Snow Biking Camping Trip

You know how it goes... You can only take a few camping trips a year so you plan it out far in advance. As the date gets closer, you have buddies drop out and plans change. You feel the temptation to cancel but want to hang on and push through. Then the week of your trip, a Polar Vortex swoops in a dumps six inches of snow on your destination. We've all experienced that, right?

Saturday night, Jason, Pat and I loaded bikes up on the truck and headed to Red River Gorge, completely disregarding the fact that snow tried to snuff out our adventure.

Our plans did get tweaked. But we held onto the fact that we were going. So we arrived during nightfall and pedaled our way across the crunchy, snow-covered gravel roads.

Pat, armed with his Pugsley, was the most confident in the snow. He was ecstatic to push his bike through the very schtuff it was built for.

I stuck with the new Disc Trucker. Would the Troll have been better? Of course. But I threw on a pair of 2.3" knobbies and made it work. Fully loaded with front and rear panniers, the Disc Trucker was awesome. I'm not sure that this ride would've been possible with rim brakes. But I had enough plushness of rubber under me that this was still rideable.

Jason rode upon his Troll perchance to find a good time. And he surely found it.

Camp was stellar. What's cozier than a warm fire and three men in a two-man tent? Nothing. Nothing is cozier. We stayed warm by chopping firewood, brewing coffee and retelling the lore of Jennifer Lopez's cinematic highlights.

When morning came, we moved slowly, but assuredly to warmth. No one was comfortable at night. But we were mostly warm. Temps dropped to nine degrees but we were well equipped.

When we finally got moving, we warmed up pretty well. I spent most of Sunday's ride with no gloves or head covering. The riding was really awesome. We would wiggle and teeter into a slow fall over and over, laughing hard the entire time. I'm not sure how much mileage we actually covered. But we pedaled for several hours. Our original plan was the ride the loop around the Gorge. But that was a plowed, salted loop and we didn't want to pass up on the awesome snow on the gravel road network. So we stuck around the gravel for the day.

I took way too few photos on the trip. I wish I had thought of it more. The Disc Trucker shined brightly for this function and I barely have the photographic evidence to prove it. I'll do better next time.

But the trip was great. Perhaps, even, a once in a lifetime opportunity. Kentucky rarely gets snow like this. And it would be rare that it would align with my schedule enough to allow a full overnighter within it's midst.

Get out there.