Mountain Biking in the Louisville Kentucky Mega Cavern

 DJ, Jeff and I left very early this morning (earlier due to daylight savings time!) to make the trek down to Louisville, Kentucky for two reasons:  The North American Handmade Bicycle Show (more on that in another post) and to ride the cave...the Mega Cavern!

 The Mega Cavern is a mine that has been repurposed as a recreational facility.  It has climbing, zip lining, and...mountain biking.  This is a view from the parking lot.  It goes down from those gaping square holes in the ground.

 Very tidy facility inside.  The tent is the registration, and behind that are doors that go into a lobby of sorts.

 The lobby had the climbing stuff, as well as the zip line.  Very cool!

 There was also a concession stand and gift shop.  Remember, this is all underground, in the mine.

 And on to the mine.....At first, it's a bit overwhelming.  There are seemingly trails going everywhere, but upon closer inspection, there is a very well thought out design.  Follow the arrows, don't go where it says "wrong way"!

 Here is Jeff, sitting on his bike next to one of the big line of dirt jumps.  Most of the youngsters were doing big things on these big jumps.  They had all sorts of bikes for this:  bmx racing bikes, dirt jumping bikes, and clunkers.  Some of them were very good!

 A taste of some of the wild jumps.

 A kid boosting a set of doubles.

 A very cool sort of hip turn on the XC course.

 A big feature in the line of big jumps.

 A view from the top: This was at the top edge of the mine.  Along the right wall, where the riders are walking up,  is the main cross country course. The kids in the foreground are waiting their turn to go down one of the three jump route.  I stuck to the XC course and the other stuff that flowed.

 This is the scariest thing I did.  Dropping off this platform, down the hill, up the next "jump"...only I hit the right edge of the jump and took the hard right bowl turn into a slalom of sorts.  Super fun.  The cool kids jumped this big ass jump!

Other features of the course included wooden pathways, old shipping containers that could be ridden through and over, super fun twisty corners, fast and bumpy straights...something for everyone. 

It was truly a fun time.  It's advertised as being 60 degrees or so inside the mine.  It was more like 50, 55 degrees, but it was not a problem.  Upon our arrival, there were 60 people or so riding, and that included kids as young as 5 and adults well into their 50's.  We were wasted after riding 3 hours, and at that time there were less than 25 people in the mine.  If you are in the area, make the time to visit this great facility.

I present to you - Moto Girl

 I really try to avoid watching videos of people crashing.  It gets to me.  I always feel a twinge when I see some poor sap's head hitting the ground.  But sometimes, I just have to get my fill of this video and the music that's played in it.  Don't worry, it's super short.


Just because you can doesn't mean you should.

Colorado - Seems like Yesterday

It seems like just yesterday, but it was actually the summer of 2012 when we loaded up the family and drove to Colorado.  We did a lot of fun stuff; we visited a train museum in Nebraska, sifted for gold and toured an abandoned gold mine, rode bikes at Valmont Bike Park, and went to Red Rocks Amphitheater.  This photo is of the boys posing in the massive rows of seats.

Birthdays - A Little Late

 For the longest time, we've been celebrating Hanna's birthday alongside cousin Max.  They're not on the same day, but they're close.  You can't beat a cookie cake.  Yum.

Hanna is obviously quite engaged, whereas Max looks a bit like he's dreaming about what he's going to do to the cake.  Or maybe he's worried about the candles. 

St. Francis Park - A Jewel in South City

 I have been around St. Francis Park for almost 30 years.  I have lived in quite a few different apartments that are within walking distance, have ridden my bike there, and have even raced crits around it. It's a wonderful place.  A few Sundays ago, Deanna, Eli, Hanna and I walked around on a cold day just to get outside.  Some of the sculpture work around the pond is awesome.

 Tiny frogs are positioned in pretty good places for a real frog to be.

 Looked real from 15 feet away.

 Closer to the front of the park, this one is really interesting. 

 Tiny dragon is a nice touch.

 Mosaic heart would be a great gift on Valentine's day if not so heavy.

Mermaid is reading while keeping watch over the pond.

Car Watching - 1982 Nissan 280ZX

 While not as cool or exotic as many of the cars I like to get photos of, the 280ZX (and it's 240-260 relatives) are part of the car culture from the time I grew up.  I caught this one in a grocery store parking lot late one afternoon.

 While earlier 240z and 260z versions were very stark and quite sports-car like, the 280ZX was a bit softer and a bit heavier...more to the liking of US consumers.  It's increasingly rare to find any of the Z cars anymore, as most rusted away quickly.

This one had a few bad spots on the body, but it was in fine shape overall.  The interior of these early Japanese invaders was actually pretty neat, much more modern than things you could buy from US makers in 1982.  The interior of this one was pretty nice.

