"Mia, where are you ?"

so there i was in las vegas, waiting for mia's flight, it was supposed to come in from houston at 9pm, however, mia was late getting to the airport and missed the plane. now i didnt know this yet so here i am hanging out on the strip trying not to get too drunk and half ass looking for hookers, hey, its vegas... i lived in vegas back in the 90's, i left just as the excess was beginning, the mirage was the bad ass casino at the time, the mgm and treasure island were going up , i didnt go back for 12 years. in 07 i drove out to california to meet jeff in carlsbad, he got us a condo to kick back in for a few days, vegas had changed... when i left there were about 800,000 people in the valley, when i returned there were over 2,000,000. i couldnt believe how far out they had built, there are houses freakin every where, from mountain to mountian and one end of the valley to the other, vegas was kind of a nasty place before, now its completely vial.
when i got to the airport mia's sister called me, i had a message to go to the courtesy phone, thats when i found out for sure that mia missed her flight and wouldnt be there for another hour or so, hhmm, back to half ass looking for hookers, and lots of starbucks...

thats a picture of mia on her new road bike, thats some where out side of houston, hard to believe there is a nice quiet place like that close to such a huge place, there are something like 6,000,000 people living in the houston area. i may have to find out for myself what houston is like as i cant find work and there is work in houston, yes i may be going to texas for a minute.

anyway, mia finally made it to las vegas and we got some food quick like then hit the freeway and screamed north on I-15...

not even half of those high rise buildings existed 15 years ago, and they are still building that crazy city center project, i will try to find a pic of it and post it, has anyone seen that bridge they are building at hoover damn ? i'll try to find pics of that beast also, no idea how they will keep base jumpers of that thing...

my friend mia, thats when she rode the ms150 this year. mia is one of my two best friends in this world, we started riding in 2001 but have been friends since 1989. we were at the moab fat tire fest in 2001 and she was run over by some stupid fuck in a toyota truck, she really hasnt mountain biked since then, and when she moved to houston she gave up riding all together, well she recently was bitten again and promptly went out and bought a new trek madone, wait a go girl...

"Jen, Jordan, nicer parts of vegas, and Mia missed her wings"

so i hadnt even been home from moab but two days when jordan called and told me he was coming back to utah to ride at gooseberry and brian head, solo, well shit i needed to go get mia from the airport, her flight came in on that saturday night, so i decided to call jen and see if she would show us the "cowboy trails". every thing worked to a letter, we all met up at the trail head, it was too cool to see jordan that soon, i was sure i wouldnt see any of the cali boys for a while, and it had been about 6 months since i had seen jen and jay,( i know you all dont know jay and jen but i have to say its weird that they are getting devorced, ive always known them as a couple) when she was at "little creek mesa and broke her arm.... so jordan drove from carlsbad, i drove from st george, and jen came from the east side and this is where we met. if you are on I-15 and you get off on charleston then go west you cant miss the trails. just keep going out to the red rock state park area and when you pass the entrance to the park its another 1/2 mile on the left, you cant miss that big horseback sign..

thats jen, i met her and jay in moab 2003 for the halloween festival, thats the same trip i broke my arms on. shes a great chick, always been one of my favorite people on the planet and it was soo good to see her. i feel horrible about the divorce and jay is a great guy, some times it just happens as we all know, i hope they both stay in touch with me...

the trails were cool, the dirt sucked, but again i am so spoiled by the soil in my native land, we rode with a friend of jay and jens, but i cant remember his name, so many trails and so many poeple and i have gotten so far behind in the posts thats what happens, i will find out and make that right, i have a feeling that i will see him again.

anyway we went to the top of the main trail and branched off to a ridge that over looked the red rock area, it was fun, it will better when i go back and spend some time, we were a little pinched, jen had to get some sleep before work and jordan was eager to continue north to get to st george and ride "barrel roll". i on the other hand would spend an agonizing 12 hours in shit city waiting for mia to arrive. it wouldnt have been so bad if the penguins wouldnt have gotten the shit kicked out of them in game 4, and if mia wouldnt have missed her first flight out of houston, as i was stuck at the airport for a really long time waitng for the next jet from texas, i was half drunk and half looking for hookers most of the time, fucking vegas...

this is jens sick ass new ride, a 29er turner celtic green with full pink chris king, you go girl, when the hell are you going to get that skinny ass north and ride with me ? you know the turner wants it bad baby !!!

im so jealous you butt, i want a nice new shinny rig with pretty chris king pieces. that fuckin green is so you jen, do you remember how drunk we got that night in fruita ? wooh, you guys even out drank "Hans Ray" for gods sake, that was a cool trip, cant wait to take you to the rainbow rim ....

