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On the Road: Joe Cruz Treelines Alaska, Pt. 1

Maybe you remember in the spring when we built a Treeline SL for our buddy Joe Cruz. We said then that bringing Joe together with that bike would guarantee adventure, and we’re happy to say we were right. Joe is a restless soul. He spends his days teaching philosophy at one of New Englands bucolic colleges, but any break in the schedule, any opportunity at all, Joe will travel, and when he travels, it’s by bike.

The first adventure on his new Treeline was to Alaska, first a quick tour of the area surrounding Anchorage and then off to the glacial north. Joe is a vivid writer. Here are some words and pictures from the trip:

Out of the airplane window, snow ripples bound for the horizon and enough time passes for an epiphany, no signs of human life for unusually long. It’s March so home is seeping away from winter but I’m headed back toward it now, mostly into sparsity and space, woods that aren’t just parcels and rivers that pick up speed to that geologic inertia less compromised by our interventions.

Two Bikepacking bikes prepared for Alaskan adventure

Anchorage is a place that is not about itself, its arrow of reference points to the mountains on clear days or towards the chop and surf of river and ocean. Wide linear strip mall avenues with cheap block era architecture, low downtown buildings huddled together as awkwardly as a group of strangers not wanting to be left out of a conversation at a party. When I’m driving it in my brother-in-law’s borrowed inevitable ’86 Toyota pickup, it takes longer to get anywhere because the one way streets take you ’round expansive city blocks, but it also takes less time because there is speeds and space, like going twice as fast at a 1/2 time frame rate. It’s a built up environment that isn’t an aspiration but an accommodation of the varied wants or realities that bring people here. Gold, adventure, work, birth, misanthropy, dreams, freedom, land, fear, courage.

distant riders on the snow covered tundra

We pitch a pyramid tent by the sinking sun and firming snow, anchoring the lines to our bikes, I draw a straw short enough to put me at one of the edges and I keep waking in the night to a suffocating dream with damp nylon on my face. Nick, who’s at the other edge, points out that one of the advantages is that he and I can just lift the edge to take a piss and that’s a plausible enough consolation. Inside it’s cozy, there’s no end to the eating. Nick and Lael each have used up an entire loaf of bread in making their sandwiches and they seem content with living on those, I seesaw between jealousy and quizzical skepticism for days.

Our hours are upriver and downriver churning on the Yentna, sometimes we spread out and I meditate the blinding white, the pulse of patches of soft snow, the ruts of the snowmachines. Sometimes we’re three and four wide talking, wave at the occasional mechanical speeder, the boys find unopened cans of beer in the snow from where they fell off supply sleds, we’re dehydrated enough to be left loopy after a few deep gulps.

This is just an excerpt from Joe’s journal. Read more here. We’ll be sharing more of his adventures here in coming weeks.

Spring’s Promise/Summer’s Heat/Fall’s Hope

Seven road bike in the woods

It’s overwhelming, Spring in New England. The flood of riding possibilities that come with better weather leave you wondering what to do first, how much to do, which direction to ride. It’s like a starving person confronted with a Vegas buffet.

And in a minute, it’s summer. The riding becomes regular, more regimented. You know where you’re riding, when, and who you’ll ride with. You start to feel fit, maybe you even are. It’s hard to tell. Everyone else is getting fit, too.

Cafe Racer SL with red and white pointed panels

Then the heat sets in. You pay more attention to your water bottles, spend more time, off the bike, making yourself drink water. If you set goals, you begin to know whether you achieved any of them, even if they only amount to riding more with friends.

Although it’s still warm here, the factory’s big tilting windows channeling in whatever air is available, we can feel the change to Fall coming. Conversations leave the road, turn to cyclocross, mixed-terrain, Fall mountain biking. Someone says the words “fat bike.”

Seven Treeline Fat bike with drop bars

If Spring is a beginning, then Fall is one, too. We start to dream about cool temperatures, wondering how much faster and farther we might go. There is an urgency, too, in Fall. Winter is coming. We will ride straight through it, but certain places and certain ways of riding will be less possible. Fall is the time to cram in the good stuff, the things we missed during the Summer’s high heat.

Joe Cruz, the Treeline SL Early Review

Our buddy Joe is a bike-packer of some skill and repute. Regular readers will recall that we built him a Treeline SL recently, in advance of a trip to Alaska (more on that to come). Now that he’s back, we’ve received an early review of the bike that we thought worth sharing.

Treeline SL in the rugged countryside

Hey Seven, 

Though I’ve had the Treeline for over a month, I’d only ever ridden it in Alaska on frozen rivers and snowmobile trails with a full load. It was fantastic in that context, the most perfect adventure bike I’ve been on.  

Treeline SL in the frosty woods

But tonight I joined up with our Thursday Night Mountain Bike Worlds and rode it unladen. Holy s*%t: that bike rips. I pointed it down chaotic corkscrew chunky pitches and it just carves and carves. The geo is brilliant, super fast turning but so easy to throw your hips to stand it back up it seemed like cheating.  So many thanks for your hard work.  

More soon,

Joe

Plus Size Versatility

Our buddy Tim Brick, at Brick Wheels in Traverse City, MI, sent us these photos of their latest Seven demo bike, a Treeline S, built to ride as a 29+ mountain bike, or a full-tilt fat bike with 4-inch tires.

Seven Treeline SL

Versatility is value. At first glance, the Treelines are fat bikes, built for snow adventures, but we were never interested in just building fat bikes, as awesome as they are. We wanted the Treeline to be a valuable bike year-round, which is why we made them part of our mountain line. Roll the snow all winter long, and then swap over to plus-sized tires for  regular trail riding.

Seven Treeline SL

Guaranteed Adventure

Here we are with Joe Cruz (the one in the blazer), the night he picked up his new Treeline SL from the shop. A philosophy professor during daylight hours, at all other times of year Joe is compulsive traveler and a committed back country cyclist. We wrapped this bike Tuesday night, and tomorrow Joe leaves for Alaska, where he’ll swap over to studded tires for a week of glacier exploration outside of Anchorage.

Joe Cruz poses with his new Treeline SL and the team at Seven

We count ourselves lucky to be able to work with riders like Joe and Jeff Curtes and Daniel Sharp and Matt and Mo Bruno Roy, and of course countless others who use our bikes to find and share big adventures.

As kids, we remember pedaling away from home, disappearing for hours at a time, going wherever our wheels would take us, and the chance to recapture that sense of exploration and adventure now is really priceless.

Watch this space for more from Joe as well as the rest of Seven’s sponsored, encouraged, and inspired riders. The adventure is guaranteed.