There are some awesome parts of newspapering. Like constantly worrying whether your industry is going to go up in flames and whether you’ll have to go become a corporate PR flack to pay the bills. No offense to corporate PR flacks. Anyway, one of the best parts about the job of “newspaper reporter” or “journalist,” which is what I technically am, is getting out of the office and talking to RPs, or real people. And by real people I mean celebrities. Who wants to talk to real people anyway? They’re just as boring as I am.
But for real, I love getting out of the office and exploring. Vermont has no shortage of eccentrics and the vagaries of the state are legend. Vermont is also repleat with a bazillion things to do outside if you are so inclined to pull your sweet one off the couch every so often. Sometimes I am so inclined and I take advantage of the natural beauty of Vermont by visiting City Hall Park with some breadcrumbs and a can of pepper spray. I kid.
What I really like to do in the summer is hop on my mountain bicycle and try to stay upright while pedaling along the endless miles of singletrack in this area. My new favorite place to ride is Millstone Hill in Barre where Pierre Couture has overseen the construction of nearly 70 miles of mountain bike trails that lace through some of the most historic granite quarries in the world. If you don’t want to read any further (and frankly, why would you?), I’ll give you the gist right now: Go to Millstone Hill. Take your bike. Ride the trails. Here’s a picture of what you should wear:
P.S.- I’m bringing back the grimace. So HOT!
If you’re olde-fashioned and you want to read the actual paper newspaper, a story about the new trails at Millstone Hill will be in this Friday’s (July 4) Free Press.
The trails are outstanding and the history of the place is overwhelming. Granted, it’s in Barre and most Chittenden County-ers are loathe to travel to any place in Barre, but it’s well worth it.
My reporting experience began last Wednesday when I had the brazilliant idea to use a helmet cam to video our ride. Now, I can barely turn my computer on, so I’m not sure how I thought I was going to be capable of operating a camera mounted to my head. Art Bell, a local video production guru graciously allowed me to use his helmet cam and kindly offered me a 37-second tutorial on how to operate it.
“First you want to have two cameras going. One you get some sweeping shots of the scenery and the bikes. Don’t use the zoom. That’s the biggest mistake people make is using the zoom. The helmet cam will get the trails. You don’t need to worry about sound. You can just get some music to put in the background. Then cut some nice shots of the surroundings and then bam, hit the trails.” Um, ok Art. But what about like, um, turning the camera on?
The helmet cam had about 14,000 wires that went with it and somehow I managed to plug each one into the correct port to get the thing to work. I tested the helmet cam on my dog before I left and she and her idiot face showed up perfectly on the tape. We were ready to go.
Two friends, Bichael and Parah (the names have been changed to protect the innocent) agreed to ride with me, bless their hearts. They were mostly there to make sure I didn’t come back to Burlington in a body bag after I fell into one of the quarries. After we got all suited up and the helmet cam was strapped to my head with a piece of gaffer’s tape courtesy of our well-prepared photographer Glenn, Pierre gave us our map and we were off.
I fumbled with the hemlet cam’s remote starter gizmo as we began our adventure to the quarries. Who knows if it actually recorded anything. It was spitting rain, which made for a dicey start to the day. Our ultimate goal was to make it to the new trails designed by local trail builder Hans Jenny of the Fellowship of the Wheel. To get there, we rode the Lower and Upper Mainline trails to an intermediate trail called Locomotion. While on Locomotion, we passed three old quarries that have since filled in with water. I probably would have been able to enjoy the views more if I wasn’t so worried about crashing onto the jagged granite chunks that lined the trails.
After the Locomotion trail, we met up with photog Glenn for some scenic shots at the Rock of Ages quarry. Dear God, that quarry pit was deep. If I ever wanted to off myself, this is probably where I would do it. I nearly offed myself accidently by walking on the rain-slicked rock face in my sketchy bike shoes. This is how far I would have fallen:
From the Rock of Ages quarry, we hit up the new Fellowship Ring trail. I’m not sure, but we may have ridden it backwards. It’s definitely a directional trail and as I consult the map now, I’m thinking we might have gone the wrong way. Bichael, using the sodden tissue of a map, was guiding us to glory, but may have gotten it a bit wrong. But who am I to judge? I’m no navigatrix.
While on the Fellowship Ring trail, I had a few accidents that could have resulted in almost certain death. Thankfully, the helmet cam was off by that point (it was raining pretty hard and I didn’t want to damage the tens of thousands of dollars of video equipment stuffed in my CamelBak) so you won’t get to see just how many times I fell over. But I do have a little photo of my injury of the day:
If you look closely on the lower portion of my hamhock, you’ll see a bleeding wound. The things I do for work! On one of the many wet rock drops, my rear tire slipped and I came tumbling down the hill into Bichael and Parah (again, protecting the innocent). I cut my calf on the chainring, but worse than that, I snagged my favorite cycling socks. Is the Free Press going to pay for another pair? I doubt it.
If you’re still jonesing for some more riveting blow-by-blow of the outing, read Friday’s Free Press. Otherwise, see you on the trails. Or at the bottom of the quarries.
