Active Triangle

Today is Christmas. We decided to take the bikes out and do the Walnut Creek to Reedy Creek to House Creek to Crabtree Creek greenway circle around Raleigh.

We’ve ridden every section of it in the past, but never all together. We parked at the Poole Rd. parking lot and decided to head down Walnut Creek first, and make the loop that way. The trail was fine until we got past Worthdale Park. When we got to the bottom of the hill, and back near the river I we quickly found that all the rain we had earlier in the week had made the river spill it’s banks, and deposited sand, mud, and muck all up and down the trail. Right past Rose Lane the trail starts up again with a boardwalk. Today, the boardwalk was wet, and covered in muck. I downshifted a couple gears and before I knew it, I was being SLAMMED into the boardwalk HARD. Apparently my rear tire decided it wanted to be in front, and tried it’s best to come around in the muck.

I scratched the frame of my bike in a few places, and bent the drop of my handlebars inward about 2″ from the fall. Otherwise, the bike was okay.

I landed right on my tailbone, and it freaking hurt. Thankfully, the position of being on the bike saddle didn’t hurt much, so after we walked about a mile through more mud and muck we were able to get back on the bike and continue the ride. My wife then began having issues with her pedals and cleats getting too clogged up and having issues getting unclipped.

We rode on without much issue for a while after this, going up the Reedy Creek, and House Creek trails. When we got around to Crabtree Creek, things got soupy again. 

It’s hard to see, but in the above picture, there was probably 16″ of sand piled up under this bridge on the trail where the creek had spilled over it’s banks and left all kinds of mess. We actually decided to go through the grass, cross the road, and walk down the embankment on the other side instead of going through all this mess.

Not far onto Crabtree Creek my wife had to stop for a pedestrian on a bridge, and couldn’t clip out causing her to fall over on the bridge. She’s alright, other than a bruised ego, so we kept on. We didn’t really have any choice but to keep pushing on, but yeah.

Anyways, we finished the ride, and were thankful to be back at the car when we finally got back there. I had thought I noticed my rear tire feeling a little low, and when we got home and I wheeled the bike up into the garage it was completely flat. Hopefully I can remember how to change a flat, it’s been about 7 years…

My tailbone is sore. Sitting here writing this with a handful of ibuprofen in me, and it’s still throbbing. Hopefully it’ll heal up soon.