The first post Reba rebuild ride was at Mitcham Hills near Lynton.  This was the first time I’ve ridden at Mitcham, and as a result, the fork took some larger than expected hits.  Having sufficiently exercised/abused the fork, I think it is safe to say that the rebuild was a success.   The Reba has regained full travel and the poplock is once again functional.

Anyway, back to the trails.  From what I’ve been reading, MTB access to Mitcham is a relatively recent and many of the MTB trails are still under construction.  My first-ride impressions are that there are a wide range of trail types from easy fire roads to fork-killing downhill runs.  I rode several (most?) of the open trails.

The green/easy fire roads are used to connect many of the more difficult trails.  There are also some sections of green/easy singletrack that is mostly smooth and fast.  The  blue/modeate XC trails are fairly fast with a mix of loose rocks to smooth dirt singletrack.  The black/advanced trails have some nice drops, steep climbs and technical downhill sections.  There are also some double-black trails, but I haven’t made it to those.  If the black trails are any indication, the double black trails are probably not very rideable on the hardtail Eriksen, but I try anyway.

Overall, Mitcham has some fun and challenging MTB trails and I’ll definitely be back many more times.  I’m going to ride the Erkisen there the next few times, but soon I’d like to get the cyclocross bike on the trails and see how if works — I haven’t even had the knobbies on the Gunnar since leaving Maryland.  The last post showing the Gunnar with knobbies was all the way back in November ’08.  Anyway, based on my first ride, Mitcham seems to be more cyclocross-bike-compatible than Eagle.  I think there are some green and blue trails that will be fun on the Gunnar, but I’ll bring a couple spare tubes.

Yes, it is Spring here.  In fact, we just started day light savings this morning.  Springtime is a great time of year for cleaning and fork rebuilding. Yep, the Reba needed a rebuild.

But, instead of rebuilding the Reba I took the Gunnar out for a ride.  I started from home and rode north to the River Torrens, and then up the river towards Adelaide.  Normally these paths are quite crowded.  Fortunately, Katherine woke us up around 4:30AM, so I got an early start.  I didn’t really have a specific route in mind, so I just kept going.  Well, somewhere in the Adelaide Hills the paths along the river change to about 100m of gravel, and then about 10m of singletrack and then nothing.  The ride ended up being about 83km and 3 hours.  I did not bring a camera.  Speaking of trails, these cycling, walking and public transit maps from the South Australian Government have been very helpful.  The maps include dedicated cycling paths, shared paths, bike lanes, and even bike shops and bike lockers.  According to the maps, I rode through Paradise, and then off of the map to some unknown section of trail (probably the gravel).

Back to the fork.  Sometime during the last ride at Eagle, the Reba lost half of the normal travel and the poplock stopped working.  The symptoms were somewhat familiar, so I knew it was time.  I was able to locate the oil and o-ring kit locally.  Bio-Mechanis Cycles & Repairs in Adelaide had the o-rings in stock, and they even had parts from Surly, Salsa and some others I haven’t seen here.  The only difference I noticed between this rebuild and the last, was that the oil I used this time was blue, while it was previously red.  The only difference you’ll notice this time is that I don’t have any “during” photos of the process.  This is mainly due to the explosive and oil filled nature of Reba disassembly.

Here, in the “after” shot, you will notice that the fork looks exactly like it did in the “before” shot above.  This is good.  The now functional poplock and restored full travel are also good.

This weekend I made it out to Eagle Park on Saturday and the back on the Coast to Vines and Veloway on Sunday. Saturday was warm and very Spring-like. The trails at Eagle were dry, fast, and more crowded than usual. I managed about 20km with about 90 minutes of riding time.  I also managed to flat-spot my rear Crossmax ST and lost some of the ceramic braking surface.  Ugh.

Sunday was also Spring-like, but in this case it was overcast, rainy, and unfortunately very windy.  I started out from home, rode north to the River Sturt Linear Park Path, then to the Veloway, and finally onto the end of the Coast to Vines trail at Willunga.  I turned around there and took the Coast to Vines trail east to Reynella and back onto the Veloway, then back up the River Sturt path and then home.  All of this added up to a total of 101.53km.  This was my first metric century, though a few years ago I did manage a couple non-metric centuries.

Shorty after I took this photo I was attacked by an angry magpie.  Apparently these evil birds like to attack pedestrians and cyclists, but prefer cyclists.  This particular magpie gave me five or six swoops and managed to hit me in the head/helmet a few times.  Next time I ride through this area I may have to take protective measures.  (Thanks to Rachel for these tips.)  Also of note is that these foul birds prefer to attack the head, face and eyes.  Charming.