Mountain Biking at Beaver Dam Reservoir

This is to document the first three mountain bike trips Jonathan and I took on the trails at Beaver Dam Reservoir.

Saturday, 15 September

After Jonathan asked about riding his mountain bike on trails, we decided to (finally) ride the trails at Beaver Dam Reservoir.  It was awesome and we'll definitely be back for future rides throughout the year.  First trip we started at the southern part of the reservoir and parked at the National Parks & Recreation Center.  We decided to bike up to the Hope Baptist Church where we planned to take a break before heading back (approximately 2.5 miles).  First stop was the big rock as you hit the trails heading down towards the water.

I sold my mountain bike a few years ago when I bought a road bike (for riding to work on once in a while) so now I use Michelle's bike.  It's a bit small for me but gets the job done considering I hardly every use it.

The dam at the reservoir is currently under construction so the water level is lower than normal.  The rock Jonathan is on would normally be about 7 - 10 feet under water.

Nature's couch :)

Made it to the parking lot at Hope Baptist Church.  Time for some water, snacks and a breather before turning around.

Sunday 11 November

Our next trip started at Hope Baptist Church and we planned to head north to the dam on a new set of trails (approximately 2.7 miles).  This leg was more challenging with water crossings and plenty of mud along the way.  Super fun, my only regret is not having a better battery on my phone to take additional pics or video.  We had clean bikes to get started.  It was a beautiful day but in the high 30s and low 40s.

Our first water crossing.  We had to walk the bikes across since there were too many large rocks to get past.

We rode behind Edgar Tillett park and Jonathan wanted a picture of the ball fields behind us.

Little guy tried to ride over the downed tree and got the front wheel over just fine....  lol

We had to lift our bikes over several downed trees and he did a good job of managing his bike.  He was acting a little silly when his bike fell over this tree.

We couldn't go over this downed tree, we had to find an alternate path around it.  Nonetheless, it was a great photo opportunity that he was interested in.

Alas....we reached our destination with the dam in the background.  Only problem is, the water, snacks and chocolate are in my backpack back at the car.  :/

We got a little muddy but it was great fun.  We also learned a lesson....wear boots next time!

I guess the bikes looked dirtier in person.  This was supposed to be evidence of our offroad mudding.

Sunday, 23 December 2018 with Michael & Mike Dwyer

My buddy Mike recently bought a mountain bike so it was time to take him and his son, Michael, on a ride to Beaver Dam with us.  We did the southern portion of the reservoir so some of these pics are at the same locations.  One thing we didn't get a picture of was the "unicorn poop".  Not sure what it was but it looked like colored chalk that was dropped in a puddle along the way.  It actually looked like brightly colored poop (red, yellow, blue, pink) so I matter of factly told the boys it was unicorn poop.  Pretty sure they bought it.

On the way back, Jonathan was peddling through a longer stretch of mud and lost the front end.  Kinda hard to tell from this pic but he had mud on his hands, forearms and face. Took it like a champ.  We walked to the stream nearby to rinse off and clean up before hoping back on the bikes and peddling on.

Back at the big rock on our way out.

A group picture on the big rock before calling it quits.  I setup Mike's phone on a tree branch with the timer set and it worked pretty well.  A little out of focus but the only way to get all 4 of us in the same pic.

The boys at the end of our trip.  They had a great time and will be ready to attack the northern portion of the trail together in the near future.