Well 6 months since the last visit and itching for a bit of North Wales trail centre action 5 of us made our way over to the real home of Fearingout - the Marin Trail near Betwyscoed.
A hazy start looked promising and as we made our way along the A55, making good progress in the light traffic.
By the time we arrived in the car park the skies had cleared and the first climb shaded by the trees was welcome rest bite from the sun - although the lack of a breeze made the atmosphere very close - good progress was made by all. After a quick breather at the top we dropped the saddles for the first 3 sections of singletrack. The first was lightning fast and got the blood flowing, especially in the dry conditions, tight twisty and a good surface. At the second extensive clearing had transformed this section visually, but no maintenance has made the trail quite rutted and off-camber and this has been worsened by people dragging brakes on full-sussers and drifting off course. Third up and the jumps are now just ruts due to the amount of traffic and again dragging brakes.
After another climb this time in the full sun - we re-grouped for a few quick singletrack sections which are in need of some repair. Still good fun and quite quick on a full-susser they're crying out for some decent jump and berm repairs. The short distance to Dragon's tail was reeled in quite quickly, and after stopping off to help some day trippers with rental bikes who'd had an off with a nasty elbow gouge we paused briefly to prepare for the assault. It's not worn out that much, being largely rock, but it's still rough as hell. For filming purposes we set off in tight formation, Jon and I cranking as hard as we could - in-advertantly leaving Ross and Chris for dust (in the dust!). Next up Ross offered to take the camera and after a small off after a front wheel drift he caught us dropping back onto the fireroad for the traverse round to Endor. Some lads with a Blur 4X (nice bike) and a Orange Crush were stopped with a puncture and no tools, so we helped out with Chris donating his spare. Endor is totally different - it used to be so dark through there now it's so light! 80% of the trees are down I'd say... The rest of the route passed by quite quickly with the short sections of singletrack interspersed by fireroad climbs - which were by now almost unbearable in the sunshine - so so hot.
Eventually we made it to the summit and the top of the last 3 descents. The first is hardly worth the extra height and was knocked off quite quickly. The second was dry dusty and fast and we did a bit of filming on the bottom jumps with a train of 4 - quite a good laugh and hairy if anyone had crashed. Jon was finding jumping the full-sus a different game to the hardtail and Pete was enjoying himself getting some air for the first time.
The final descent had some clearing work done on it as well turning into a dry dusty speed fest - absolutely bloomin amazing! I don't think there are enough supalatives in the english language for me to describe how good it felt for the 2 or 3 minutes it took to rag the arse of my Coiler through the rough sketchy conditions. I've said it before but I was grinning from ear to ear. Pete did a good job filming even capturing Jon's crash - blamed on 'showing off for the camera'.
Gwydwr yet again delivered in full. 100% satisfaction. A good ride, just long enough, not too many climbs, good for the fitness and awesome final descent. Beats the pants of Llandegla. Shame it's not a patch on the Tweed Valley... still first love and all that, I'm sure we'll be back before the end of the year!
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