Master Chung used to say, "You are not really living until you are nearly dying."
Master Chung was right about so many things.
OK, so Blown Gasket knows a girl, who knows a guy.
A guy named Karlos. Who rides...
I have no idea how much Karlos rides. A lot. Enough so that one of his back yard training rides would cause most people to run screaming from the name alone.
The Paisley St. Francis Wagon Trail 60 Mile Death Loop.
And we are invited! Yes!
Distance junkies. Our kind of people. And not just any distance junkies, either. Mountain bike distance junkies. The worst!
Or the best! Depends. Does your brain light up at the mere thought of a "60 mile Death Loop"? If it does, you've already got the right stuff.
24 riders are gathered at Chuck Lennon on this February Sunday. We shake hands with Karlos and exchange first names with a few others while waiting for one last rider to pull in. That's it. There is no sign-in sheet, no registration, no medals, no bling, no tee shirts, no fee, and no anxiety about start time.
That's Karlos, standing center.
(Look up Singletrack Samurai.)
It's an honor!
"So, if you don't die, do you get your money back?" someone asks.
"Full refund," laughs Karlos.
It's my favorite sort of start. Mid morning. Leisurely. Blue sky. Green woods. Quiet roll out.
25 riders long, the line snakes around the easy sections of Chuck Lennon singletrack.
Then we come to the dreaded (for me) Red Panther loop. Popeye is waiting up for me at the drop in. "Just do it!" he growls, knowing I won't unless I am forced.
And I don't. I am off the bike at the first sketchy drop-in bridge, and letting the others swoop by. Good for them! But I am not quite willing to die before even getting to the Death Loop.
It's a relief when we cross the railroad tracks and hook to the south for the first leg. Finally! Death Loop time!
Having no Garmin, I had spent some time on Saturday checking out the online version of the loop. Just in case I am off the back. (Not an idle concern, considering the company.)
I even made a few notes on good old fashioned paper. They are stashed secretly in a Ziploc and tucked into my Bento box. Popeye has agreed to hang with me, but my pace is often so easy for him, he can sometimes get away from me without even noticing.
Crib sheet.
It's a 2 pager.
Turns out the crib sheet is never once needed. Karlos waits up for everyone at the crucial turns. Popeye has the Garmin. But it doesn't matter. The GPS in my head is humming along in full sundial mode. At least keeping track of our heading is cake, even if the trail isn't.
Well, it is and it isn't. The navigation part is easy, anyway. Head south - road turns to bike path, to singletrack, to double track, and back onto road. Turn west. Cross the Route 44 bridge over the St John's River. Then road. Then dirt road bending to the north. And singletrack again.
Except for Red Panther, the first 20 miles to the start of the actual Paisley-St Francis Wagon Trail really is a piece of cake.
Karlos makes sure to wait up for every last rider.
Watching for stragglers.
Popeye taking pictures of some of the Melbourne guys over his shoulder.
Mark (in red) and Blown Gasket.
First Blood - always much admired.
One of the wait stops in Ocala National Forest.
But this is Florida. You can't make a cake without breaking a sweat. Especially if the recipe includes sugar sand.
The east end of the St Francis Wagon Trail was once a bustling port on a bend of the St Johns River. In the 1800's, citrus was brought by wagon and loaded onto steamships for northern market. Long abandoned, the land was bought by the government in 1940 for the Ocala National Forest. To see it now, you'd never know a thriving port town had ever existed.
Once a bustling port?
Hard to believe now.
OK, so on to the wagon trail. It's easy enough.
Until it isn't.
The sun is still shining. The sky is still blue. But the straight and shady double track suddenly turns into hill after hill of hub-sucking sand.
I am not sure what the fast guys up front are doing to get through it, but back here in my neck of the woods, even the fat-tire guys are off and pushing.
I suspect every one of us is thinking the same thing. How long is this god-awful stretch of sand? A mile or two? Or five? There is no way to tell from this point.
Well, we wanted to be Death Loopers. It is time to do or die.
There are others alongside me, also pushing. At first there is quite a bit of chatty commiseration. But after awhile my personal world shrinks down to the bike, the sand, and one foot in front of the other.
I push on and on. I am soaked with sweat but relentless, not about to let the slogging get to me. I stare downward, hoping fruitlessly for a firm foothold, if only for a step or two.
At the crest of each hill, I am tricked into thinking I might be able to ride down. But I am toppled by the sugary downhill almost as often as the up.
Somewhere along the way, my hellish grind is tempered by a vision of the original Death Loopers.
I picture sweating oxen and cursing men. Whistling whips. Wagons without the benefit of fat tires, sinking deep into the sugary sand.
Suddenly, I appreciate the ease of my life and the choice I have made today - to be here on this trail, ankle deep in sand, and leaving tracks where I have never been before.
It is not over soon, but it is over eventually. I am so absorbed with pushing I don't even get a photo of the wagon trail of sand.
Actually I am so generally whipped that I don't take another photo the rest of the day. Which is too bad. Because the Florida Trail and Alexander Springs are incredibly beautiful. And the miles and miles of straight forest road on the run back to the east are impressive.
What I really appreciate though, is the feel of good, firm dirt under my wheels.
Trails are negotiated, sandwiches devoured, dirt roads ridden. A mile long series of 20 foot puddles is skirted in bendy swoops. Popeye gets a giant splat of mud across his eyes. Mark offers up his bottle of water to rinse it out until Popeye can see again.
Up ahead, Karlos and some of the frontrunners decide to stop at the river bridge for a beer before knocking off their final miles. Those of us with a long drive ahead back to Melbourne forge ahead on our own.
My calves moo out a familiar warning of impending cramps - just as two guys go off the front of the paceline at the last turn onto pavement. It's tempting to go with them and hammer to the end, cramping be damned. But to hammer now means to pay later. I only have to think of the last time I howled with leg cramps on a long drive home.
I tuck in behind a slower four man paceline for an easy final leg. Popeye, true to his word, hangs with me all the way back to Chuck Lennon, where our fast friends have the coolers out and are already popping open the first beers of the day.
So we are Death Loopers! With a cold beer in hand, and a story to tell. Nearly dead, but truly alive. And no refund necessary.
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