Whitewater

Minnehaha Creek is frozen well enough to ride on, well mostly but you have to get wet feet and a

very icy bike. It's about 20 miles of whitewater riding. Yes, I know that's not correct but it's close; Let me explain...

It's obviously white and it is a waterway so we're working with the correct components.


It's rough and difficult to ride in places. With the groundwater springs, drains, runoff and fast moving water making holes and thin ice and exposing rocks, it's whitewater.

I expected an easy but fast ride. That wasn't the case. It was technical, and slow much of the time. We had to chose our course well or suffer the consequences.

An urban creek has many crossing in 20 miles. This is a pipe about 75 feet long with a bend in the middle so its dark.

We just started the ride and you can see the ice from a dozen slush crossing.

This is the best we'll get for a road sign.

Bad ice. We had a lot of this. Much of it deeper and wetter. You'd hear it crackle then it would explode around you. We were lucky to not get this over deep water.

Break downs. The ice is already causing problems.

Fat bikes are awesome!

Dude! What happened to your hat?

 This hat!

 I'm mad! I dropped it in the slop.

I'm happy! I have a new hat!

Ice and more ice. My bike probably had 10 pounds on it and the rear wheel was rubbing so hard it sounded like a bass boat. You can see I couldn't shift to high gear because it's encased in ice.

We didn't make our goal to get to tonka but we got back before dark. It was touch and go at points with the water and break thoughts. I had to pin a busted chain and we both had frozen gears. I had wet feet from riding water up to my hubs. A testament to wool, my feet were comfortable yet I left foot prints on my wood floors when I got home.

On long personal challenges the last few miles are where you learn about yourself. Your tired, your gear is failing, your will to push is gone, the desire to quit is high. It's what separates adventure from the illusion of adventure. If your broken and want to quit and your mind is talking against you, don't quit.

It was a real good time and an great use of winter Whitewater even if it hurt.