mud biking - 072206

I wasn't really sure whether I was going to go biking but I decided to go nonetheless so I can spend time with my office friends. As usual, I got to the meeting place first (like I always do) and nobody was quite there yet --- typical. I was surprised because there were actually a lot of people going biking on that leg of daang hari. The folks arrived one at a time in the following order (the scale of lateness) : jowell, joseph, ricky, ali+iam, trixy, ice, and finally agnes. I was hoping bene could come biking since its been a while since I last saw him (bene, was the first one who greeted me on my birthday this year). He is a one of the nicest fellow I know of. I didn't expect jowell to join the bike ride either and was surprised when he arrived biking (from alabang).

The bike ride started light - a good 5-10 minutes of paved road. The "fun" started when we reached the end of the paved road and we started exploring the dirt road. Initially, there were just a few portions that were muddy and most easily navigated these. On the first route we took, we had to turn back because the trail was fenced at one end. The next trail brought us to a single, super muddy forest like route. This is where our mountain bikes quickly turned from clean to extremely dirty - and I do mean extremely dirty. I actually didn't mind so much the mud on my legs and how heavy my shoes were from all the mud clinging to it. I think this is the first time I gotten downright dirty like all get out. It was actually kind of fun doing that and I had fun taking lots of pictures along the way. It was at the point when some finished off their water that we made the decision to turn back from the trail we were going, which I think was the right decision considering we have decided beforehand that we were going to go to the alabang area first to get our bikes cleaned. The shortcut through the fenced area cut the trip back by a good 30mins and we stopped over a sari-sari store where a cold pop-cola was a welcome refreshment (so ok, I'm supposed to not drink carbonated drinks anymore). We finished the trail around 1230 (I think) and then biked some more to get to alabang. Surprisingly, the ride to alabang wasn't that exhausting, maybe because it wasn't scorching hot. There wasn't any car wash at Caltex so we had to bike some more to the shell station. Seeing the hi-pressure water pump taking off all the dirt & mud from my bike made me think how nice a shower would feel at that time. We contented ourselves though with washing the dirt right off our legs and then got a cab to take us back while iam stayed to watch our bikes.

We decided to have a late late lunch at mcdonalds where we laughed our hearts out reminiscing the comedic moments of our bike ride. I really missed hanging out with my intel friends - there's always a lot of laughter when I'm hanging with them.

more pictures here : mud biking - 072206