""Hornsby Mountain Bike Trail is closed due to wet conditions and is unlikely to reopen for several days." Per Council Website. You can get the tweets directly from council if you choose. We certainly got some rain recently, great weather for ducks"

The following data table (bookmark it and read it often) provides good insights into trail conditions from Manly Dam right up to Cowan and down again to Brooklyn, and almost out to Hawsbury. If we consider factors like the following (highlights) we can all learn to predict conditions more accurately: Wind dries trails, clay holds water sand drains, rock reflects water, timbers and logs in valleys protected from dry wind can be slippery, ridge trails like Jubes get more wind so dry quicker, OMV in the darker parts gets hardly any wind.

Your mind is thinking all these things every time you go to lift that front wheel over a wet log, and if it isn't, and your body/bike is still intact, well you might on the the next damp mossy looking log/root you prepare to roll over.

Looking at attached graphic: The 1st recent (blue highlighted) rain event was dried out by the winds (thanks wind!!!) that continued all week (yellow highlight). However, last night's rain event (blue highlight) was just too much for Old Man's Valley. If the trail was concrete, asphalt, or compacted granite, no problem, but we like clay, sand, rock, timber, tree roots, peddles, sandstone, leaves, loose-over, and all these variants for good reason. It's an important part of off-road cycling.

NobMob http://nobmob.com/ keeps a listing of trails open/closed status, and is only as up to date as the last "update". This still requires riders to use common sense, most status's are updated from experienced rider's common sense, trying to pass on what many of us consider just plain common sense. not local land managers. Very hand if your travelling to a trail that is so far from home, you can't predict the conditions by scratching a stick in the dirt in your front yard before you load all the those bikes up. If OMV is closed, maybe check NobMob (there is a huge database of trails) and you might find something else to ride.

Fire Trails are open for riding regardless of weather, (except thunderstorms obviously). For people driving a long way to find a "Closed" sign, maybe you could save on fuel/time and simply ride an open single track, fire trail, or concrete loop closer to home after reading the charts. Surfers read charts to, tide, water temp, wind, and wind direction. They take to the skate parks when it gets too messy out there. Fishermen have been guessing conditions based on the weather, moon, clouds etc. for thousands of years before any council had a website or twitter account. Sailors do it too, the live ones do it most often!

Per: http://www.hornsby.nsw.gov.au/my-lifestyle/sport...

A rant about open / closed / soil types / wind / chart reading / common sense / want to ride concrete, go road riding.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Snorc-Sydney-Nort...

Noel