We climbed the Ridge Trail (stopping briefly to talk to the guy who built the connector extension, and is now working on eliminating the last little bit of road riding on the Ridge Trail -- he said there are contact names, etc. on a tree at the beginning of the Ridge Trail), and then ripping the upper Family Fun Center feeder. I successfully rode up the log jump at the bottom, taking it straight on. We then hooked up with the new trail that parallels the lower Intestine. From here we hopped up to the Candy Trails, which were in excellent shape, and climbed them all the way to the top Candy Trail take off.

Here we headed into new terrain for me. Russ led up a squiggly singletrack (the second on the right if you are coming down the top Candy entrance from the feeder above the Intestine). This led us through some very nice rolling terrain around to another set of logging roads, which we followed briefly before diving back into the woods again -- and coming out on the upper Loop Rd. (from below).

We followed this around to the Little Big Trail, which we looped once. I was in the lead, and when I went off the first big log drop a little too far forward. As I came down I pitched off to the right side and sort of "straight legged" or "stiff-armed" the side hill on the landing so that I pitched back to the left, still on the bike, with one foot in the clip and the other flying wide like a buckaroo cowboy. "Nice recovery" was Russ's sardonic comment. Do or die.

At this point, I realized that my back shock had lost all air, and so I locked out the rear and rode the rest of the way on a hardtail.

After talking to a group of three riders who seemed pretty lost (Russ steered them back to the road the most direct way, which was toward the right), we went straight ahead at the crossroads into another new-to-me trail called Kaiser.

According to Russ, Kaiser is the longest trail on the mountain. It was pretty muddy too, but we followed it all the way around until we came back to the four way intersection, and then retraced our steps back up Oly. I was able to ride up a pretty steep pitch toward the end (Russ said "I'm impressed"), and also successfully survived a couple of all wheel skids in the moosh.

I'd have to say I generally enjoyed the hardtail experience, except for a couple situations. One in particular is an example of the difference bewteen hardtail and dual suspension technique -- I was in a series of root ledge hop downs coming back on Oly, and I was travelling at a pretty good clip to keep moving in the mud. Normally, the rear suspension absorbs a lot of the force of this maneuver, but when I tried it with the rear end locked out, I found myself hurled right off the trail. One second I was on the trail, and the next I was out in the rough trying to fight my way back.

The City of Bellingham twinkled scenically in the distance from the clearcut that divides the upper and lower Ridge Trails, but we didn't stop for a pic because we knew that the lower Ridge Trail would be very dark in the woods.

And so we hurtled on. At one point, as we were flying down the rooty fall-aways on the lower Ridge Trail, Russ said, "I'm riding right over stuff I usually steer around because I can't see it."

Approximately 2400 verts.

Vert Quest chronicles "The Man Known As Mongo's" pursuit of the World Record for climbing on a mountain bike, 404,000 vertical feet, or the vertical equivalent of 13 sea-level-to-summit ascents of Mt. Everest during a 12 month period. Mongo's mountain bike climbing tricks are distilled in Mongo's Over-the-top Guide to Climbing.