Trail Wanderlust
San Diego Trails
So lately. I have been doing the Wednesday Stoke ride out in Santee with Steve. Not all miles are created equal and these are pretty good.
They are not exactly supposed to be on the map, but snooping around on Strava or trailforks will find you the goods
Steve working the line less traveled.
Good Times!
I made it out to the Cuyamaca Mountains for a a dawn patrol ride this morning. It was a brisk 55 when I started out but it not take long to warm up.
The east side singletrack followed by the fireroad climb up east mesa was quite manageable.
It was about a three to four mile climb up to fireroad to get to the single track that tasks our across the meadow.
I was a little bit past prime time for the wild flowers but there were still a plenty. I took the singletrack out to where you start descending down towards the Indian Creek trail. Here is some info on that option.
After a very peaceful break I retraced my tracks back to the fireroad. For something new to me I took the Oakzanita peak trail.
It was a little under two miles long and most of the climbing occured during the last half of a mile or so. Most of the peak prominence is on its western slopes so you have already gain much of thr elevation when coming in from the east. The last half mile is very much a loose rock and techy bit of fun ckimbing.
The view from Oakzanita peak was really cool and worth the effort. On the return trip, I took an unmarked trail that took me most of the way down the mountain. It was a great bit singletrack. It popped me out on the East Mesa fireroad. This was the upper Descanso Creek trail and saddly it is not only marked at the bottom, but also marked no bikes. Its a shame as it would be my preferred way to come off the mesa. I would not want to climb it. After that it was a quick spin on the East Side singletrack back to my truck. A great morning in the bike.
Daley Ranch is still holding onto some springtine!
I did a loop that include the Sage trail up and over into Jack Meadow and the up the way an over to Engelman Oak and back around.
Sometimes I find myself with a ho hum attitude about the local stuff. This is particularly case after roadtrips. But rides like that this help to shake those feelings off.
Life has been busy. In a good way. Busy enough that I have been living life and not carving out time to share it in this format. I go throgh these spells. I have come to realize that this blog is just as much a sanitized log of my life on two wheels for myself as much as it is for sharing with others. So I’m going to fill in the historical gap from my last ride until present with a handful of ride stories and pics to tell the story. It is currently the later half of August but this post is going to be date back to middle of May. I will close the gap until the posts about the amazing times on the bike I am currently having in Washington state.
—— Now onto the catchup ——
So I bought a new toy. A 19-foot travel trailer. Its has a queen size murphy bed for my sweetie and I. Along with that he has two bunks so it could also support MTB roadtrip with the broz. After a very close to home shake down outing we took it up to Laguna Meadow for our first real outing.
I did not have a reservation but the campgroup has a number of sites that are not part of the reservation system. So I went up midweek grabbed a spot for the remainder of the week and the weekend. After setting up the trailer I went for a spin around the meadow, up Chico ravine and down Los Gatos.
There was plenty of springtime going off on the meadow. I have to say it was very cool to have a baby house waiting for me at the end of the ride. I ended up spending the night there and going straight into work in the morning.
Last weekend, I took a freind of mine (Jim) out to the Cuyamaca Mountains to show him around. The weather was overcast around rhe county and as we headed up into the mountains it started to get a little foggy. At the trailhead we were pretty much socked in.
We started up the west side single track. After crossing over highway 79 we came upon some wild turkeys which are plentiful in this area. We made our way north along the Green Valley fire road until we got to the bottom of Soapstone Grade.
From there we continued north on the Upper Green Valley single track and climbed our way up to the junction with La Cima track right by Sunrise highway. During this climb the clouds/fog cleared up as we got up above it. Things were pretty beautiful at this point and the La Cima trail over to the California Riding and Hiking Trail (CRHT) was a great as ever.
While riding along the CRHT it was pretty cool to look over towards Lake Cuyamaca and see all of the clouds to the west being pressed again the mountains. It was like the mountains were playing giant linebackers protecting our pocket of sunshine.
We connected up to the Cold Springs trails for some super fun descending down to the south. Down near the bottom we once again rode back down into the clouds.
Not a shabby day to spending a weekend morning!
So I have not been up Bernardo Mountain located on the north side of Lake Hodges in a quite some time. While it is not a terribly long climb, it has always been a solid climb with some pretty technical bits up near the top. For many years it has been one of those benchmark trails to judge where I stand against my former self. I decided to go out and run “the test” again.
Before I really got started I had to take a short pause to yield the right of way to one of the locals. I have only see a few rattlesnakes this year so I was pretty bummed that I was not lugging a round my DSLR rig on this ride. After some interaction time with Mr Nope Rope I was onto the climb proper.
There is a distinctive spot on the trail where the “test” really starts. Its probably a little more than halfway up and the trail switchbacks to the right and gets rocky, ledgy and steeper all at once. It is not like this all the way up but there are plenty of sections like this to negotiate. From this point on I had a series of disappointments. (Just for the record I did not clean the climb to the summit from here) The amount of sanitation that has occurred in this trail has very much changed the character of the trail. For the most part there are no longer any loose rock sections to climb. The loose rocks have for the most part have been kicked off the trail and piled up along the sides. People have even pulled out rocks to make some sections smooth. Smooth sections that are now going to be more prone to erosion now that the soil “armor” is gone. I realize that some people think they are improving the trail, but really? There are also those other types you feel the need to modify the trail in order to say they rode it or to get that personal best. Those folks are some other special flavor of narcissistic asshole.
Maybe I’m just a grumpy old bastard. Maybe I’m the narcissist asshole yelling the equivalent of “back in my day we had to walk to school in the snow, uphill, both ways!”. Either way I did much better on that climb than I should have. It was not because I was in any kind of better shape or more skilled than my last outting here. The climb is just not as hard as it used to be and I’m pretty aggravated about. Its not easy by a long shot, it is just not as hard as it used to be. I realize this happens to most trails as I have seen it happen in numerous places but it does not mean I have to like it! Alright Bitch Sesson complete.
Today I went out for a quick spin in the Cuyamaca Mountains which rarely falls into the “This Sucks!” category.
I started from the East Mesa parking lot and took the East Mesa singletrack up to the visitor center where I connected to the Green Valley fire road. I took this up to the Green Valley single track and work my way to the La Cima trail.
The La Cima trail took me to the California Riding and Hiking trail, which I took south where I hooked up with the Stonewall fireroad and then over to the Cold Springs trail.
At the bottom of the Cold Springs trail I crossed HWY 79 and hooked up with the West Side singletrack and took it south back to the East Mesa staging area. It was definitely a fun day on the bike!
It is with a bit of sadness that I must pass on that this beautiful old oak tree has finally moved on from Daley Ranch.
On my Sunday morning ride, I found this tree toppled over completely blocking the eastern half of the Jack Meadow loop. Half of this oak had come down a year or so ago, but the other half finally we over as well. Considering that Daley Ranch has a staff to handle this kind of stuff I imagine the tree came down on Saturday. Good bye old friend you were a most welcome shade spot.
Ahhh back on local dirt! I met Steve and Brian out in Santee for some playtime on the rocks.
It has been pretty hot as of late so a dawn patrol ride was in order. Lake Hodges was the place.
My sweetie joined me on this ride as well. We pretty must did the north side trails as an out and back.
It is definitely summer with pretty much all the vegetation in dry hot weather mode. There was some surprises. The cacti for example has just recently flowered which I expected that would have happened much earlier in the year.
