Ride Bikes...Wherever: Shadow Falls Rendezvous

Its time for round two.
First official fire and ice.
No further ado.
(Haiku by:______)

As promised, we offer prime tunes for whatever activity you choose. Produced by our good friend, blog affiliate, and sleazy music man, LUXCE (aka Luke Stettler). Its a free download, pretty snazzy eh? Also noteworthy, the photos are credited to Jessica Lynn, a kind female with a camera. Sit back, pump some decibels, and enjoy the rest of the post.

A fine image for our crew:

January 18, 2014. The first time we got together for a semi-planned group ride.

The crew: Grant, Joe, Leo, Marty, Sam L., Anders, Sam G., Stephen, Uncle Jerry, and a handful of Luther College graduates

Beer Present: 21st Amendment IPA, Ranger, Hauenstein tall boys.
Expert Opinion/Description: pretty damn good

The day...
Anders was so ambitious to organize a bike ride that he created a Facebook event for it dubbed Fire&Ice Pedal Powered Phun Phest. Those things are legit as hell and legally binding. The agreement was to meet up at Grant's house in Como around 11 AM. So we all woke up around noon and showed up to Grant's by 2. Sam and Uncle Jerry had to bike from North Minneapolis to St. Paul because they wanted to be hard core. It was a sunny day and perfect for riding a bicycle. Our crew made its way from the Como area through Dinkytown and the University of Minnesota campus. Then we cruised East River road to the St. Thomas campus in St. Paul on a variety of bikes; fixies, squishy geared 26ers, rigid single speed 29er, a cyclocrosser, and geared roadies. We all had one thing in common, big smiles and backpacks full of beer. We reached our point of entry into a forested ravine. We took the gentlest decent and ripped down slightly packed snowy singletrack, winding over a stream on sweet ladder bridges. We eventually came to a cliff's edge where we set up shop. Wood collection was sort of tough seeing that dead and down wood was scarce. Luckily there was a bunch of dead buckthorn that we cut down with Joe's hatchet.

Sam and Uncle Jerry arrived after the fire was ablaze and got right in on the action.

Then ders's Luther pals showed up on foot to hang out and take a few photos. Anders was happy, along with everyone else.

We enjoyed the afternoon sun as long as it lasted and left Shadow Falls just after sunset. Anders parted ways with the group right away to have a date with his girlfriend who also biked the fresh snow to get to the restaurant. He says "I wish she would have joined us but I am happy that we could end my awesome day with a nice dinner date." A sweet chaz nostic that Anders. The rest of us went back the way we came and considered it a day to consider.