Posted by: snowsnake
The combination of trails in town where I live in Alaska are incredible on a hardtail - basically the only reason I own a full-sus is for long distance backcountry stuff. Lots of folks around here just squish their way around the XC trails on long travel enduros, and there’s definitely a bit of stigma towards hardtails. The bike I’ve spent the largest portion of my riding career on was a Trek Marlin 7, which admittedly isn’t the most capable hardtail, but was plenty for me to ride (almost) everything I wanted to around here. One of the only negative experiences riding a MTB that’s stuck with me is a couple years ago someone I know saw me out riding on that bike and literally told me to “get a real bike”, which has only spurred me on to ride harder on my hardtail. My full-sus has been down for maintenance for a bit now, and I’ve been really enjoying the hardtail-only life again - though an interesting discovery I’ve made is that I much prefer the ride feel of aluminum 27.5+ wheels to carbon 29ers without rear suspension to add some give.
Anchorage perhaps? I made a trip out there last summer to visit a friend and stole his girlfriend's bike for a day, rode from his apartment near Westchester Lagoon all the way down the paved Coastal Trail to Kincaid Park and we tried to ride as much of those genuinely fun undulating "cross country" trails as we could, and all the way back on paved trail...
...and I was on her 150mm travel Norco Sight and my buddy on his 170mm Trek Slash. That was pretty par for the course it seemed, only saw two hardtail riders all day, one on a hardcore HT and one on an XC bike. My buddie's been trying to convince me to make the move up there and I think I could maybe justify getting rid of my big squishy enduro bike and just having my Kona Woo with a winter fatbike wheel and rigid fork setup and summer 29er+ and suspension fork setup. Super jealous of the moisture y'all get in the summer, and the lighted trails in the winter seem like one of the best way to get some reprieve from cabin fever, but my buddy does complain a lot about how fucking cold his rides to work are in the winter, but he claims it's still better than driving during that part of the year.
Best part of that ride may have been the entertainment provided by all the tourists on rental hybrid e-bikes on the coastal trail, zig zaggin with each pedal stroke, pushing the bike up a hill, or being unaware of a giant moose blocking the trail. My pal gave that lady a good fright when he told her to stop and that if she went any further she would most definitely get gored by Alaska's most agressive land animal.