"Bow to the burgh, pittsburgh penguins, stanley cup champions!! SORRY KATE..."

i know i wrote early on that i wouldnt be blogging about much other than bikes, bike trips, bike news, bike porn if i ever get it sophie, and pretty much bikess bikes bikes, well its time for a much other.... thats "maxime talbot" holding the 2009 "stanley cup ", i have two real passions in the sports world, which is the world i live in and if you know me very well at all you know i am addicted to "ESPN", anyway, my two things, bikes and HOCKEY ! max scored two goals in game seven of the finals and the "PENS" won the cup on detroit ice, ive been a hockey fan for 20 years or more and my team has always been the "pittsburgh penguins", and how cool is is that a talbot plays for the pens and wins the final game ? while i was with the french girls i found out that the talbot name is popular in france and quebec, i thought it was english but shows what i know...

the pens won back to back cups in the 90's so it was a stretch between titles, there have been some tough seasons, as of late though those tough seasons have payed off well, a number of top draft picks including two #1's ( in fluery and crosby) have transformed this talented group of youngsters, combined with a few savey veterans into a potential dynasty !!!

it broke my heart to watch detroit skate the cup around the ice in pittsburgh last year after winning in 6 games, as it did countless numbers of pens fans, what retribution to return the favour this year, who knows we may be doing this again next year... hey hossa, do you feel like an idiot or what ?

hockey is such a great sport, no holds bared aggressive brutality, please NHL never take that away, if you dont like the fighting and the true nature of the sport, just dont be a fan, leave, dont try to change it , just leave it alone...

thats "mulkin" winning the mvp trophy for the whole playoffs i believe, or maybe its just the finals, i cant remember, hes one of the best players in the league and hes 21 years old, crosby is 22, and fluery is 24, man things look good for us "PENS" fans for the next minute or two, fuck yeah, GO PENS !!!!

p.s. kate send me some pics and i will blog you girl, i met kate on the moab trip, shes a redwings fan, we mixed it up at woodys tavern, shes cool, i had fun...

"Arches national park, take two"

this is my favorite view of delicate, you have to work your way around the bowl and then up to the other side, its crazy, theres this huge drainage that would just be too fucking cool to see during a rain storm...

jordan, he really likes to take his clothes off, wouldnt surprise me to find out he has taken a job as a strip dancer some day..

i have a tattoo of delicate arch on my neck, moab means more to me than i can really tell you all, its where part of my soul stays while i go other places, i must return from time to time to visit myself and it was way over due...

kj kickin it on the wall, damn i miss those guys, i cant wait for brian head !!

that was the end, the only end my friends, cant wait till the next moab trip. the zaun and i rode for two more days but i have no pics of it, then zaun left and i missed them all. mountain bikes have taken me to great places and introduced me to great people but no greater place than moab and no greater people than these guys, may the bike gods bless them all !!!!

"Last day, arches, a good bye, and back to the trails"

the guys decided that they wanted to go into the national park on their way out of town, it was a good way to end this trip, this is the area called "park avenue" i love to take newbys into the park its just mind boggling..

this is the first time you can see the arch after hiking the trail to the site, its not a bad hike but it sure would be a cool mountain bike ride...

you dont realize how big delicate is until you walk over to it and then you see...

this pic shows the real size, i think its something like 90 feet high and about that much across...

i like this pic, its an arch through an arch...

"Down the rim, porcupine that is"

theres the zaun coming down the section that i broke my arms on in 2003, yep broke both arms at the same time, and that was with about 7 miles to go to get to the river.
see those boulders on the right near the top ? ok, on the right of that see the little way through ? theres sand right there and i was following some guy through there and he washed out in the sand, i took a line into the boulders to avoid hitting him well i slammed the boulders and snapped both of my radius bones plus a couple in my left wrist. it was a real drag trying to wipe my ass..

i like this pic, we are almost down at this point and the gnar gnar single track is fast approaching..

this was without a doubt my favorite day, we had a real blast on this 6 hour ride, this was also the last ride with the cali boys as they would be heading home in the morning..

almost to the river, i like this section a lot, super flowy and a bunch of jumps to hit, zaun says that he climbed this the last time he was in town, i think thats a great idea and i will doing it next time..

ah the river, its about a 5 mile ride back to town from here, i love these guys, its my favorite crew to ride with now, and i just got the word, they will be headed up to ride brian head next month, yes, virgin rim and bunker creek, hopefully the zaun will be able to join us..

