Two Tries Hill (or "Don't Hook a Bike in a Tree in the Dark")
I remember it well as if it was yesteryear.
I first attempted 3LH from the east (your red route) late one day in 2007. I didn't have a proper map. Just my Benchmark Mapbook. I got a little way up the hill with my bike to somewhere. This was well before the recent DNR logging so the roads on that side did not connect to the upper roads which go to the top. I thought that upper road can't be too far through the forest crosscountry so I took my mountain bike on my shoulder to hump it through. Well I got a few hundred yards in through ever-worsening brush and no sight of the upper road. So while standing atop a large windfall log, I hung my bike up in the lower branches of a tree so I'd be able to see it on the return. Well, I continue up the brushy slope and it's getting wetter and wetter and I recall hitting a higher road but must have either run out of time or thought it was not the correct road, so I headed back down. I found an older road (that came back to a farmer gate) for the descent and tried to circle back around to my bike. But it was getting dark and I was wandering around back and forth looking for it. The terrain all looked right but no bike. I was worried, actually getting quite convinced I'd have to abandon the bike and come back for it on another day, but just at the last gasp of searching I spotted it. I retrieved it and got out back to my car. What an ordeal for a failed summit bid!
A few weeks later I returned and biked the long route from the south (your yellow route).
That's my comical story and I'm sticking to it.
If I had never found that bike again, imagine a logger coming along some years later and finding a bike hanging up in a tree he was going to cut down.
It's really quite amazing that any of us who went outdoor adventuring before the widespread use of smartphones, moving-map GPS, and Google Earth are alive to tell such tales. These young punks nowadays have no idea how hard it was to find a summit in the map and compass days.....
Klenke - Jan 23, 2015 5:23 pm - Hasn't voted
Two Tries Hill (or "Don't Hook a Bike in a Tree in the Dark")I remember it well as if it was yesteryear.
I first attempted 3LH from the east (your red route) late one day in 2007. I didn't have a proper map. Just my Benchmark Mapbook. I got a little way up the hill with my bike to somewhere. This was well before the recent DNR logging so the roads on that side did not connect to the upper roads which go to the top. I thought that upper road can't be too far through the forest crosscountry so I took my mountain bike on my shoulder to hump it through. Well I got a few hundred yards in through ever-worsening brush and no sight of the upper road. So while standing atop a large windfall log, I hung my bike up in the lower branches of a tree so I'd be able to see it on the return. Well, I continue up the brushy slope and it's getting wetter and wetter and I recall hitting a higher road but must have either run out of time or thought it was not the correct road, so I headed back down. I found an older road (that came back to a farmer gate) for the descent and tried to circle back around to my bike. But it was getting dark and I was wandering around back and forth looking for it. The terrain all looked right but no bike. I was worried, actually getting quite convinced I'd have to abandon the bike and come back for it on another day, but just at the last gasp of searching I spotted it. I retrieved it and got out back to my car. What an ordeal for a failed summit bid!
A few weeks later I returned and biked the long route from the south (your yellow route).
That's my comical story and I'm sticking to it.
If I had never found that bike again, imagine a logger coming along some years later and finding a bike hanging up in a tree he was going to cut down.
kevinsa - Jan 23, 2015 6:57 pm - Hasn't voted
Re: Two Tries Hill (orIt's really quite amazing that any of us who went outdoor adventuring before the widespread use of smartphones, moving-map GPS, and Google Earth are alive to tell such tales. These young punks nowadays have no idea how hard it was to find a summit in the map and compass days.....