Another summer down. I guess it is as good of a time as any to reminisce about spending some time on my Evasion Lite deep in the mountains of Virginia this past July.

The elevation provided a welcomed reprieve from the heat, but not so much the humidity. Pedaling and pushing your bike up a mountain along a narrow, overgrown track for nearly five hours allows your body to discover new avenues of perspiration. I swear I was dripping from my kneecaps and fingertips within the first half hour. Not even the myriad creepy-crawlies lurking in the seas of wild grasses we rolled through could even latch onto my skin; I was so slippery. Although, one tick, that evil little shit, found its way onto my shoulder at the end of the trip. If I could have simultaneously drowned and burned it to death, I would.

This part of Virginia is a true wilderness, brutal and beautiful. The ride, at times, was unforgiving. You could say the experience was type-2 fun; this is what people who have a positive outlook on life call a hard time. Although, that seems unfair. It was as wonderful as it was difficult. I have never been much of an athlete, so my physical self was in tatters. My spiritual self, however, flourished.

The shadows below the canopy were entire universes attempting to swallow me whole. Our freehubs buzzed in sync with the swarms of crickets and cicadas in the trees. It is a sound that I can only define as being the sound of summer. On every descent, the looming briars were claws slashing my arms as I passed at 30 mph, fully loaded and unable to swerve or stop. They actually cut deep at that speed. Maybe bleeding out is part of the mountain’s growth plan. Things love to grow en mass here, the sharp, the invasive, and the poisonous. A little bodily sacrifice is fair admission.

As day turned to night, the clouds bubbled up into a thunderstorm. The wind weaved through the trees like water through rock , making them creak and talk. And then the rain came down. Everything got soaked. So it goes. Luckily we had each other, a very charismatic dog with a fish bowl for a head named Prince, stacks of bean and cheese quesadillas, and a swimming hole at the end. But next time I am bringing an extra shirt and different shoes.

-Jared