I was really looking forward to the first ride of the season. After a miserable Winter and very cold Spring thus far, this Sunday promised to have great weather. As it turned out, the weather was great; sunny and mild.

Mike and I decided on a moderate ride up to the Hosie Reservoir, situated behind the Aylesworth Dam. The Aylesworth Dam is managed by the Army Corps of Engineers and is open to the public for fishing and picnicing.

I hadn’t worked out all Winter , except for a few cross country skiing outings, so I wasn’t sure how I would handle the more difficult sections of the trail. I met Mike in Archibald, near the St Thomas Church and we headed up the tracks to the trail head.

This section of tracks is made up mostly of silt left over from the flooding we’ve experienced in the past 2 years. In some stretches its over 5 inches deeps, making it very difficult to operate a bike.

After about a mile and a half, we reached the trail head and headed up towards the Aylesworth Dam. The trail eventually leads to an old railroad bed, this in turn leads to a dirt road that runs under the Casey Highway, onto, what can best be described, as a spillway with plenty of rocks. This is one of the more difficult sections of the trail and I usually use a lower gear and gut it out. I actually didn’t feel too bad after we reached the Dam at the top of the spillway and was encouraged. I should have known better.

It was at this point that Mike noticed his front tire was a little low. We stopped at the Dam and tried to add more air using a compact pump I brought along. Unfortunately, we could not get the pump to properly seat to the valve stem. We also tried to use a spare tube I also brought along, but to no avail. The pump was not going to work today, in fact it fell apart after a while and we had to abandon the ride.

I decided to ride my bike back to our starting point and pick up Mike with my car.

It was a disappointing start to the season…