fumes.
Descending the final drop, I didn’t take offense when the normally friendly Gray Jays chose to switch to further branches. It seemed certainly possible I could run into any of the quaking aspen trees at this point. As I started to smell the campfires in the campground and was just coming round the rock band above our campsite, I hit a giant rock sideways and my seat rickoshayed into my Lady Parts. I fell head first down a rock serving as a guardrail of sorts for the edge of the trail that descended steeply into a ravine. I caught myself, pushed my bike off me, and crawled back onto the trail. I decided to mostly walk the final mile since I could no longer sit on my seat.
After reuniting with my troupe happy to see I made it back to the campsite and even happier they wouldn’t have to execute a rescue, I took a shower with our new pump operated camp shower, downed several burritos and gallons of water, and tried to sleep to no avail because my third bottle of fluid I carried was actually caffeinated iced tea for an emergency pick me up. I watched the moon and stars rise over our open air tent and at 1:30 am got up to pee. I looked up at the steep cliffy descent trail and saw a lone cyclist using two headlights confidently descending quickly around the hairpin rocky switchbacks where only hours earlier I’d seen a guy do an end-over. It just goes to show you should be careful whose opinions you trust. There’s a lot of people out there happily cray cray.
I decided I must have learned something through all this suffering:
1. Type Two fun: is only fun After the fact if you actually have the skills to do the activity in the first place. Otherwise it will always remain a sufferfest. 2. Mountain bikes and dirt bikes should never overlap. 3. Hope for the best. Plan for the worst. 4. Not all “Black” graded trails are the same. Some are mostly Blue and some are unrideable. It’s hard to know which is which from people’s bogus reviews. 5. A positive attitude can really pull you through some crappy days. 6. It’s important to realize practicing resilience is focusing on survival. 7. Mindfulness, or recognizing how we are feeling and choosing how to react, can change the course of every day. 8. Our capacity for self compassion is limited only by our choice to practice it. 9. Our capacity for suffering is definitely limited by our intake of simple carbs, and or mini-strokes (I did not think about those BTW until I read a womens health magazine. I think I’ll discontinue that one). 10. I prefer rock climbing or, should the occasion arise again, Mountain Man Rendezvous 11. I’m pretty sure you can crawl faster than 2.5 miles per hour, and If you have to, do that. Just keep moving. 12. Never round up a Three Star rating. In fact, it’s generally prudent to round down because there are a lot of people out there with questionable taste. 13. Write “I love you” on your rescue note, in case it’s the last time you get to say it. As for me, I think I may be getting too old for the mantra “It doesn’t have to be fun to be fun.” It should, at some point, have a quality of fun.
This little write up is dedicated to Sasha Underwood who is now on her third day of crushing 50 miles a day of the Colorado Trail solo, which passes through terrain like this a bit further East and I bet after she gets her Derailer fixed and finishes the 486 mile trail, she won’t even cry once. But if she does, that’s ok. And it’s ok if she Hikes her Bike more than the expected 100 miles.