The 3rd Annual Rancho Relaxo! Byron and I rode up Friday, got caught in traffic, picked up Kathi, got caught in more traffic, finally arrived, Kevin and Gary showed, ate spaghetti and stinky cheese, drank beer, agreed to get up early and avoid the storms.

We met Ray at the trailhead at 9am, hoping to get in a window of dry, or at least relative dry, before a storm that was supposed to rage all day.

Up Schultz in the rain, up Weatherford in the rain, waiting at the top of Weatherford in the rain.

Note that Alex is wearing a garbage bag. Vacation home in Williams but he couldn’t remember his 5$ slicker.

At this point, people’s faith in my route was wavering. While it was really more due to the storm, there was an equal amount of whining about an hour of climbing. Down Ricochet and all the negativity disappeared. DUH!

Going up Secret, past the log roll with the giant gap, I saw this awesome obstacle at the top of a short hike-a-bike. It was ungettable going up, but descending it made for a nice hit.

and yes I rode off the trail on purpose, to cut short the HAB.

The rain let up finally at the top of Supermoto and we played the whole way down, enjoying a sweet run out on the connector trails back to Schultz.

We got off the trail in just the nick of time, as 10 minutes on the drive back to Alex’s in Williams, the storm started in earnest. Up til now, we had had misting and some rain but nothing really miserable. This downpour lasted, on and off all night long. It did make pre-washing the bikes easier, however.

So trapped inside, we did what we do at Al’s Tours – drank ourselves retarted.

The next day we got going slowly, and then a bunch went out for breakfast, so we did not get on the trail til noon. I was displeased. Hammered up Schultz, up Little Gnarly in less than 15 min it always seemed longer, then Jedi.

Jedi was slick in some spots and a few of the steep chutes were dicey but I managed to keep it together. One “easy” section with a huge off camber exposure i center-punched a rock and scared the bejesus out of myself. but rallied for this photo woohoo!

We left about 2:30, but then got caught in a 15 mile backup north of Black Canyon City. unreal, the accident happened at 12 and we got there at 4 and still lost 1.5 hrs holy shit.