Family Mountain Biking.

I have recently come to the realization that I have completely forgotten how to write.  I guess posting one-sentence Facebook posts, conversing with a three and a six-year and teaching students with developmental delays isn't really challenging my cognitive abilities.

I am taking a graduate course towards my CAS, which requires quite a bit of writing, so I figured I would start up the blog again to log our family adventures and provide some mental stimulation and writing practice. 

We have been doing quite a lot of exploring and generally just enjoying the outdoors.  I am sad that I haven't logged all of it on here for the boys to look back on.  A few weeks ago, we traveled to Carrabassett Valley for the weekend to do some mountain biking.  Ian completed a children's mountain bike race at their summer challenge and both boys have been begging to go back and explore the trails.  Now that Gabe can pedal independently and with winter fast approaching, we figured it now or never for this year.  

So, we loaded up the bikes, the kids and the dogs and made the trek.  The first morning was chilly.  Hats and gloves were required and there was still some complaining, even from my shorts and flip flop child.  As a warm-up, Ian led up around the racecourse which actually had a pretty steep downhill and some loose gravel.  I am impressed that he conquered this on his first race.  Next, Ian and I rode around a green single track trail that he had been too intimidated to try in July.  No problems this time as he took the lead.  At this point, Gabe was ready to try the "real trails" and we set out to ride a green trail that loops around a large pond at the outdoor center.  This was Gabe's first big outing with his lightweight Woom 2 and he had no trouble keeping up, only having to walk the top 1/3 or less of the bigger hills.  

We took a break for some leaf and real estate peeping - maybe someday we will have a camp up there.  After a little lunch, the boys were ready to tackle some more single track off the Narrow Gauge trail.  Ian rocked around the trails with Greg, voicing some annoyance that he had to keep stopping to wait for me and Gabe.  Gabe did pretty well with the single track, struggling and crashing a little on the roots.  The Woom 2 isn't really designed for true mountain biking but overall, I was impressed at how well he was able to handle the trails.  

I think we covered a little over 3 miles of true mountain bike trails.  We heard lots of moans and groans when it was time to leave.  I love that they love to adventure and I am so excited that we can really hit the trails as a family.