But, I think I figured out what the problem is. I’m annoyed with the snow because I haven’t spent enough time in it! Aside from one ride on Saturday, my only riding has been in the form of commutes. So, the only time I’ve been out in the snow, it’s been an impediment to getting to my destination, rather than something I take the time to enjoy.

Riding in the winter is like riding up hills: you have to fully embrace it in order to enjoy it, and the more you do it, the more comfortable you become with it. Some unexpected things came up last weekend that prevented me from getting out and enjoying the snow much. Hopefully, I’ll have more time this weekend, and I can get out and ride in the snow, and relish the opportunity, rather than simply trudging through it. In the meantime, I’m trying to keep a positive attitude, and I might even try to squeeze in a night ride one of these days. The darkness is really more of an impediment to riding after work than the snow is.

We got the biggest snow of the year on Monday. Again, schools and many businesses were closed. As usual, I rode my bicycle to work. And I did have fun with it. On my way to work, the snow was so deep in places that my shoes were dipping down into the snow as I pedaled, and snow was shooting up into my brakes.

After work, I had icicles hanging from my saddle, and I had to dig my bike out.

But, that was nothing compared to what people who drove to campus had to deal with. Check out the cars on the side of the road — they had a lot of digging to do before they could get out. All that snow had fallen since the morning.

When I arrived back at home, I had to re-bury my bike in a mound of snow.

Rob could barely walk in the stuff. That’s a 70-pound dog, legs completely buried.

Every day when I get to work, the bike racks are more buried. I have to lift my bicycle onto a mount of snow over a foot deep to lock it to the rack.

Hopefully, this’ll let up soon. I love snow, but I’d say we have enough for now.

I did manage to get out for a little ride, but only about 14 miles … I was hoping to ride 30-40. I rode the Friendship Route, which includes a bit of gravel. Many of these scenes will likely look familiar to regular readers of my blog … only this time, they have several inches of snow. The roads were mostly clear-ish, but the gravel parts were quite snowy.

We got a few more inches of snow. This morning my commute was quite interesting; many schools and businesses were closed today. There were an inch or two of fresh snow on the roads, and more snow coming down hard. My cassette and rear derailleur got clogged with snow over the course of my ride to work.

However, I had an absolute blast.

The Beast handled the snow well, I like the feeling of snow on my face, the way it blankets everything … I really just enjoy riding in this stuff. By the time I arrived at work, I had a silly grin on my face.

My ride home was more or less the same, but more intense.  It was colder, there was more snow on the ground, it was snowing harder, and it was VERY windy. It was snowing sideways!

Wind blew the snow off roofs, as you can sort of see below.

View 2010-02-07 HNF snow biking in a larger map

My ride started on a paved road, and immediately I was loving the scenery, but for a little bit, I was riding on clear roads, and started second-guessing my choice to bring my mountain bike. But I figured that once I hit gravel, there would be some snow. It was hard to gauge what conditions would be like. We had probably four inches of snow on the ground, but in town and on paved roads, it was warm enough that the roads were clear.

But, the deeper into the woods I went, the snowier it got. The more snow, the more fun I had.

I passed the first of many trailheads for the Hickory Ridge trail system. Bikes are allowed on these trails, and I’ve ridden quite a few of them, but the snow had mud beneath it. No trails on this ride.

Not that I minded. The gravel roads were quiet and beautiful, and plenty challenging in their own right.

I reached a small creek with a waterfall, and then proceeded to climb a large hill. The road went back to being paved, and not as snowy, which made the climb a little easier. I then spent a few minutes on a state highway and some smaller paved roads before turning back into the national forest.

After some momentary confusion about which way to turn, I turned onto a very snowy road and re-entered the woods. I rode over a small log. There were some truck tire marks, but it was obvious only one or two vehicles had been here. I was sort of impressed that they were able to drive through at all, and grateful for their tire ruts, which were well-packed and made for relatively fast riding.  However, some spots were icy, and I had to watch out for those.

The ride became even more beautiful than before. I was in awe at the snowy landscape and the way the warm, angular light struck everything was quite stunning.

I rode on a relatively flat ridgetop for a while, and then the road turned steeply downward. I had ridden up this hill once before, and I sure was glad to be riding down it now.

I stopped halfway down the hill to explore a small pond.

The ruts were slick and icy and I discovered that the best technique for riding down this big hill was to ride in between the ruts, where there was soft virgin snow. This slowed me down, so I didn’t have to ride my brakes, and also offered better traction.

Looking back up … steeeep!

Once at the bottom of the hill, I turned onto a different road, where I forded a couple of creeks and started climbing. I filled up the memory card in my camera. I deleted a few photos and rode on. I took a few more photos after that, but not a lot.

