Archipelago Ride

Rich Julian and I have been tossing around the idea for this ride for quite sometime as part of the our “Islands Project” concept of pushing to have all of the our small islands of open space connected throughout the county.  Each little island of open space on its own has a network of trails but nothing that gets into the “epic” range.

The ride we did yesterday was both a research and proof of concept ride.   While nearly the entire route is part of the county general trail plan, there are significant chunks that are not a reality yet.   The rider list included 15 supporters and friends who have all put tools to earth to help create and maintain our trails around the county.

Climing Vista Del Mar

We started out bright and early from the La Costa Preserve and climbed the Vista Del Mar trail up to the top and then dropped down the backside and headed to the hill just to the east with the two water towers on top.  From there we followed a series of easements down into the Escondido Creek watershed.   While riding along these easements was not too interesting in was a good venue to point out exactly where we want to put in singletrack as part of the La Costa to Elfin Forest connector.

In La Costa

Getting over to Elfin Forest was not all easement travel.  There are some nice sections that were created courtesy of the equestrain communities of Harmony Grove and Elfin Forest.  

 Almost in Elfin

Here we are crossing Escondido Creek just inside of the Elfin Forest Park.

Crossing Escondido Creek

Once into Elfin Forest, it was up the WAAAAAY Up trail.    Did I mention that this was my first significant ride in about three weeks?  I was feeling it.   Elfin Forest gets busy on the weekend so it was a good thing most of us where not setting any speed records up the climb.

Elfin Climb

Can you say Multiuse Trail?

Switchbacking

The view of The Way Up trail from the Del Dios Highlands Trail

Once up into Elfin Forest we went down the other side into Lake Hodges on the Del Dios Highlands Trail.  

Way Up From Del Dios Highlands 

 This “Trail” is a good example of why we need to educate land managers and planners on what a trail is and is not.  This was a steep graded fireroad with a generous amount of blue slate gravel.   One redeeming quality of this descent was that it has some  monster waterbars that you could catch some bits of air on if you desired to do so.

Del Dios Highlands Trail

Rich was unable to do the ride due to a recent unplanned surgery so he setup up the super sag wagon and cheerleader support.

A Two Beer Ride

Who says you have to wait until the end of the ride for a beer?

From Lake Hodges we rode the Del Dios Trail along the lake until we had to hop on the road for e a bit due to the pump station construction that is going on towards the dam.  Once around that we got back on the lake trail and made our way down to the dam.

Hodges Dam

Roadie

Freaking Roadie ruined a prefectully good MTB shot.

We had to do a bit of hoping onto Del Dios Highway for a couple of short bits to get to the San Dieguito River Trail.   This section of trail was just about to open when the October 2007 Firestorm came through and burnt about 62% of the entire corrider.    We were given special permission to use the closed Sante Fe Valley Trail.  We could soon see why the trail is still closed as seven bridges are completely burnt out.

Santa Fe Valley Trail

Even with the burn damage this was still a pretty area.  There is a bunch of work to be done, so when you here about volunteer work oppurtunities here, it would really help if you can lend a couple hands and a little sweat.

Flower Cruising

We did not exactly follow my intended route through this area, but we all knew this was going to be a bit of a Lewis and Clark area.   We ended up doing a sizable switchbacking climb that could have been avoided, the good news for me was there were no open chants of mutiny so all was good.   

We soon tied into the Santa Luz Loop and fully known trails for me.   We made pretty good time through Lusardi Canyon towards Black Mountain, but man was I starting to drag.  There are a couple of hills that I referred to as “good workouts” in my individual trail reviews but combined with our previous mileage it freaking hurt the quads. 

Heading towards Black Mountain

Rich once again met us with Sag Wagon support and encouragement.  We topped off waters and scarfed a few snacks before heading off around the rest of the Santa Luz Loop to the Los Penaquitos Canyon Connector.   This section of the Santa Luz Loop has grown in really nicely and the singletrack has gotten really good.

