Mountain biking in the Moose River Plains comes with a fist pump
By Herb Terns
My first ride in “the Plains” was 2019 after a writer’s conference in Old Forge. My bike was a mountain bike in name only—a $75 beater I’d brought to commute to the conference.
Those first rides were over tame, gravel roads with forays on easy trails into Icehouse and Helldiver ponds. But something about cruising through the forest on a bike created a spark.
The Adirondack Explorer thanks its advertising partners. Become one of them.
For the past decade, I‘ve met a group of friends every summer to ride road bikes for a long weekend. In the early COVID-19 days, renting a house together was out. I proposed camping in individual tents at Limekiln Lake, renting mountain bikes and riding in the Moose River Plains.
My buddies were skeptical. They were road bikers, and they were grown-ups with high-deductible insurance plans.
They saw danger in mountain biking. They saw jumping off rocks and other high-risk things you see on YouTube. I assured them we would be riding like suburban fathers whose families expected us to be healthy enough to take out the garbage when we returned home.
Easy riding
Pedals & Petals in Inlet helped. We rented high-quality mountain bikes and they offered route guidance to suit our (low-quality) skill level.
The Adirondack Explorer thanks its advertising partners. Become one of them.
Our days at Limekiln Lake were deliciously simple—crawl out of sleeping bags, eat breakfast, drink coffee and ride.
When the riding was done, we rode back to our campsites and swam in Limekiln Lake.
Wet bathing suits hung on branches and our bikes leaned against tree trunks, awaiting the next day’s adventure. We ate tacos, sipped beers and told stories as the campfire crackled. The real danger was running out of days.
Through the years, I’ve built my memory map of the Adirondacks. There was a perfect day on Basin Peak that got me hooked on hiking the High Peaks. There were nights camped at Uphill Brook with friends that made me realize how much I loved backcountry camping.
The Adirondack Explorer thanks its advertising partners. Become one of them.
For mountain biking, that moment came at Beaver Lake. The trail to the lake was easy and flowy, first hugging the Moose River and then gliding through sweet-smelling pine forests. I wanted that trail to go on forever.
Mountain biking wasn’t about speed or adrenaline, it was about flowing through the woods with friends.
Emile Durkheim used the term “collective effervescence” to describe those moments when movement and social cohesion combine. Durkheim was speaking of dancing, but collective effervescence is how I feel when I’m paddling a canoe in rhythm and it’s what I felt as we rode to Beaver Lake. I’d discovered another way to explore a place I loved with people I cared about.
Family fun
That fall, I returned to Limekiln Lake with my wife, Gillian, and our daughter, who were both also somewhat reluctant mountain bikers. We rented mountain bikes from Pedals & Petals and rode some of the same trails I’d ridden with my pals.
The Adirondack Explorer thanks its advertising partners. Become one of them.
On the trail into Beaver Lake, Gillian underestimated the impressive braking power of our bikes. She locked the front brake on a small hill and went over the handlebars. For a second, the dangers of mountain biking were real, but she was uninjured. With fist bumps, we congratulated her on her first “endo.”
I had thought of Moose River Plains as the stretch of wild forest surrounding Moose River Road. But our friends at Pedals & Petals clued us into more riding. We enjoyed a single track near Bug Lake north of Route 28 that rivaled my love affair with Beaver Lake.
The three of us would ride and then return to Limekiln Lake. Our bikes rested against trees, awaiting the next day’s outing as we ate in the glow of a campfire. We made s’mores, played the board game “Settlers of Catan” and relived stories of the day’s ride as loons called over the water. Again, the danger was not having enough of these days.
A friend bought his first mountain bike after our trip in the Moose River Plains. Gillian, our daughter and I all bought them after our trip. Our daughter joined a mountain biking group for weekly rides and together, we’ve returned to Moose River Plains.
Little decisions, often so small we sometimes don’t even recognize them as decisions, combine to shape who we are. That thing we’re too old or too young or too scared to start can open effervescent worlds for us. The danger, the real one, is failing to start down the trail.
Leave a Reply