29 inches - Purchase and first serious trip

Something like a month ago, I acquiered a mountainbike, one of those new with 29" wheels, that have gained ground during the last couple of years. From the first moment on, I was sure that I would like the bigger wheels, because wheel diameter is exactly what most had bothered me about mountain bikes for so many years. On plain level earth roads and hard ground downhill slopes, I always felt that the small 26" wheels set a limit to top speed far to soon, just when speeding doesn't consume too much energy. Here I must say, that for many years, back in Germany mostly, I used mountain bikes for everyday purposes and in urban environments where other types of bicycles, without doubt, would have been of better choice. 

Picture of a season 2014 29" mountain bike, taken from the official Cube webpage

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But the reason I decided to renew my bike weren't the wheels. Mainly it was the fact that the old one had already been in use for 15 years, and that it was in urgent need of a probably expensive maintenance. For two years, I couldn't decide whether to spend more money on such an old bike or to rather discard it altogether and buy a new one. This also explains why I've barely done any biking lately. When I finally had made up my mind, the only thing I knew was, that I wanted a 29" mountain bike. My old bike had a front suspension only, ordinary rim brakes and was quiet heavy.However, I'd never missed the comfort a rear suspension would provide me with, nor did I ever have the feeling of lacking breaking power. It seems, that virtually all descent bikes have disc brakes nowadays, but there still exist non fully suspended bikes, so called hardtails. Those are available made of aluminium or carbon, the latter being much lighter and - surprise - much more expensive (believe it or not: up to 8000 Euro!). My maximum price tag therefore only allowed for an aluminium hardtail. 

After consultation of a number of webpages, I saw that bikes from previous years (biking years beginning in September) were offered with a discount, but not always were available. I also learned that more or less all brands offered the same equipment, Cannondale being more expensive than others. I therefore discarded Cannondale and went on looking for a bike that visually appealed to me. My absolute favourite after internet consultation was Drössiger. 

Unfortunately, not a single Drössiger dealer exists in Catalonia - not even in Spain the closest one being French or Portuguese. 

When I started to continue information gathering by visiting some shops, brands as Massi and Merida bore interest too, but again, no last season bikes were of adequate size while actual ones still were unavailable. 

So it came I went to a Cube dealer. Due to some complications (concerning the possibility to purchase a 2013 Merida bike from him), the dealer I had decided to buy from made me wait for a month or so, but as a reward for my patience he offered me a 20% discount. Instead of saving the money, however, I went for a bike pertaining to a higher category, one that appealed even more to me .... my new bike, is a Cube LTD Pro 29 of the actual 2014 season. I could choose between black and orange and I'm still surprised to have chosen the colourful tone. (Yes, it really is the model that can be seen in the photo opening this blog entry.)

Railroad Bridge near St. Martí de Terroella

Until now, I mostly biked after work when it's already dark. My usual route is between 10km and 14km long, goes between 400m or 500m up and down and leads either to St. Jaume de Vallhonesta, St. Pere de Vallhonesta or both. Since it's dark, I stick to earth roads, basically. But last weekend I went on a Tour I had found in a guide for MTB routes to be done in Bages (our rural district) I briefly want to focus on.

Onto the bridge

Bages with MTB, Route 1:

Route 1

The proposed 60km long route starts at "Parc de l'Agulla", a water reservoir close to Manresa. Due to a total of 129 desviations, it demands quiet a lot of map reading or re-reading of the route's description. As a matter of fact, of the almost 7 hours I needed to finish this circular route, I spent about 2 hours without moving, according to my km-counter - in other words: route finding. Furthermore, the counter says that instead of 60km, it took me 72 of them to finish the route and I positively confirm that I indeed did some extra rounds. On two occasions I even lost the route and had to invent my own way towards the next "mile stone". On the other hand, I'm not totally sure about the accuracy of the km-counter, but since I programmed it myself by measuring the wheels' diameter and multiplying with pi, I don't have any reason to suppose it wouldn't count well.  

Centenary Oak tree fed by Sequia water

The route first thing crosses the C25 highway and then follows "La Sèquia" upstream, "La Sèquia" being a medieval channel that still feeds Manresa and its surroundings with water for irrigation and drinking purposes. The mentioned water reservoir, as a matter of fact is fed by the very channel. The route then stays close to a railroad track for a while and leads to the village of St. Martí de Toroella. After it crossing a forest and some fields, it enters the village of St. Pedor, returns to the channel, crosses the highway C16, enters the village of Cabrianes, crosses more forests, fields and again the C25, approaches Artès, then enters yet another forest, and leads to some wineyards responsable for a number of much appreciated wines. 

Artium!!!

The route then passes by a very beautiful place known as "La Font de les Tàpies"...

Astonishingly humid surroundings at "La Font de les Tàpies" 

29"

Masia Les Tàpies

...and approaches the village of Navarcles. It then passes by the locally well known monestry of St. Benet from where it runs alongside the Llobregat river for a while.

An old textile (?) manefactury with a dam at Llobregat river

Pedestrian overpass of the C16 - almost at sunset

After a point known as "Els Tres Salts", the path diverges from ther river's flow and approaches an urbanisation called Vilardordis that already belongs to Manresa. After another crossing of the highway C16 it leads back to the water reservoir it started from.

Back at Parc de l'Agulla

I must say, that the track as a whole doesn't seem too logical - I rather had the feeling that its main purpose was to be of 60km length, but I enjoyed it anyway, despite the fact that it cost me much effort trying to find and follow it. I really wonder how profound the author's knowledge of  the cyclable paths in central Catalonia must be in order to come up with a route like this one, because it leads to some curious places by making use of at times very surprising paths. All in all, it's a highly recommendable route that, by the way, is possible to split into two seperate ones.