Hey Mike, good to see you in our 365 group. Are you going to set up a set for your 365 pics too?

Check on Amazon. Mine had something like £80 off on Amazon. I have the 75 but I am sure you will get better for your budget. Quite a few still on offer there.

I had a friend who suggested we go and see Donnie Darko at the cinema. I had never heard of the film, and had read no reviews nothing. Totally loved it.

Also, one of my fave films is called Renegade. It is set in the Wild West, and is loosly based on the comics. However, the french director had drunk ayahusca well over 100 times, and the film is a sort of fantasy, with a Shipibo Peruvian shaman who gives the hero ayahusca. I wont describe the plot, but you think it is a typical good guy bad guy kind of film and on paper there are a whole heap of things that could have gone wrong.

But what you end up with at the end is a 10 minute ayahusca trip which is the most realistic 2D rendering of a representation of the hyperdimensional experience that you go through, and yeah, totally loved it.

Here you go

Gone With The Wind

I quite like reading about Sumaria, Mesopotamia and all that stuff. Have read quite a bit of Zacharia Sitchin although I know how controversial he is.

I love all the mysteries about ancient temples. One cracker is Baalbek. There they have cut stones weighing 1000 tons. I don’t think even today we have machinery that can lift that kind of weight, although I could be wrong.

Oh go on then Roper, I will save your thread from having the humiliation of no replies.

I still like this one from Seasonally Unadjusted. It’s of the double rock called McMoab at El Chorro

I like it as I did actually manage to ride it when out with Jim, Roper and our friend Fast Mike, but then my bike ran away with itself after clearing the rocks and I ended up doing a big faceplant into what was luckily soft dirt by the side of the singletrack. Only thing hurt was my pride.

I don’t think that’s his lunchbox in there, it hides his telescopic lens

Looks great. Apparently there is bivvying on Dartmoor as part of my MSc. Great pics and maybe hope to join you guys for a ride or two when I move down later this year.

Si

it’s not nice to mock human frailty

Says the man who posted an animation of a female friend’s crash yesterday!!

I’m guess there could be rain for me, given that I will be in the rain forests for July and August. 🙂 Hope it’s a ncie one for you guys

Down here it is low 20s, and the air is still pretty fresh. I tell you, there are some pretty burnt and pickled looking Brits coming off the cruise liners into Gib right now. Trouble is, they are all mainly wrinkled with saggy bits too and in vests. Not a great sight really.

No probs

My MTB collection of photo sets is here

http://www.flickr.com/photos/simonralli/collections/72157609685531106/

With quite a few more slightly further afield from Mijas, i.e. Marbella down to Tarifa, El Chorro and behind Estepona.

Trickydisco – your best bet is Roper. I will be doing my MSc and joining Sharki and co in Devon by then 🙂

However, after saying that the Bikefax instructions and maps are pretty much spot on.

Sounds like you should go to Mijas in Spain with trickydisco then your partners can go out in the daytime and not be bored! Sorted 🙂

Yep – there is both XC and DH at Benalmedena.

Mijas has two cracking routes,

http://www.flickr.com/photos/simonralli/sets/72157609067194407/

and you also have stuff like Torecilla and much much more around Sierra de las Nieves, Montes de Malaga and El Chorro.

You should get the Mountain Bike Southern Spain book which has all these routes in.

Costa del Si

To be honest i can’t ever see myself being able to do anything like that so no.

I think I would, money permitting, love to have another bike though, maybe a happy hardcore hardtail bike for messing around on trails and woods. But then I’d also love a full suss too. One day maybe.

Ah bless u Mr Ralli, i’m glad i made such a strong impression!!!!!!

You’re welcome. Unfortunately your tatoo didn’t actually make so strong an impression as for me to remember it in all its exactitude. I think we need a reminder if that’s OK?

I’m glad he’s not hurt. Obviously you can’t really tell if you wern’t there, but it seems like there were a good few ways he could have potentially hurt himself. So yeah, given that, a great set of pics to enjoy.

You other option is something like http://www.bullionvault.com i.e. convert your fiat currency into gold.

Thing is, in a thread which is now about tatoos, it’s going to be a bit difficult for anyone to top Bumley’s top tat photo huh?

A couple of great pics there Rich. Will look forward to having a look at the rest.

Whereabouts is Lee Quarry BTW?

Si

My fave films are Betty Blue, Star Wars, The Matrix, Renegade, King Arthur (the new one) and Thunderheart.

Not too sure if Betty Blue is no longer cool, or maybe after being cool, it was dead uncool, but now it’s cool again, and Star Wars is cheesy but I think it’s still ok to admit liking it? I doubt too many people here have seen Thunderheart or Renegade but they are pretty cool in my book.

Oh well the caustic comments could have been worse 🙂

I suppose I should have posted the pic with the tat coloured in but hey ho.

It’s a long story..

Oh – happy birthday Aleigh x

Great stuff. I take it there are no photos in order to keep the identities of the other STW riders secret?

Steve

Sounds good but I am not particularly fast, and not too technical. Are there any skills training days, or maybe would you ever consider a ride for intermediate riders, or is there no demand for that kind of thing?

I am hoping to spend somewhere between 2 and 4 weeks in Dumfries (Kirkton) in June, but would probably hold you guys up.

Ah got you. Cheers Jedi. Not entirely too sure if that is the opposite of what Munqe-chick said but hey ho.

“It’s a freewheeling without wheelieing.”

Really sorry, but this isn’t making things any clearer.

Sorry folks – what is a manual?

I don’t do jumps. I am not really planning on learning to do table tops and the like, but I’d like to do step jumps when descending, instead of having to stop a descent and walk down a step.

Still not too sure how much time I will have free this June, but if I do, I will have time to spend at one or more of the Seven Stanes skill centre bits, so I can simply try and try again till I get it.

Can I ask a few questions, which may come across as rude?

How did you get yourself into £20K debt? Are you currently living beyond your means if you are eating into your savings?

Obviously I don’t know the full ins and outs, but do you feel you have the financial discipline to run your own business? Will you be able to fully budget for all costs, including potential unseen costs? Have you fully researched the market, and will you have work from day one, or will you have to work for a month or two without a wage before the clients appear?

I would have thought you may want to sell a lot of things and clear down that debt as much as possible before starting your own business. You would be starting a new business in what could well be an ongoing downturn. How do you feel the economy will develop and is this really the right time?

I am not starting my own business, but I am taking a year out, and fully funding myself. But it has taken me some time to save and save and be very disciplined in terms of not buying myself stuff, just the essentials. Maybe you need to be disciplined, work hard on recitfying you current precarious financial situation, and then when you are ready, go into self employment?

Good luck with whatever you decide. Really hope it works out in the long run.

Gus

I’m stunned, hurt, upset and amazed. How could anyone here think I write silly posts???

But now you ask, we had a very nice time thank you very much[/url]

Here’s the link if you want to see how Gibraltar’s A list party[/url] 😀

True – but I bet you can’t guess which bar we will finish up tonight in either?

Well you should try living in a country that is 1km wide by 3km long 🙂

Took me 18 months to discover the one decent bit of singletrack too!

Hiya – sounds like you are in a good location with access to lots of different riding.

Antony

Hi – I’ll be in South America for July and August but yeah, will deffo be up for a ride when I move to Devon : )

That’s a shame. It’s just a few miles from my folks’ house, so I will still be riding it in a couple of months, just to see what it’s like.

Roper is finally back from Blighty with a shiny new bike so I am going to show him the Casares route I have discovered and hopefully try and explore a little more and add a bit more to it.