I had quite a bit of climbing to do, but it was divided into a couple climbs, with a slight break in between. Overall, not too bad. Once at the top, it was flat for a while, and then I enjoyed a long descent. This was quite tricky as it was slippery, I just took my time and made it to the bottom of the hill just fine.

Once at the bottom of the hill, I hit paved roads for the last mile or so of my ride. It was still just lovely, and the light became even more dramatic, as the sun was nearly setting.

I rode back to my car, very satisfied with the ride. This was one of those rides where I didn’t expect much going into it, but in the end, I was blown away by how incredible it was. The gravel roads were the perfect place to ride, given the conditions. Some snow rides end up being so hard they’re frustrating; this was a challenging adventure, but it never felt like anything other than a LOT of fun.

One thing I’ve been thinking about a lot since this ride is that even though I’ve spent probably dozens of hours riding in Hoosier National Forest, I’ve just barely scratched the surface of what is there, even close to home (HNF reaches basically all the way south to Kentucky). There are many trails in the Hickory Ridge system I’ve never ridden, and lots of roads that are unexplored as well. I need to ride there more often.

Fortunately, it had been warm enough that the main roads had little to no snow on them. State Road 45 was clear completely. Mt. Gilead, a side road, had some snow, but it wasn’t too bad. Still, I was riding the Trucker, with slick tires, so I had to be extra careful.  Interestingly enough, the hills were the *easiest* part, as they had large amounts of sand and salt on them. The flat sections were largely untreated, and as such has some snow and ice.

In the first few shots, you can see the progression of the road conditions, going away from town.

Here you can see that I’m enjoying myself. It felt great to ride the Trucker after spending so much time commuting on The Beast.

More importantly, the scenery was tremendous. I’ve ridden through this area dozens of times before, but it’s never looked like this.

You can see how thick the sand is, on this steep, winding downhill.

I made my way over to Bethel Lane, another back road … and the road conditions were OK at first, but quickly deteriorated. Icy snow and snowy ice made for very little traction. I was impressed at how well my slick tires handled these conditions, especially at one point when I stopped and put a foot down, only to have it nearly slide right out from under me.

At one point, my rear tire suddenly slid sideways. I recovered without falling, but it was nerve-wracking. I just had to go very slowly for a few miles.

I stopped to take a break for a minute and realized icicles were accumulating on my fenders. I had to break the ice off the front fender, as it was starting to rub the tire.

I was worried about the hill that I would have to ride down to get to Lake Griffy. The road there was in slightly better shape than Bethel Lane had been, but not by a whole lot. Once I reached the bottom of the hill, the road was clear and I rode across the causeway. The lake was frozen and a lone fisherman was out on the ice.

The road up the hill on the other side of the lake, back toward town, was clear and easy riding. Well, easy except the fact that it’s a big hill.

Within a few minutes, I was back in town. It’s a bit jarring to turn the corner after riding past a lake and through a forest, and suddenly see one of the busiest roads in town. That’s one thing I love about Bloomington, though, you don’t have to go far to get to what is essentially the middle of nowhere.

From there, I rode home, basically following my commute route. Some kind soul had again plowed the bike path. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a vast improvement over what it’s like when left alone. Whoever is responsible for this: thank you!

All in all, a great ride. Just a bit over 18 miles, but it felt like more, given the conditions.

We got a couple inches of snow yesterday/last night. Conditions weren’t too bad this morning, except in a few places. The parking lot in our apartment complex and the bike path both had ice, with a layer of crunchy snow on top.

Some of the less-traveled roads had snow on them. The city decided to try a new snow-management technique: dropping lots of salt, instead of plowing. Needless to say, this didn’t work at all.

But, the roads that get more traffic were in pretty good shape. They were just wet, and slushy at times.

On Steve A’s recommendation, I’ve started waxing my bike when I clean it. He said, basically, that it would make it easier to clean the bike, and hopefully help prevent so much slush (among other things) from building up on the bike. For now, I’m using a spray-on wax, and it definitely does seem to help. Today I found that while it doesn’t prevent slush from building up on the down tube, it does make it not stick as well. On my way to work, once it reached a certain point, it actually fell off on its own.

By the time I got to work, more slush had built up on the downtube. This happens despite my low fenders. But, most of  it was easily removed by simply tapping it with my boot.

That didn’t help my drivetrain, unfortunately.

After work, I hopped on the bike to head home, and for a few minutes, all was well. But then after I stopped at a light, I tried to get going again and spun out. I thought maybe my chain had fallen off, or wasn’t quite in gear, but it seemed to be fine. I continued on and everything was fine again, until I stopped at a stop sign, and started pedaling again. I pedaled like mad, but the bike wouldn’t go anywhere. I looked down and the chain was intact, but I was pedaling freely forward, without turning the wheel. It felt just like pedaling backwards, but I was pedaling forwards!

