The week in review.

Clif Bar sent some new flavor samples.  Mojos are awesome with a glass of cold milk.

Some new products are getting wrung out.  The 2012 Camelbak Charge LR and the White Brothers Loop 29er fork.

The HDR on the iPhone 4 still continues to impress me.  Morning sky giving way to the day.

The end of the day.

The Red Mtn Overlook & Camelbak Charge LR

Last Week's Roll Call in pics

Last week was more of the same in the middle of a mild So Cal summer.  Mid week local loops, a road ride (gasp!) Taco Friday, and one good ride on the weekend with multiple snake/lizard options and lots o' climbing.

Yes, I do have a road bike.  An old, steel custom frame that I just recently upgraded to 8spd.  Cutting edge stuff here.

Along the road ride, this stood out as a humble marker of time's passing.  Reduced for the web here, the iPhone4 takes some surprisingly sharp pics with nice color and contrast.

Taco Friday ride, Ed the Tall actually can still ride a bike after a lot of personal challenges lately.  Riding a bike is cathartic. 

Tacos with Dean the Machine and Ed the Tall.  Everyone gets a name.

Been testing a couple of Lezyne packs lately.  Excellent organization and well worth a look if you are hydration pack shopping.

Snake number 1.  A friendly country cousin in the form of a 2.5' Gopher Snake.  We also saw two Horned Toads but they were too fast for the lens.

Got trail food?  Clif Bar rocks.  Also, been playing with the HDR camera setting on the iPhone4.  Like this pic, it can really sort out the contrasty images.

Sat's ride was a 12 mile climb to the high point of the Angeles NF Backcountry.  The views were just alright ;).

Eric the Red.  Viking, mtn biker, all around good egg.

Hard to see here (in the blue circle) was the surly relative of the Gopher Snake we passed earlier.  He...or she...slithered off to look for a fight with a smaller adversary.  How can anyone NOT know the difference between a 'good' snake and a 'bad' snake?  This bad boy looked all business.

Out on the Epic again.  Crazy good all day bike unless it is really rough out there. 

New Hydration Pack love.

Been diggin' this one so far.  The new Charge 450 from Camelbak.  This may just become my fav pack.  I have not loaded it up too heavily yet, but it is darn light for its size, comfy, and versatile.

And it is RED!  Very nice.  

Hydration pack love set against the Autumn leaves.  Kinda romantic, eh?  Will the relationship last?  Ahhhh....we shall see.

I will know more once I get it really stuffed and packed-up, but I sure am digging the new Camelbak Antidote reservoir.  That is a nice improvement over the old one and the new Antidote will retrofit older packs.

More to come as time and trail miles add up.

Happiness is a full bladder.

Or, 'Hydration Packs I have known and loved, or just liked a little bit'.

Most everyone has heard of the concept of the 'Quiver', that being a selection of various shapes, sizes, weights, lengths, etc, of whatever it is that helps you do what it is you do.  So, a long board and a short board for surfing; a powder or a down hill ski; an AM bike and a hardtail SS, etc.  The quiver is the idea of having more than one kind of arrow at the ready.

And so it is with hydration packs.   I have a passel of them right now where I used to have one, then two...a regular one and a bigger one.  Now I have a small one, a medium one, a few large ones, a red one, a green one, etc.  So I thought I would talk a bit on what I like about a few of them and encourage you to build a quiver as well.

Go fast, go light:  The Baby Bear pack

The Camelbak XLP

When I first saw this pack I thought, "holy smokes, I can't put anything in this".  I am a consummate over-packer of stuff.  So I saw this as limited use.  But over the year, this has changed.  It may be the perfect summer-after-work-ride pack and I think it would be killer as a race day pack if the race is supported or not too long.  First, it is darn light.  The stretchy pouch can hold a windbreaker OR arm warmers/leg warmers but not much else.  That keeps it into the warmer climate zone for me as it is hard to carry shed layers like jackets, etc.  The tool section is perfect for the basics like a CO2, multi tool, etc and maybe some snacks.  I slip my longish pump into the bladder compartment, a 70OZ version, and I have stuffed extra food or gloves, etc, into there as well.  I took off the waist strap as the pack is so short that it was like having a 'ribcage strap'.  It is easy to remove the strap...velcro.  All summer long, this has been the pack of choice for a 2 hour and under (supplemented with a bottle for 2 hrs) rides from home.  Complaints?  Well, the little loop of string that the bladder clips onto is stupidly hard to get out of the clip on the bladder, especially with gloves on.  That is about it.


