Riding Steamboat Hot Springs Trail and Lower Bear Trail

On my second day in Steamboat I headed a little farther out of town. Steamboat has had the same wet spring weather that we’ve had in the Front Range, so most of the high elevation trails were reported to be pretty swampy. I rode up the Hot Springs Trail to Lower Bear Trail and back down again.

I really enjoyed both trails.  They were not really all that difficult technically. Lower Bear is a granny gear climb, but nothing too severe.  During the entire ride up I was dreaming of video-ing the descent, inspired by my previous days adventure.  I rigged up a Manfrotto Superclamp to my stem and mounted my Canon G10 camera on top, with a plan to record the gorgeous descent.  I wasn’t really sure if the camera was going to survive or not.

Climbing up through the Aspens, the camera mount system seemed to be withstanding the vibrations. . .

I stopped at this overlook, turned on the camera, hit record, and descnded the trail at about 85% speed, trying to be as smooth as possible. About 1/3 of the way down I realized that the camera was rattling. The tripod mount was coming loose from the camera body! Bummer.  The video was really shaky with a nasty rattling sound. Too bad. It looks pretty cool, but also really amateurish at the same time. So I went back to the condo and promptly ordered a new helmet cam! Stay tuned for real videos coming in the future!