Youth ! What splendid time of our lives. We are
full of pep and ready for all of the excitement and
adventures that life has to offer. Today's youth have
entirely new ways to experience those thrills. I sometimes
thank the heavens that I was born in much simpler times.
Of course I guess the thrills were always there if you looked
hard enough .. Maybe I just wasn't adventurous enough.
For instance I guess I was lucky that I was well past my
thrill seeking prime when I bought my first four wheeler.
I love to ride and the Sportsman's club that I'm in gives me
an excellent opportunity to ride in just about any kind of
terrain I care to. long trails through pine forests, several
creek bottoms to explore, acres of hardwood woods to wander
and an abundance of open fields with lakes and ponds
and endless connecting trails. Often after my morning coffee
at camp I take a nice slow ride into one of the forested areas,
shut off the bike and just sit there as the sun comes up and
soak in the sights and sounds of the world waking up.
Everybody has different ways that they like to
enjoy the area. Some love the hilly terrain in some areas
to test their riding/hill climbing skills. Others love the
mud holes in the creek bottoms and usually come back
looking like a giant mud ball, silly to me but they have their
fun so to each their own, Personally I don't enjoy washing
the bike that much lol
One thing that is popular year round are 'night rides'. I have,
in the past, gone on a few but it's not my cup of tea. Now I
very often ride by myself or with a friend or two at night just
to get out in the open fields and enjoy the stars and such away
from the campfire and lights but riding in a group at night just
sort of seems senseless to me. You can only see twenty yards
in front of your bike and staring at fifteen or twenty tail lights
all night just doesn't do anything for me. But the younger crowd
seems to love it so I guess they see something that I don't see.
The problem arises when a group sits at their camp all evening
having a few beers and general campfire fun and then gets bored
and decides to on a 'fun ride'. Most of the time everything is cool
and a good time is had by all. However there has been two times
this summer already where these night rides have become a little
too rowdy. Once a young man ventured off trail and wrecked
into a blow down tree suspending him and the bike several feet off
of the ground. This called for taking the club bulldozer out at three
in the morning to push down the tree and retrieve the bike. Thank
God nobody was injured but had it been an upright tree the results
could have been quite different. The problem is, as I stated before,
ones vision is limited to a few yards in front of the bike. At slow to
normal speeds this is not a problem. But if you add a few extra miles
per hour and a couple of beverages that save vision distance shrinks
considerably. This past weekend proved that. Just as we were about
to turn in the other night I noticed a e-squad on the road entering the
club grounds. Being nibby (I mean curious) we jumped on the bikes
and headed down thinking maybe there was an accident on the well
pad up the road. Turns out that while on a ride, three of the bikes got
separated from the pack somehow. In an attempt to catch up I assume
they were traveling at a pretty good speed. Although not a member
one rider who was a guest of a member and had rode these trails many
times and thought he knew exactly where he was forgot about a rather large
dip in the trail and hit it head on and flipped the bike several times end over end.
I ride this trail every week and although it is a pretty nasty section it is by
no means dangerous at normal speed and with ample time to react. But
it just came up too fast and with limited vision he had no time to react and
slow down. The young man suffered multiple head injuries. The problem
arises in this type of accident is that specialty equipment must be utilized
to treat and transport a person from a such a remote area. Lucky for us one
local fire department has such equipment. A nice six wheeled all terrain bike
with trauma equipment on board. And because our club held bike rallies for
years both the local emergency units and life flight helicopter have all of the
GPS coordinates for all of our club property. This has proven invaluable over
the years and paid dividends again this weekend. With a couple simple calls
a person can be located quickly anywhere on the property. So although it did
take a little while to get him stabilized and brought out everything went
smoothly from the extradition to the life flight landing right on the chosen
pad at one am. Although in a great deal of pain reports are no life threating
injuries just a pretty long recovery time and i'm sure a few facial scars as
memories. I expect to see a few slower riders at night for a while but i seriously
doubt it .. Give them thirty or forty years... they'll catch on..
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