Dreamride Blog

You will find a lot of helpful information on cycling equipment, history and local color here. Enjoy the bicycle testing, reviews and the political rants, but pardon me while I get environ MENTAL.

First, I must say that the trail-building skills and hard work done on new trails in the Moab area is quite impressive, giving us the best singletracks I have ever ridden, and this opinion is shared by everyone who rides them. My quarrel is not with those who build these amazing trails or with mountain bikers who fall in love with them (I, too, love these new trails, and guide them for our clients), it is with a culture that still insists on developing even the very last of the pristine lands. It is like we do not have any rules that pertain to intrusion into wildlife habitat, and this disrespect for other species is sure to bite us on the ass. We are still wiping out the natives for our own selfish reasons.

I’ve been witness to the destruction of some of the most beautiful places on Earth. I watched the eastern coast lands of North Carolina change drastically from big trees to golf courses, crystal clear lakes to brown lakes of pig shit. And now, over the past 20 years I have watched the continued destruction of ecosystems surrounding Moab, Utah. There are many people here who have watched the change and are saddened by it, but do not speak of it because, “We have to live here.” Tourism is the prime force in destruction of fragile ecosystems in southeastern Utah, even more so than cattle, mining or nuclear testing. Off-road use of any vehicle carries a huge responsibility. Please exercise your brain cells for the sake of other living creatures. Look before you leap.

Read INFO ON CANYON COUNTRY WILDLIFE to get a grasp on just how fragile and ancient the flora and fauna is in this place. The Mormons did enough damage already and will certainly do their share in the future, but let’s us Gentiles KNOW what we are doing BEFORE we do it. WE DO NOT OWN THIS PLACE. We are just in it for a few years. For your information, you will be dead soon. Canyonlands will be here long after your children are dust. We share this place with other mortal creatures who fit within a mesh of life that sustains all of us. If you ride for one second over the living terrain of Moab, Utah on your bicycle just to make yourself smile, and you don’t have this in your mind, you are fucking up.

I have been watching illegal and legal trail building on once virgin lands (now they are fucked) surrounding Moab, Utah, and see places that were home to pristine gardens of life with diverse plant and animal populations becoming ever-expanding sand piles. Visitation numbers in some areas are exploding into massive over-use. There are many ways and causes for species loss, but exploding networks of spiderweb ATV, OHV, motorcycle and mountain bike tracks is a blatant clue as to the prime destroyers in the areas I am talking about.

Trails can give access to places that many, even all people should not go. If you do not understand this, then you doom us all to stupidity, because the source of all knowledge is in nature (yes, we are nature–get over it) and having no respect for other beings leads to self-destruction DNA-wise. Our teachers are out there in the desert and forest and we are back in town on the cell phone, tweeting away, watching TV. In Moab, I have been watching the teachers–the coyotes, the foxes, the deer, the elk, the badgers, the cats, the skunks, the mountain lions . . . recede, quietly. Some of these species recede into town. Town has more resources than the sparse desert with all those vehicles rolling around. Some just die off.

I have seen methods of legal trail construction cause tourists to loose their way, leaving tracks that last decades and decades, and getting those folks into “situations.” I have watched illegal trails suddenly appear, later to become legalized. I have watched well-defined legal trails that have been there for decades become illegal. I have seen trails built in the worst possible places. I see them avoiding obstacles by traveling over rare vegetation. I see trails built to be impossibly technical, avoiding logic, traveling over rare desert vegetation to get to an obstacle. None of it makes much since, but sometimes there is a trail that is nearly perfect in its design, something of beauty that gives you access to a feeling of solitude and wonder without rupturing a remote ecosystem. Sadly, in a place such as Moab, perfect trail is the exception to the rule.

In southeastern Utah 97% of the land is public and a great deal of it pristine. Land management is LAND MANAGEMENT. We live in what kind of a country with what kind of government with what kind of bureaucracy? We get what we deserve as long as we kiss up to corporations like they are the teat and treat our mother Earth like she’s trailer trash.

Impact on the land is visible. The mostly invisible impacts are within the lives of night creatures who have carved out a home in the desert over eons. They simply retreat or die off, no longer visible to the rare soul who goes out into the desert at night (myself). If you come from the coasts and the farmlands, this is hard to recognize. It happened to your wild populations a long time ago. Europeans are enamored by our wildlife, but they killed their wolves long ago. The majority of people on the east coast think bears are pests. People who consider deer to be pests need to look in the mirror at the real pest, the one that has caused aberrations in animal or plant populations that lead to increasing death and degradation of the entire ecosytem, that includes us, by the way.

Environmental impacts of tourism, recreation and sport are not a concern for participants who live hundreds and thousands of miles from Moab, coming here to escape the very forces they bring down on this place, and who have never spent much time in such a climate. Damage done is seldom publicized or even rightfully witnessed. Habitat has no political power and it lives in the night.

If you grow to love a place, a particular area that touches you with its beauty and its wildness, then you watch it rot and erode because of a sport, or an event, or a mine, or a large vacation home, it truly hurts. I hope I can share this hurt with you. It is important that you know it exists. If you can share it, then it will reward you in little ways. You will see a spider as others see a cat. You will see a mountain lion as worthy of devouring your life. This makes you present.

