Greetings fellow MTBRs. The story to follow is my first attempt at contributing some biking experiences to this forum. I’ve always enjoyed all of your stories, but with a busy school schedule and a full time job all at once, it’s kind of hard to spend any time on things like this. As the title suggests, this is the story of the bike trip two years ago I will never forget. We all have them I am sure; odd things that have happened during bike trips that become the thing of legend with riding buddies. They are the events that at the time make you think, “I am nuts for doing this sport,” but are later laughed off as a freak thing of chance upon in reflection. My friends and I have a story like this that we always talk about whenever we ride on one of our favorite trails. It was a perfect summer day in Bumble Fuck County that faithful day in May ‘00. We were going for a ride on a remote trail I just happened to find by accident earlier in the year. The entrance is nothing more than a small gravel clearing at the side of the road that is blocked by your standard swivel base park gate. The trail actually starts out paved and the farther back you go, the more grown in it gets. Towards the end, it gets kind of tricky with some steep drops covered in loose shale rock and a few stream crossings. It is a decommissioned road that was replaced by the connecting road a long time back I believe. Our trip usually starts by carrying our bikes over the locked gate. Except today, the gate was already open for some reason when we got there so we just rode on in. Initially, the ride was uneventful as we rode down the grown in paved section to get to the fun part. About three miles in the woods, we heard gun shots coming from up ahead. This immediately struck us as odd since the surrounding area is completely desolate except for a few survivalist shacks (I have some stories about those too). Also it was no where near hunting season. It must have been fear of being labeled a coward by the group that made us keep riding towards the shots because nobody said anything. So we keep riding and sure enough, we see a beast of a man walking up the road with a gun. I’m not going to describe him in length, but just envision Charles Manson on a bad day. Now I don’t know about you guys, cause I am not a hunter, but I don’t think people hunt with handguns (animals at least). Needless to say, our speed record for this length of the trail greatly improved that day. We tried to put what we just saw behind us, because like I said there are all kinds of wacko survivalists out in this area. The guy could have been just a local crack head. Besides, we were nearing the end of the paved section and the ride we all were looking forward to was about to begin. It was at this point though, that we learned why the gate was open. Sitting just off the road where the non-motor car navigable section began, was a car that we had never seen back there before. The windows were all smashed and it looked like someone rammed it into a tree because the front end was smashed all to hell. We got off our bikes to investigate. On the drivers side area there were some large rocks on the floor. (Presumably used to hold the gas pedal down). Other than that, the thing was empty. Satisfied with the lack of blood on the car or the surrounding area, we yet again attributed the junked up car to the local hillbillies having their night out. We continued on our trip, completing the trail’s loop, and went home. A week passed and I had long forgotten about our Charles Manson of Bumble Fuck trail. Then the phone rang, it was my riding bud Neil on the phone. He said, “You aren’t gonna believe this. There is an article in the newspaper about our trail today. You know that car we found? The police were called to investigate it. They found a dead person in the trunk. They have a picture of the guy we saw in the paper and he is charged with the murder.” Since then, I always carry a 9mm pistol with me when I ride. I am not a gun nut like I said, I really would prefer not to carry one for fear that somehow I end up shooting myself in the ass while I am riding. Nevertheless, that ride really convinced me that when you are deep into the woods you can run into anyone or anything. I know that some of you are not going to believe me, I wouldn’t have either before this happened. Just keep your wits about you when riding out there guys and keep safe!!!
