Mountain Biking, Pocahontas State Park — Trip Report

The trip report

Rob and I met at the parking lot of the Science Center, Pocahontas State park and biked down to the lake and the boat ramp. The conditions were a warm and a bit humid after a night of rain but the trails were in excellent shape.

We crossed the bridge and proceeded to try a new trail, the Fendly Station Trail, which is a double-track fire road, but with surprising twists and turns. The trip started at the Nature Center, I rescued a box turtle in the road. We coasted down a steep hill (brakes? CHECK!!) and then across a steel foot bridge. The Fendly Station trail has three challenging hills at the beginning. After a good burn getting to the top we proceeded along the trail with a fair amount of hills and some down hills, twists and turns and many options to take Loops of the main trail but which would bring you back to Fendly Station.

We kept on the main trail and in about 20 minutes of good strong riding ended up at the dam which had a good amount of water flowing over it and we rested. We went down hill, proceeded past a caution sign warning of the upcoming water crossing however due to the rains it was 60’ wide and about 4’ of fast moving water—far too risky to cross. This marked our turn around and as far as we could go on the trail going west so we headed back and explored a few of the other trails and loops, but eventually getting back to the Forrest Exploration Trail, the trail we rode the previous week.

At an intersection we left the Forrest Exploratoin Trail and headed up the Hawkins Parking lot trail which is off Newby’s Bridge Road. The ride up the trail was a slow grind up to the parking lot and after all of the ups and downs we had gone through it was hard but what a nice burn in the legs!

After take a quick rest at the parking lot we headed back to the Forest Exploration Trail and Fendly Station Intersections and took the Forest Exploration trail back through some of the nicest woods around, with twists and turns, riding along the side of a woody ravine, down a hill past a huge boulder, across a bridge and slough, up another hill or two; down one last hill and across a stream. Shortly before us was the steel foot bridge at the boat launch parking lot

However, we weren’t at our starting point which required grinding up a paved road to the top of a hill and then on to where we parked. We rode for 90 minutes and about 10 miles I would say. I need to get a odometer for my bike so I can track my miles. We got a good sweat and several good muscle burns and definitely the hardest ride so far this season.

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About this event

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A nice bike ride about 5 miles long (60 minutes) which will challenge you without making you wish you stayed home! There are lots of great mountain biking trails in Pocahontas but we'll go on the easiest "green" trail with enough downhill to make up for some of the uphills.

http://www.dcr.virginia.gov/state_parks/poc.shtml

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