This blog focuses primarily on education–sometimes in the form of a bike review and sometimes in the form of a rant on ecology. We simply want to attract smart, caring people to come to Moab to ride with us because we give a shit about how you treat this place, and how we treat this place with you in tow. If you have any research or insights to share that will further enlighten, please take the time to share it here. Trail building solutions are the problem of the trail builders. I do not build trails in the wild, though I occasionally come across a newly marked trail and cannot help but improve the trail builder’s awareness of a more eco-friendly route by moving or removing cairns, destroying markers or lining the trail with rocks. I marked a couple of routes north of town many years ago and soon learned that a line of cairns can turn into a freeway of motorized off-road madness, leading to more and more destruction, until at last the fence goes up and the signs shout at you, “REVEGETATION AREA.” “Designated” camp spots erupt. My solution to this problem is simply NO MORE TRAILS. There has to be a place where humans should not go. This concept is not foreign. It is Native! It is amazing that we cannot agree on setting aside what is left of the wild in this country, even as we discover how easy it is for us to destroy places we cannot even get to, let alone the places we love.

Issues relating to habitat encroachment and destruction of living desert soil crusts, as well as positive aspects of trail building in appropriate places need to be contrasted in this blog, but who gives a shit? Another topic I have been researching over the years is the psychology of trail building. A trail can describe and express a method of respect and consideration, or it can encourage unnecessary speed and casual destruction. It can be all about panic or it can encourage meditation. It can actually define the world as dangerous and foreboding or allow you to define it your own personal way. This study is where we can separate rampant abuse and instilled disrespect from careful, respectful visitation. An active discussion is desired. If you have something valuable to say, please do so.

Who gives a shit?

This blog is policed by an independent party. If you give a shit, expect wisdom, humor and insight to stick like glue and stupidity to vanish almost as soon as it is posted. We give a shit, but don’t care for people who would rather throw shit at a personality. After many years of promoting responsible use of the mountain bike I have found that negative feedback is easy to inspire. The suppressed, repressed and internalized guilt people feel when they realize their joyous lust of a sport can be extremely destructive to our Mother Nature causes anger that finds its way into the discourse. This blog is not here for people to defend or encourage trail building on public lands. It is here to bring understanding of the responsibilities of trail builders and users alike.

It is easy to build a trail in the Moab area because in this desert and sub-desert environment vegetation does not readily recover from impact. Three people can make a hiking trail by simply walking in single file across living soil crusts. The same is true of mountain biking, only more so. The decision on where to put any footprint or tire track should take into consideration not only the lay of the land, but living mosses, lichens and other vegetation that clings to a tentative existence in such a harsh environment, providing all the necessities of survival for creatures further up the food chain. Stay on the trail by all means, but sometimes the trail itself is the problem. It brings in dopes and Buddhas alike, then tells them, “This is all about mountain biking, nature be damned.”

My best friends are traditional Native Americans and I am blessed to have had elders to confide in and learn from, to bless me and to teach me about blessings. It is hard for someone of Western European ancestry to be in a position where the teachings and the unique perspective of the peoples who lived here before we arrived are taken as “law.” Natural law is respected in aboriginal cultures. White man’s law is something completely different. To a western European, theft of personal property is more important than understanding that we cannot “own” anything for very long. For western culture’s thinkers and doers it is hard understand that we are not here to dominate, but, in truth, there is only one reason to be here. We are here to live and getting this living thing right is the chore in front of us. Natural law is not policed by men in uniform. Its penal system is the world we end up with when we do not respect concepts of “balance” and “respect.” God’s bounty is not for our exploitation. It is for our welfare. We take too much, and, well . . . our ancestors get what we deserve.

Sometimes it is better NOT to do something than to do something without knowledge or permission. Knowledge is gained from experience and openness, AND the opportunity. If you have been culturally reinforced to believe you can know it all and it is all science and fact and reality, trouble will follow. Native America considers elders, those over 70 years of age, a resource of knowledge and wisdom. The dead, too, leave us with wisdom in text and image. Most of what I have to say here comes from these people. Elders are consulted whenever there is an important decision to be made. Sometimes there is no answer. But we must listen, and interpret with understanding, in silence. In western culture noise gets attention. Silence is boring. Time is money. Happiness is a goal. Material goods are the worth of your very soul. From this lack of understanding comes our inability to see other living creatures as our equals.

Can you be happy in front of a crucifixion?

I must start and end with a “prayer” (not the right word, but we don’t have a better word in English for this– “dedication” comes close) for our brothers and sisters, sons and daughters, grandfathers and grandmothers, the ones on many legs, no legs, on wings, with roots, and in the sea. The prayer is not to a god, but to a Mystery, a higher power and higher powers (we are indeed puny–to me, a lion is a higher power, as is a whale, as is a thunderstorm, as is a tidal wave), the four directions and the centers from which the directions are experienced, beings we cannot possibly see or understand, the creator who is the creation, the possible, the impossible, unknown and unknowable, and the lessons before us. Let us gain wisdom and share understanding. Let us learn a new way. Let those who destroy beware of destruction. Let those who love beware of the power of caring and the responsibility of honest words and actions. Let those who cannot see or understand, gain understanding somehow. And, it they are hopeless in their misunderstanding, let us eat them for dinner with a nice Merlot. And let those with a fine sense of humor share the best jokes on Earth right here, right now and on these pages in this virtual, yet real, storage place for thoughts and ideas, because we need to laugh, a lot. We need a loud, smelly fart in the prayer line to remind us that we are but animals living among animals who give us their lives for our sustenance. Respect is something we can learn from the most modest soul. Eat and be eaten.

Who gives a shit?