this trip was about Beckie doing the marathon, so I didn’t get bummed not riding Gooseberry and Hurricane. I was just content after arriving hella late to   get out before daybreak and ride the Zen trail, close to everything on the south side of St. George.   A guy i met in Sedona at Spring Fling 2 yrs ago responded to my post on MTBR and showed me around.

We parked above the eroded bottom of a bluff, and i nearly went ass over elbows riding the steep down to the base of the Zen trail’s mesa, not awake or focused on the rising light.

a mile approach of mild ledgey doubletrack led us onto the sandstone mesa for some mostly-intermediate techy goodness

classic Utah views in all directions

fun in the hoodoos

Tae looking southward

rolling swoopy descents through the slickrock with some small drops and jumps mixed in

Zen took just a bit over an hour, so i next went off the adjacent bluff onto the Bearclaw Poppy trail

the drop in was fun, but i only got one chance to spot and hit the coolest lines

then it was several miles out-and-back of rolling spidering trails along the toes of the mesa that Zen traversed.   There were some really fun moments, but the big bike and the spiderweb of trails led to a lot of indirect wandering where i was not always able to use gravity to my advantage.   It was kinda like Desert Classic, but with steeper dropins and no hikers.

i should have headed back to the hotel, but it was still cool out and i wanted another loop on Zen, and to push myself into some fitness on the big bike. i moved pretty steadily without many pics, until i nearly ran this guy over on the one steep rocky slot on the trail. I took the left line.

4 hrs and 23 miles made hauling the Heckler 3 states and 400 miles worthwhile.