Quick Weekender – Guacamole

Last weekend, Bill O’Neil and I got in a quick weekender in St George, Utah.  This is not our first rodeo for a roadtrip so most of the planning came down to the “You bring the usual, I’ll bring the usual.  Meet at the usual spot.   What time?”   So with all that intricate planning done we were headed north on Friday morning.

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We made really good time and were rolling through, Huricane, La Verkin and into Virgin by early afternoon.    The destination for the afternoon ride was Guacamole Mesa.  We had ridden here a couple of years ago and were itching to get back out here.   Above is the view from where we parked on the mesa.

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It was a fabulous day out in the low-mid 70s.   In the valley below is Dalton Wash Road that we came in on.

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View that don’t suck.    I love the nice combinations of singtletrack dirt trails, up/downs, slick rock, mesa views it just a great buffet of the stuff I love about this area.

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Near the south end of the mesa on the Holy Guacamole trail.  The trail names are all pretty cool and themed;  Margarita, Lime, Salt-On-The-Rim and of course Guacamole.

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More mesa goodness.

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A great time of the year to be out here.  Lots of the flora has thier springtime happy face on.

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Zion National Park is the backdrop to the north and east.

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There are some cool rock formations to ride through around and over.    The trail can be technical enough that the views can be thier own hazard.  Sometimes its best just to stop and take a look around.

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Riding on the slickrock (equestrians came up with that term – it really should be called griprock) is always fun and I enought the route finding aspet of following the trail.    Finding and chasing cairns is demension of riding out there that I find quite in enjoyable.

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Of course when you have a whole field of this stuff sometimes freeforming on the rocks are a ton of fun as well.    (There is a waldo in shot above).   After knocking out this ride we head over to Little Creek Mesa where we setup for camp for the next couple of days.  And enjoyed some tasty beverages and camp food.

Cruising through the Cuyamacas

This past weekend, I got out into the Cuyamaca Mountains.   Main this place has some nice scenery and trails.  We started from the San Diego River staging area just off of HWY-79 and took the west side single track up to the visitor center and then took the Green Valley fire road to the Upper Green Valley single track for a climb up to the La Cima trail by Sunrise Highway.   We then looped over to the California Riding and Hiking Trail.     From there we took Soapstone Fireroad over to Cold Springs trail and then loopback on the west side trail.   We were a bit past the greenest time of the year but there were still plenty of blooming flora.   Good Stuff!

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Steve and Rodney climbing the Upper Green Valley Singletrack

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The board members of the Pacific Crest Trail Association were seen out and about in Green Valley.

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Plenty of water to cross on the west side trail.

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The Cold Springs Trail

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Bloom along the entire hillside

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Rodney on California Riding and Hiking Trail.   This is one of my favorite sections of this trail in the county.

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Steve working his way up to the “Oak Trees”.

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Lake Cuyamaca has both a upper and lower dam to help keep the “normal” water contained in the south end.   You can see the upper dam as the thin line of land in the middle of the picture.   There is water in the entire upper valley which is just incredible.

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I believe Steve is trying to convey that this trail is the #1/Ichiban Trail  🙂

I am overdue for an update to my Cuyamaca Mountains page.   I think I am going to split it up into two different pages to cover several of the routes you can take out here better.