Does anyone know of any local WA ski-lifts that operate during the summer (so as to MUni)? I used to mountain bike at snoqualmie pass (before I learned to uni), but they closed the lifts a year or two ago.
I don’t know of any seeing as how I’m nowhere near you but a word of caution: Many ski lift employees may try to keep you from getting on the lift w/o a brake. If you don’t have one be ready to explain the (disgustingly simple) concept of DIRECT DRIVE. Show them that if your legs stop moving so will your ride.
Doesn’t look like Mt. Baker, Stevens Pass, Summit at Snoqualmie, or Crystal Mt. offer summer lifts.
Snoqualmie put out a Press Release in April 2003 stating they were discontinueing the summer lifts due to flat growth, increased insurance costs, and increased topsoil erosion & plant destruction from Downhillers not sticking to the trails.
Whistler still has summer lifts but I don’t know their policy for unicycles.
Bummer. I’m so glad we were fortunate enough to have two great sets of races and rides at the Snoqualmie Pass, in 1999 and at Unicon 11 where the whole world got to play.
I’ll never forget my favorite quote from the Unicon race down the mountain. Yuichiro Kato has a fairly limited English vocabulary. He used to be the undisputed fastest rider in the world, but he had limited offroad experience. So we’re barreling down the first part of the course, a really rocky, bumpy dirt road in a crowd of riders trying to get in front of each other. As the pack started to spread out, I heard his voice somewhere nearby: “Oh my goodness!”
Perhaps this is why there is very little lift-assisted mountain biking in the Lake Tahoe area anymore. Squaw Valley no longer does it. Fortunately Northstar still does. If you want to ride some lifts and enjoy awesome trails with lots of other riders, mark your calendars for Muni Weekend 2004, September 17-19.
(another shameless plug)
In the thread below, Nathan discusses this:
http://www.unicyclist.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=27895&highlight=whistler
Sounds like at that location at least it’s ok (for now).
I am definitely planning a riding weekend up there later in the summer. While I’ve recently developed a taste for climbing, Miles has informed me that Downhill is where it is at.
I checked the Whistler Blackcomb mountain bike page that I wrote about in the thread Tom mentioned. Looks like there have been some improvements. A-Line was one of the few good trails that was open after the big rain when we visited and now it has some wooden features added. When I wrote that, I understated how much hassle it was to actually be allowed to pay lots to ride, but we were the first ever unicyclists there. Supposedly unicyclists are welcome now, but I’d love to hear the experiences of the next person to try it.
It’s a shame that so many of the Calif and WA lifts are no longer running in summer. Then again, I like the uphill too, and don’t like the cost and commercialness of lift-assisted Muni.
—Nathan