Santa Luz Singletrack

George

The connector took us under a few bridges and another mean climb and into area known as “The Tunnels” that brought up onto Del Mar Mesa where we then dropped into Penasquitos Canyon.

In Da Tunnels

At this point in the ride we could all hear tiny bubbles escaping from a tap in the distance.   Considering most of our states of fatigue, we made quick work to the west end of the canyon and the Pro-Built Wheels Bike Shop where good food and beers were awaitng us. 

In Shop Keg

An In-Shop Keg, You gotta love it.  On this evening it was Sierra Nevada on tap. 

Da Shop

The guys at the shop did it up really great for us and it was most welcome.   Big thanks to Squadra for hooking up the return shuttle back up north after the eveing festivities.    We could have easily done 60-70+ miles but we settled for just 43 miles with about 5,500 feet of climbing.    I’m freaking beat and loving it!

-Bill

Back in the Saddle at Lake Calvera

After a couple of weeks being off the bike due to my face injury at Goat Camp, I finally got back on the trail.   I had tried doing a bit of stuff in the outdoors late last week but the “brand new” skin on my lips was quite sensitive and the slightest of breeze and direct sunlight was unpleasant to say the least.   Today I gave it another shot and decided hit up one of my local trails, Lake Calvera, which I ride to right from my front door.   Will has a two hour hockey practice tonight so I decided to take Jake out for some one-on-one Dad time on the trails.

Jake on Bridge

We had a great time out on the trails today.  I am always amazed at how easy kids put up new skills.   Most of the time I show them something once, they do it once and then it is locked in.   Man I wish I could still learn at that rate.    I have made a point of gradually progressing the length and difficulty of the rides I take them on each outing and today was no different.   I took him on a lot more twisty and rocky singletrack that he has done in the past.   I also made a point to get him to the “Back 40” of Lake Calvera which meant he had to do a good deal more climbing than usual out there.  

Jake Singletrack Cruising

For me I can tell it will take a few rides to get my MoJo back.   I still have some numb spots on my face which makes for a really weird sensation (or lack thereof) to feel the sun and breeze only on a portion of your face.    The good news is that the spots are getting smaller everyday.    In what little technical bits I did encounter today, I caught myself glancing at where I don’t want to go.  Not good.   I’m sure after a few rides I’ll get “it” back but it was an odd mental riding state today.    What I lacked today in riding prowess was more than offset by the high quality time I got with my youngest son who put in a solid 14.4 miles today. 

-Bill

A Chance to Give Back!

Mark this on your Calender Folks.     

From the San Diego Mountain Bike Association 

Black Mountain Open Space Park

Volunteer Trail Work
SATURDAY, MARCH 29th, at 8:30am
Having organized more than a dozen volunteer events held at Black Mountain Park since 2002, The San Diego Mountain Bike Association has helped to define and shape the park’s trail system. One new trail recently opened, and more trails are being planned. Our volunteer efforts and close working relationship with the park’s ranger staff will continue to ensure that all current and future trails are open to mountain biking.Join SDMBAus on SATURDAY, March 29th, at 8:30am to help maintain the trails we’ve for which we’ve worked so hard to gain access. We’ll be doing tread work on the CANYON RIM TRAIL, which badly needs repair to make it usable for mountain bikers. Bring water and gloves; we’ll provide everything else!

 Here is thier flyer for the trailwork event with directions on how to get there

Here is my information on the Black Mountain area (It could use a little updating).

Also right next to Black Mountain is a portion of the Santa Luz Loop with is worth checking out as well.

