the secret spot
Just as surfers have their own, jealously guarded surf spots, so Huw Cooke finds solace in a secret trail he can call his own – or at least borrow…
I had pushed the bike for a good hour through briars and the comblike lower branches of a Forestry Commission plantation, waded a couple of small streams and dragged heavy feet across ploughed fields to reach it. The dew was still clinging to the bracken like the condensation on the outside of a cold bottle of beer and the sun was hard in my eyes. I had marked it on a map about six months previously and always knew that it was a summer solstice ride. Every once in a while I had returned with a saw and spade to work on what I had found and, on the longest day of the year, I was going to welcome summer with my own pagan ritual. My legs were cut, my feet wet and a sheen of sweat clung to my forearms after the effort of getting to the small clearing. Originally, it must have been a stone quarry, but rushes and brambles had staked their claim and no one had been here for years. Below me, somewhere in the trees, were the lumps of odd mine workings, silver and lead in their heyday, and twisting its way between them, the doctored deer track that was my purpose for a dawn ride.
The nature of man is a complex blend of selfishness and altruism. On one hand, we look out only for ourselves, yet on the other we are capable of acts of incredible generosity. Darwin sought to explain this contradiction by arguing that we subconsciously calculate the advantages and disadvantages of every decision that we make and that every choice will ultimately benefit us in the end. Like evolutionary gamblers, we bet on the benefits always outweighing the risks. I like Darwin’s analysis that we want everything for ourselves. It fits my philosophy and it means that I can unapologetically defend the concept of secret spots. I’ve stolen the phrase from surfers and it suits my purposes. Surfing in Europe has its roots in the grass-smoking, nature-loving Californian hippies who came to spread free love. Aimless wanderers, continually seeking the quiet corners to find themselves, they introduced the stiff upper-lipped British explorer to the idea of travel without purpose. In stark contrast to the intrepid expeditions conceived in the hallowed halls of the Royal Geographical Society, these trips had no destination, no worthy objective and no official photographer. They were journeys to the backwaters and eddies, off the beaten track and hidden from the world’s gaze. The hippies introduced surfers to the selfish and often accidental art of discovering secret spots.
The ground was dry and dusty after a few weeks of decent weather and I was riding my tried and trusted Cinder tyres, as tight on the corners as a Yorkshire Terrier/Great Dane coupling, and I was running them at high pressure. Having trimmed and carried out my own brutal cosmetic surgery on the trail, I knew it inside out despite never having ridden it. Initially steep and twisty through the pines, it then opened into the mine section where I had dug in a few kickers before speeding up into wide berms and a stream jump in the bottom of the valley. I slugged back half a litre of water, pulled on the body armour and checked the bike for any mechanicals. The first run of a new trail is always special and I wanted to ensure that everything was just right. I didn’t waste any time. There was no need to stop and savour the moment – I had been doing that for the last few days since I had seen the forecast – so I just swung myself into the saddle and launched into the downhill.
Surfers, like a modern day plague, spread along the Atlantic coastline finding places where no one had ever surfed. They drove down dirt tracks, got lost in forests, were chased off farms by men with moustaches and guns, spent days on remote beaches waiting for fresh swell and learnt that a single perfect wave washed away the frustration and agony of all the dead ends, flat tyres, reef cuts and dysentery. They rediscovered their Darwinian selves. Mountain biking has always involved the discovery of new places and, while the modern day honey pots of Whistler, Scotland and the Alps have torn riding into a new, and exciting, direction, we should never forget where we, as mountain bikers, came from. A couple of turns through the wider spaced trees let me gain speed and I restrained my fingers from feathering the brakes. I wanted this first run to be right on the edge. The bike felt good and responsive and, as the trail started to twist and turn between the trunks like an escaping prisoner ducking and diving from the impending bullets, I flicked the back end into the bends. The trail slipped under the wheels – dirt and pine needles, barked roots and the odd stone, clawing branches and leaning trees. Everything was getting faster and I was losing control.
No room for Hendrix
I’d like to make it clear that I don’t have a cannabis plant in my flat, I don’t listen to Hendrix and I don’t speak in a kind of sub-culture jargon. In short, I am too old to be a hippy searching for the meaning of life. A job, a suit, a mortgage and an inability to sell my gas-guzzling van have taken their toll on me. But I do subscribe to some of the simpler things in life and I have become an addict to finding places to ride where no one has ever been. Not in the sense of a stoned search for nirvana, but in a xenophobic way. Riding in places where it is hit and miss. A nudge gamble that more often than not pays dividends.
I burst out of the trees and hit a hard right hand corner before dipping into a small bombhole where I pumped hard to gain the speed for the first kicker. A steep face of packed earth on an old tree stump that boosted me a couple of feet off the ground in a smooth trajectory onto an uphill transition. A quick couple of pedal strokes and I swung the bike left across the inside of a small bowl, leaning into the turn and feeling the rubber bite into the earth. Everything was running to plan and I dabbed the brakes to bleed a small amount of speed for the next jump. Tempting though it was to hit it at full speed, it was the sort of hip jump where a smooth landing allowed the set up for the final big double and, as I launched, I flicked the bike to the left, spotted the landing and felt the suspension compress as I landed. God, it felt good, my line was sweet and I was riding as relaxed as I had hoped. It was about 20m before the double and I lined up my approach with a pine trunk on the other side of the gully that split the double. Steep sided and about ten feet deep, it was some kind of drainage channel or collapsed tunnel. I’m not quite sure, but it was the kind of jump that requires commitment. I hit the takeoff fast, opened my body and lifted the bars to drive high. The kicker was solid and I knew I had the distance. A momentary flicker of fear as I thought I had too much speed, but it passed and I pinned the landing before laying the bike hard over to the right and into the final few berms.
Poaching with the Uni
I am happy that most people don’t share my enthusiasm for secret spots. I don’t consider myself a pioneer or a role model or a cult leader. I am doing my own thing for my own reasons. It can be incredibly frustrating to push the bike up valleys for half a day simply because the contours looked good on the OS map. Hillsides that, according to the soil charts copied from my local University’s geography department, should be well drained, turn out to be slippery disasters. And I have had more than my fair share of run-ins with farmers. But I believe in freedom, finding my own way and once in a while riding somewhere that no one else ever has and, you never know, maybe no one ever will ride again.
The trail widened slightly and swung into a left hand berm that I rode high, dirt spitting off the tread, and then into a right hand berm that seemed to slingshot me out with an impatience unseen since that
whale swallowed Jonah. One thing left. One final jump over the stream. I pedalled again and hit the kicker as fast as I dared. I didn’t know if I was going to clear the stream. The bike lifted well, the speed seemed good and everything dropped into slow motion. Light flickered off the water, dust hung in the air and the other side seemed a long way away. I still didn’t know if I was going to make it…
Huw Cooke.
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Nice to read that first thing this morning Huw
now where’s me shovel ?
Nice – must start something like this during this holiday
Ace! Those pics are of the wood I build in!
Those barrels have since been completely consumed by a tabletop…