wo
small tales, epic trails
My tale begins a little over a year ago. The flatness of Manchester, both elevation and scene, was wearing a little thin. I’m a West Country lad and my girlfriend is Scottish. Neither of us have any ties to the North West other than that’s where we met. The weekly commute to North Wales to ride was beginning to drain me. Upon returning from holiday in America, where my girlfriend’s sister resides, we decided on a change. Were we going to stay in the UK or move abroad? Then it happened - I landed an interview for my dream job: trail builder/designer with Rowen Sorrell’s ‘Back-on-Track’ company. After all, this has been my occupation in my private time for years. This was the change we needed. The catch was the need to have GIS/ CAD computer skills as well. Luckily for me this had been my background for the last 6 years. What could possible go wrong? Nothing I guess, just a better man won. I remember Rowan questioning me in the interview about my commitment to moving to Wales. I said “I’ll either take this job or I’m off to New Zealand”, those were the lengths we would go to. So here I am at my laptop in Nelson, NZ. A lot has happened since the interview last summer; moving to Scotland, starting my own little (very low budget) video series, a serious back injury on the first weekend of 2013 which stopped me riding for 3 months and moving to the other side of the world. After spending 28 hours plane hopping our way through Asia and Australia, we were welcomed in Wellington by friends, one of whom just happened to be a local trail builder. I tried to relay to Dave the seriousness of my injury, and that my second ride of the year was a very slow casual ride back home on the local trails in Bristol to say good bye to old friends. Less than 3 hours off the plane Dave says “no worries” and we were shredding the lovely cut bench and 30 min descent with fantastic views around Wellington. I’m glad to say it was all for the best. I will attempt to put into writing just how good the riding is down under. It’s not even the quality of the trails, (that’s just a bonus) it’s the quantity. Nelson is to Queenstown what Kamloops, Kelowna or the North Shore is to Whistler. From my door step, it’s a 15 minute ride to where a lot of local riding starts. The popular Codgers Bike Park has anything from 5 to 20 minute single-track descents, 4 steep gnarly DH runs including a National DH and a killer 42km XC run that climbs to 900m and back down to sea level in one go. And that’s just the trails close by. The real fun began when I was lucky enough to work for NZ Trail Solutions. The work was based on private land owned by “the Client”.
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Summer