Ready for most anything, daily driver:  Momma Bear packs

The Camelbak M.U.L.E. NV.

Perhaps the quintessential all-rounder, the M.U.L.E. was my first decent hydration pack years ago and is still around today, having been refined over the years.  It has enough carrying capacity to bump it into a semi-epic pack for 3-4 hours rides unsupported and holds 100oz of water.  Camebak does a great job of compartmentalizing their packs.  If you can't find a pocket/pouch or stuff spot for something on the M.U.L.E., you may not need it...or...you need a Poppa Bear pack.

JeffJ (AKA Circus Bear on a Bike) is rocking this pack and he is still happy with it.

Honorable Mention:

Osprey Raptor 10.

Osprey has a very impressive line of packs and they are very well made.  I love the nice touches like the zipper pulls that can easily be used with gloves, the killer Hydraform reservoir set-up, the Lid Lock helmet holder and the sleek overall feel to the pack when worn.  I think some of the organization of tools, etc, needs to be re-thought a bit along with the silly hip belt pouches that allow things to fall out too easily.  But, overall the line of Raptors from the Six (liter) to the Eighteen (liter) offer a wide choice of sizes and all of them are really good packs.  Osprey is making some real inroads into MTB hydration packs and I bet with some refinement they will only get better.


Deuter Race EXP Air:

I have had this pack for quite a while and it has not been used lately with all the new stuff to play with, but it has a LOT to like about it.  The mesh back panel and the support wings at the hips are excellent.  It is expandable with a zipper in the main compartment, the bladder is set up with a nifty clip that opens fully to allow for ice cube entry or cleaning, and it has a stow-a-way rain cover and helmet holder built-in.  The main compartment is kinda one big bag, so a bit more organization would be nice, still and all, I really like this pack and it is killer on hot days with the mesh back panel and a full load.

Bigger Days:  Goin' all Poppa Bear on ya'.

Osprey Raptor 18:

An expanded version of the Raptor 10, I have used this pack on some bigger days and it is super.  My absolute fav part is the Shove-It feature that allows for clothing, cameras, food, small animals, interesting fossil samples...whatever...to be stuffed in it and then compressed with the straps.  Love it.  Perfect pack for days that require lots of clothing changes.  When you are wearing all the clothing, the pack is pretty tidy, but begin to strip jackets, jerseys, etc, and the Raptor 18 just swallows it all up.  Add in the typical Osprey stuff like the Hydraform 100 oz Reservoir, the high quality of the construction, and the tool and smaller item organization and you have a winner.   What would I add?  A rain fly option built in, but at least I can get one separately.


Honorable mention:  Camelbak H.A.W.G. NV.

If the M.U.L.E. NV is the Prince of pocket storage, the HAWG is the King, the Bwana, the Big Mah-Mu.  It is a pack rat's delight.  the NV back panel carries the load with comfort, the adjustable and pivoting shoulder straps, the killer side pockets that swallow up cameras, GPS, etc...the list goes on.  It is a big pack that has a couple of things against it...it is heavy to begin with. Lots 'o material here.  The main compartment gets 'intruded into' if all the other compartments are stuffed full, so it is not as big in there as you might think.  Still, if you like the MULE and want more of everything in a pack, you will love the HAWG.

Reconnecting.

