Gnomenclature

The sun, playing a golden reveille over the pines, announced to camp that another day was not going to wait for them to recover. Inside haphazardly set tents the weary eyelids of soldiers cracked open, their fatigued minds replaying a litany of triumphs and tragedies from the previous day. Outside, the remnants of yesterday’s battle lay strewn across the sand choked grass. In places embers still burned. Several hulking metal carcasses lay in ruin, their insides empty as a string of broken promises…….

...Ok, so that was overly dramatic again. No, it wasn’t exactly a Civil War battle scene. The parts of "soldiers" were played by a ragtag band of mountain bike festivalers and technically speaking the embers were from a festive roaring bonfire…



and I guess the metal carcasses were actually just kegs. Hey, they were empty (as broken promises) though.



We went out three separate times on Day 2. Some of the following gnomeyness was borrowed from this treasure trove of elfin goodness.

'Nuther map in case your following along.




The first time out we rode up North Face, along Cliffhanger and Switchback and back down Hermosa's swoopy descent. We cut it pretty short because some people in our group were still feeling the first night afterfest effect.



We found the infamous Plumber's Crack on Toad Road, riding it up the slope this time around. We would reverse the direction on Sunday with interesting results for Yours Truly.



Is that Corey hiding behind a tree, or perhaps a gnome?







5.8 miles. 1055 feet of climbing.

In the early afternoon, we hit the skills loop for a couple of college tries. I liked the stunts because I'm really terrible at skinnies and these were a little wider and sturdy. Even though there was only one truly anorexic stunt, they were all still challenging.





More stunt pics from Lucy's Loop here

Instead of the Alley Cat race, Nick Corey and I opted to head off for trails furthest from camp, Goat Dance, et al. We knew a trail with that kind of name would feature some painful climbing...and it did. We took Snodgrass and Prime Cut out there, nice flowy lowland trails, perfect for warming up.





Aw, a fern gully, there must be gnomes in there somewhere.



Top a ' the Goat, Ma!





11.78 miles, 1488 feet of climbing.

We again hem and hawed about a night ride, but who would want to miss the Mini Cycle Death Race? This clip was from an early race, it went down (or up?) hill from there. Either way, this is a family blog and what happens at Gnomefest, stays at Gnomefest (kinda, sorta).



Our Very Own, Melissa, tried her hand (and tutu) at the race. She was the only contestant that sat on the bike the whole way.



This pictures sums it up pretty well. The Flickr caption is Caveman v. Zebraman. The names of the racers were colorful, the heckling/cheering (?) was hilarious. It was quite the spectacle.



Starting early and rollin' on into the evening...handlebar rides for many of the ladies....play on Playah.



Beer potluck; I couldn't resist having a Hamm's (the beer refreshing, the beer refreshing...Hamm's) .



Coming next: Happy Trails to us on the final morning.