This weekend, I had a work outing to Limburg, the southmost province of the Netherlands and the most hilly one. One of the activities was mountainbiking in a man-made cave system. I consulted with the guides beforehand and was allowed to bring my unicycle while my collegues were on “grotbikes”.
It was a unique experience, but quite tiring since most of the caves were so low that I had to crouch all the times. I can still feel it when I crouch again. The bikers had their heads lower and were fine most of the time.
This particular cave system is called Sibbergroeve, and is the longest of its kind in the Netherlands, total length is 140 km. It was created to obtain the marlstone that these hills consist of, to be used for building purposes. It’s still used for that, but only for restoration.
On the picture you see me heading the group (next to the guide) because of my lower speed. This is the highest part where I could ride upright though.
Wow! great Picture!!
You must have had great fun havent you? Such an experience should be reported into the “been there, done that” page;).
Note to myself: Take the 20’’ and lower the saddle for cave riding:p
Man, how long have u been riding? and what kind of uni, i also love the idea of cavew riding, that picture is greater than a cheese grater, can u go unicycling under water in ur next thread please?
It’s not very often that overhead height is a problem when cycling (except going under fallen trees/branches). In a place like that mine/cave, the unicycle could be more disadvantageous than usual. Looks like a rare situation where riding with the seat too low would be a good thing.
Nice ride klaas
How much Km’s did you ride in the caves??.
I heard some rumors that we going to do this on the next “Unicycling in the Dutch Mountains 2006”.
Now i kown what unicycle to use the 20".
I don’t know really, the contact was made via the lady who did the booking for us. But when I was there I heard that some unicyclists had ridden in the cave before, so they may actually not have been overly surprised.
I’ve been riding for a bit over 5 years. This was a KH24 (and indeed not ideal). I’m often riding underwater in a sense i.e. below sea level, see caption of last pic on http://www.xs4all.nl/~klaasbil/beest_photos.htm .
I think we did about 6 - 8 km. I was in contact with Geert Mestrom and indeed they are considering this, that’s why they have been trying it out a few months ago.
I wonder why it’s so low there. I went to similar mines (Limburg too) , but the ceiling was almost so high as to be obscured in darkness. The walls were all scribbled full with signatures and names too. Not sure if they were open to biking though. (Or unicycling for that matter).