Every so often I like to revisit old trails and locations that I had not seen in years.  This was the case for Saturday's ride #1.  I did not want to stuff 20 bucks worth of gas in the family truckster to get across town, so I looked into the map-in-my-head and came up with a route that I figured would get me about 4 hours of riding.

I had to be back by mid day for a potential bit of bike testing business, so I got out a bit later than I had intended, but still I was on the road by 08:00 AM.  I grabbed the SS Jabberwocky just to up the difficulty a bit.  Gears are sooo easy (sure) and besides that, I just like to ride the SS every chance I get.

The Chinese calendar has the timeline broken down into odd things (to this Westerner's reckoning) such as the 'Year of the Rat", etc.  OK, fine.  In that case, I will call 2010 the Year of the Bee.  We always get hives placed in various canyons and such in the local area from spring to early summer, but this year was intense.  Many rides were like some hideous video game where you are trying to avoid hundreds of flying targets in your path.  It did not always work out so well.

So, on the first section of dirt, it was the same scenario.  Bee city and the keepers thereof.  I gotta get me one of those suits, maybe with an 8 panel chamois in it.

Bee keepers..a blessing and a curse.  I heart honey.

A bit farther along the road I played hide and seek with a coyote.  It always amazes me how agile animals are.  He (or she) was bounding through the brush like it was nothing.  Then it hit the road and would run a bit, stop and look.  I would pant and pedal a bit closer and then the pattern would repeat.  Neat animals, unless you are a chicken or house cat.

Peek-A-Boo.

At the top of the first 8 miles of climbing, I took a Snickers break before it melted.  I was melting too.  Kinda warm today as the June gloom seems to be giving way to July roaster.  I was also wearing the Bonty shoes I have been testing and a new pack...yes, another one...an Osprey Manta 25.  It was bigger than I needed for the day, but the mesh panel kept it cool on my pack.  Nice pack and ready for hiking and scrambling as well.  More on that later on The Cyclist Site.

Comfy shoes and Swiftwick socks.

Osprey Manta 25 hydration pack.

It must have been 15 years or more since I was on top of this Townsend Peak.  When I was doing a couple of Ride Guide books for mountain biking, we hit every trail on the map and some that were not on ANY map.  This trail showed it taking off of the peak and heading west toward the town of Piru and the lake there.  Then we drove a truck up a good road and parked at the hitching rail circled in the pic.  The trail takes off just behind the rail and heads down and to the right towards the far right arrow, ending up at the middle arrow far below.  The lake is behind the hills here.  I could still see the trail and I remember it was a good ride, passing through cattle grazing areas and lots of wildflowers.  I also remember pushing 50% of the way back up.  We never came back and I don't think this one made the guide books either.

Like many USFS roads, this one has been falling into ruin.  At one point, there was a wash out that prevented any vehicle from getting through and now the road is brushed in and narrow.  Actually that is good for me...more fun...but bad for anyone else who might want to get a horse trailer or other vehicle in there.

Spring clings.

We drove a truck through here?

The goal achieved.

I celebrated my peak bagging by laying under a Yerba Santa, getting  my head out of the sun, and listened to the frenzied buzzing of myriad buzzy things...files, bees...dunno...but they were the insect equivalent of superbikes and sounded like Suzuki Hayabusas on the pipe.  No wonder insects have short lives.  I was much less stressed then they were and cloud watched a bit before heading out.  

One gear pedaled, one bike pushed, one peak bagged and reconnected with.  See ya' in another fifteen.

Osprey Raptor packs

Lately I have been hydrating myself from some of these packs...

So far I have been enjoying the latest from the Hydraulic-Raptor series of packs from Osprey.  The Raptor 6 (on the right) is the baby bear and the Raptor 18 (on the left) is the poppa bear.  I think there are a few niggling things that needs to be addressed, but my fav so far is the Raptor 18.

The pack making experience of Osprey shines thru and I cant wait to get the 18 out on a big ride.  Last nights 2 hour ride showed it to be stable and well fitting.  The shove-it feature can swallow a ton of clothing.  Full test reports to come.