""Day 4, arrival of the zaun,and the porcupine rim, part 1"

the zaun had arrived about 10 pm the night before, today we were going to do the whole rim loop, we parked at city market and the journey began, i love riding with no hands, it feels like im flying. it was good to see the zaun, i had seen him in salt lake just a couple of weeks ago but hey, its the zaun, my favorite riding and camping bud through out the years..

at the first switchback before the ranger booth kj told us they had been scouting this little ridge line, thats zaun descending it in both pics..

up up up up , i think its about 2500 feet of gain to get to the jeep trail that takes you to the rim, and its about 12 miles from town..

thats the zaun lagging behind, i like this part of the road, as you go through that gap at the top you come out and see the la sals, beautiful fuckin mountains. its not too longer from here, i think the next time i go to moab i will give serious thought to riding up all the way to burro pass at 11,000 feet and descending the whole enchilada.

this was the up part of the porcupine rim trail that day....

"Slickrock pics"

day three after riding soveriegn brent aiden and the other guys wanted to go back to slickrock.

these are some of the pictures they took while out there..

i love this sequence of kj and chris coming off of mushroom rock..

they had a blast, i needed a little break because the "zaun" would arrive tonight and i would have another two days to go with him after the cali boys left, and i wanted to go to the bar and watch hockey, im a penguins fan you see..

"David Letterman is calling "

well as promised the stupid human tricks ala jordan, funny shit man. he would suck the air out of the bottles and slide them all the way down his neck and chest to his tits..

you can see the red lines crossing on his skin, ten minutes before this he had his shorts off and the soldier flying in the wind, damnit we should have took some pictures of that but we were too busy busting guts...

"PORTAL"

i almost forgot the pics of the portal trail, i couldnt remember where the entrance was so it took us a minute to find it, but when we made it to the signs i remembered every thing..
if you look ahead of me in this picture you can see where the trail begins, ive been on some pretty hairy trails in my day and this one rates at the top, for those of you who have been you know, those of you who havent, well, get ready to walk a bit. dont let that discourage you though, every one should see this view, every one should feel like they are going to die every once in a while, and you will never believe there is a trail there if you dont see it for yourself..

just inches from falling as much as 400 feet in places, it was a hair raiser riding this at times, fuckin chris almost took a wrong step, i turned around for this pic..

the infamous sign, its actually 200 feet to the first cliff, theres a good chance if you fall you will roll over that edge and plummet another 100 to 200 feet further to the river floor, ouch !!!

we were in the switch backs when we spied this dude, its an honest to god rock crawler, i just bet when night comes this guy crawls around, can you see the eyes ? how 'bout the legs ? to put him in perspective he was about the same size as a short school bus...

this picture tells it all, do you see the trail ? come on its right there, see it ? okay, i know if i didnt know that we came through there i wouldnt be able to point it out either. at the top were the cliff comes down and there is that little v then the boulder, see it ? now were the bushes run along the the upper edge, see it ? so the trail comes through the v and along the top of the bushes, yeah i know, go see it some time its pretty cool !!

"Day three, north of town"

day three we headed out to "soveriegn trail" i had rode this a long ass time ago, but damn, i swear this was closer to the la sals, oh well we started out and it was a lot like being in friuta to me, which those of us that know thats a good thing, it had a good mix of rough spots and flowy single track, theres even some good descending in a couple of places. the whole crew started out on this one but a number of them turned back because there was some mechanical stuff and brent fell pretty good at one point..

we came to this one spot called "copper ridge" and it looked like this big flat piece of slick rock up to a ridge with some small hoodoos on top, well we decided to check it out. there was nothing flat about it, chris and i took a way different line than anyone else and we ended up traversing and scaling these small canyons that you couldnt see from the actual trail, it was tough going at times, i almost fell into that hole that you can see me riding above..

you have to look close and then you can see jordan on his bike and then if you look at the top there is a hiker climbing the rocks, this was a cool section, a few switch backs through the ledges and the boulders and on to some more cool downs..

a little piece of one of the smaller climbs, some people dont care for this trail but hey, its mountain biking whats to complain about, yeah its exposed and a bit choppy at times but soveriegn is a good one in my book, its a great end of the trip trail that you hit on the way out of town or maybe camp out there the last night or something..

like i said we split up on this ride also, but the funny thing was that those of us that continued on found a connector trail that got us back to the cars before the guys that turned around, we were all on our second beer when the others showed, and jordan had already performed his stupid human tricks, those pics on the next post...