This was a truly weird sensation, and occasionally I could get the gears to engage, but mostly, I was unable to move. I was about two blocks from a bike shop, so I walked over to see if they could do a short-term fix to at least get me home. No dice … and apparently the cassette on this bike is really old and weird and they can’t replace it, either. I had another wheel at home, that would require some adjustment and probably a new cassette, but I still had to get home.

So, the two miles home from that point were a combination of walking, coasting downhill, and trying to get the gears to catch. They did a few times, so I ended up walking probably a mile, and riding the rest. Naturally, parts were quite icy, which would have made for a great test of my studded tires, but I had to walk. Damn.

I made it home safely. I still need to put the other wheel on, and make some adjustments. Ugh. I’d just ride the Trucker tomorrow, but it’s very icy, and I really need the studded tires (they won’t fit on the Trucker).

I parked at Hesitation Point and pedaled out toward the campground, on the new trails. The Walnut Trail, an intermediate/advanced trail, had some footprints but no tire marks, and I was sliding around a lot on the four or so inches of powdery snow, but it wasn’t too bad. However, I skipped the really technical part, as it seemed like it would just be too treacherous. I figured the Limekiln Trail, which is generally easier, would be a better bet, but it was worse.

Several people had ridden there before I got there, and they had compacted the snow, making it awfully slippery. Even slight inclines were impossible to climb at times, because I just couldn’t get any traction. My rear wheel would spin out when I tried to climb.  That trail also has more of a sideslope than I realized; you don’t even notice in dry conditions, but with the snow, I kept sliding toward the ravine.

As you can imagine, this was not a lot of fun. I was expecting to have to go slow, but all this sliding around was really dangerous, and not fun at all. That, combined with the additional effort required to push through the snow, had me pretty frustrated. I still had fun, in parts of the ride, but overall it was one of those rare occasions where I did NOT enjoy being out on my bike.

I did, however, see a lot of really beautiful scenery … and I got some pretty good photos, as well. So, it wasn’t a total loss.

This was a drive and ride situation, I wasn’t sure how the roads would be, and this let me get to the area where I wanted to ride in time to actually do some riding there.

I parked the car on a paved section of road, but it immediately turned to gravel. The gravel parts had snow on them, compacted somewhat by cars, but fortunately not icy.

I reached a lake, and could see that some people had been out on its frozen surface, ice fishers and sledders, and some deer. I walked out a bit on the ice myself to check it out. Some holes had been made and you could see the ice was about four inches thick.

After testing the ice thickness, I went back and got my bike (visible in the photo below, by the shore). I wanted to ride on the ice a little.

I was headed across the lake, on the left side of the below photo. I considered trying to ride all the way across, but I wasn’t sure the ice was uniformly thick.

I got enough of a sense for riding on the ice to want to do more of it. It’s just something you have to be very cautious about. I stayed within the area where others had already been, and there were several holes where I could confirm that the ice was thick.

Making tracks on the lake

After that unique experience, I got back on the road. The route across the lake would’ve been a lot easier, but I just wasn’t sure about it.

After that, I had some more wonderful gravel riding.

I made it over to the area I noted above, directly across that part of the lake …

… and looked over at a ridge on the other side of the lake, which I would later climb up, and then ride down.

I rode on, and the scenery remained quite breathtaking.

I turned and rode on paved roads, briefly, which were relatively clear by comparison …

… before turning onto another gravel road. The sign said “No Outlet,” but that depends on your mode of travel, and your willingness to make your way through the woods on rough fire roads and horse trails. On my bicycle, and abundantly willing, I planned on riding through.

Around this time, my water bottles started to freeze. I had to bite down on the valve to crack the ice, and take frequent drinks to keep them from freezing shut.

The fire road/trail was just wonderful and, riding through the powdery snow was fairly easy, even if it was slick at times. Some places had footprints, but it was wide enough that I could make my own tracks off to the side. In addition to human footprints, I followed deer tracks literally for miles. Apparently, deer use trails, too! Later, I also encountered some ski tracks.

I stopped for another drink of water and noticed the sun was setting over a distant ridge.

At this point, I was almost finished. The trail spit me out onto a gravel road, in an odd rural neighborhood. I saw a very ramshackle house for sale,  with an RV parked near it.

I rode down the hill …

… and soon, I was back at my car. I have to say, this was the best ride I’ve done in some time. It was cold, and challenging, but it was also incredibly beautiful. Riding in the snow is an experience you can’t get any other way.