Welcome to the Family, Laura

Today my brother- and sister-in-law baptized their newly adopted little girl.  (That's my son Tyson who is Laura's God Parent...who would have thought?)  Welcome to the family, sweet girl.

Playing auto mechanic - Ford Fusion

I have not spent the time wrenching on my current car like I have my previous rides.  It's more like an appliance than a toy, so I don't relish the opportunity to do work on it.  I'm not sure there is anything fun to work on in this car, anyway.

But routine maintenance is something that I have always done on my own cars.  Like changing the oil and rotating the tires.  Which is what I did today.

Now I smell like oil.  And my neck hurts.

TBT - Throw Back Tuesday - Vector BMX in Florida

A cut-out from the NBL Members newspaper in 1985.  Check out the patch above my left eye...I fell earlier in the day.  Can't remember falling, but remember wearing that stupid gauze and it was messing up my vision the whole day.  Memories are strange.

Car Watching - 1970 Buick Skylark GSX

 If this is an actual Buick Skylark GSX, then it's a rare bird indeed.  This top-dog muscle car from Buick would be one of 678 examples built in 1970.  This one looked very nice indeed, looking through the glass windows.

The 455cu.in. V8 was rated at 350 horsepower, but it held one of the highest torque ratings of any car in it's time:  510 lb-ft.  There was one option higher, and still more rare, the Stage 1.  But I'll take a GSX spotting any day.

Lucky night for car spotting!

Car Watching - DeTomaso Pantera GTS

 Ok, so this Pantera didn't come to me.  I spotted it in a little place on Gravois past Bevo Mill.  You all know my love for the Pantera, so we had to stop. The size of the exhaust pipes make me believe that this thing will bring the thunder.

 This was a gorgeous car.  The yellow is stunning, although taking photos with my phone through the glass windows will not show that too much.

 Great body.

 I was able to catch the DeTomaso symbol in the grill under the point in the nose.

 The side view is just as stunning.

 The wing is enormous.  Look just at the tail end of the roof, just ahead of the black wind diffuser...are those what I think they are?

....Yes!  I'm so happy I was able to get a view of the velocity stacks stacks poking up through the engine cover.  If that's still a Ford 351 Cleveland in there, it's breathing pretty well!

Car Watching - 1965 Chevrolet Impala Super Sport

Into the lot pulled a 1965 Chevrolet Impala Super Sport today.  It was a sight for sore eyes, being the middle of winter.  Do you know how hard it is to spot cool cars...especially vintage iron...when it's 20 degrees outside?

 This was a 327 V8 car, and the owner had taken the time to do a fairly nice job of restoring this wonderful piece of Chevrolet history.  He did it himself, although his son had started the project with him.  Girls soon took the boy in a different direction, so dear old Dad finished it by his lonesome.

 The body was great, and the "Super Sport" script was on point.

 The interior was dandy.  White vinyl.  And that cue ball shift lever gave the nod to a kick ass manual transmission.  I should have gotten a couple more shots of the interior, as it was really nice.

 Good looking fastback roofline has always drawn me to this years car.

 Oh, those individual circular tail lights....love them.  The bumpers were looking fine, too.

 Looking down the side of the car was a treat.  He did a great job on the body of this one.

Muscular, great paint, 327 V8, manual transmission....I was really, really happy to see this one today!

Final Post of 2014!

 This was supposed to be my last post of 2014, but I was under the weather so it's my first post of 2015.  The first photo is of my two favorite people, Ma and Pa Zimmer at Christmas.

 Eli, reading Christmas stories to the little ones.

 ....he gets easily distracted.  Love the hat.

 Hanna always has a smile for the camera.

 We took Rex for a hike at Laumeier Sculpture park.

 Cool pyramid thing that Tyson would have been climbing on if he had been with us.

 Miniature high rise apartment building.

 Chainsaw-cut Redwood trunk

 The remnants of a very cool swimming pool.  This is my favorite part of the park.

 It was a personal pool, yet it was nearly as big as a public pool.

 The view from the other end.

 The story behind it's inclusion in the Sculpture park.

 Another part I really like.

 Metal sculpture hanging in the trees. 

 A boat-like structure.

 That is a lot of metal.

 Hanna loved the eyeball.  It appears as though this eyeball belonged to a heavy weed smoker.

 Rex was beside himself with all of the other dogs that were at the park.

 Hanna was not down with the mud hut.

 But, she was willing to lend a couple of hands to the armless sculpture.

 Hanna and I at Joey B's.

 Like her hand tattoo?

 Me trying to be serious at New Years Eve.

 Didn't work.

A parting shot with Alex, Michael, Mrs K and I.