Santa Luz with Black Mountain in the Background

 -Bill

My Friends and Family are Funny

I had not really appreciated just how much laughter is generatered from my friends and family until this week.  With my injury it is dreadfully painful to smile right now and I have also been scared to stress that area with a smile.  Of course the smile is somewhat self limiting.  You start to smile and the pain shoots through the roof.  Bye-Bye Smile.    So what I started doing is when someone says something funny and I start to smile, I grab the left side of my face and keep my muscles from pulling the corner of my mouth back.   This of course is somewhat funny looking to see, which wants to start another round of snickering with the peanut gallery.    My Wife and I realized that laughter plays a significant part in our relationship.  She has been getting a little bummed with my forced stoic demeanor as of late and I have come to better appreciate the nature of our relationship as well.   I did not think I would gain a little knowledge about my marriage from the crash, but yeah, I guess you always need to be ready to learn.   I can however think of less painful ways to learn stuff.  Hopefully, it will be over soon.  I amazed how quickly the face area heals, but the trend of the nerves healing quicker than the wounds is truly a painful bummer. I did get 9 of 19 stitches out today which is a start.  (The other 10 are the internal kind that will disolve on thier own.) 

I don’t exactly know where these ramblings are taking me,   I’ll leave things with this – Take note and enjoy the smiles and laughter around you.

Goat Camp Goodness Goes Bad

Sunday was a climb up into the White Tank Mountains west of Phoenix.  This area was incredibly awesome with the vibrant colors of spring going off.  The trails of the White Tanks are extremely diverse.  We did a loop that included some burly climbing on the Mesquite Canyon trail before things mellowed out to mostly smooth benchcut singletrack interspresed with technical bits.  There were some impressive views along this trail.  From the Mesquite Trail we connected to the Willow Trail and enjoyed some more springtime desert goodness.   From the Willow Trail we connected to the Ford Canyon Trail which had us busting out a switchbacking climb up to the junction of the Goat Camp Trail.

Greg on Buttery Smooth Singletrack

The Goat Camp Trail had been on my to-do list for a long while as people who are much better riders than me have all said it is one of the gnarliest trails they have ever been on.    The trail did not disappoint.  It starts off really scenic and pretty as you work your way over a couple of ridges before coming to the final descent.

This is where things get incredibly technical.  The opening descent is a steep loose monster that is quite shaly with big chunk a plenty.   Our guide and all-around awesome guy for the day, Greg, described it best when he said “If you touch your front brake just a little too much, the earth opens up and swallows your front wheel”.    The middle section gets more firm undertneath you but the trail is just impressively rugged.   It is hard to put a pucker factor on this section.  It is more like a continual state of colon lockdown.

Kevin at the top of the Staircase

There is a really tricky feature known as the Spiral Staircase.   There is a bit of a chunk gate to get into the feature followed by steep left handed roll down into a really tight righthander that exits into either a spine roll or a chunky set of stairsteps.  JD impressively flashed the entire thing after a quite look see of the line options.  I kept having problems at the bottom as I could not get through the bottom right hander smooth enough to get onto the spine roll.

Below the Spiral Staircase is another just mean section known as “Jack Hammer”.    It was somewhere along this section that I blew a move and went off the bike and unfortnately smacked into a sharp-edged rock with my face.   OUCH!!!!! I knew it was bad as soon as it happened as I could feel the left side of my face move in the “wrong” direction and then go numb.   Behind me was Kevin and when he gave the question we all get asked sooner or later “Are You Okay”, I had to respond with “No, I’m hurt bad”.

Here a Carnage Shot (WARNING: It is quite icky …)

Like myself, Kevin has been offically trained on Wilderness First Aid and he did a great job sizing up the situation and getting all the supplies out and starting the work of patching my lower and upper lips back together with some steri-strip wound closures.   I know the poker face and measured repsonses  medics are trained to give in situations like this and I knew Kevin was concerned.  I’m sure some of you are already thinking “Did he film that?”  Yes, I was filming when it happened.  It is mighty hard to see you own face so I used the camcorder with the screen flipped so I could see the damage myself.  It was not pretty at all.   After getting patched up, Kevin and I walked down the rest of the trail.  It was not too far before we JD and Greg where waiting for us.   I could see the concern in thier eyes as well.

Kevin Patching me Up

We had some gear spread amongs a couple of cars, so JD and Greg went on ahead to get everything setup for my exit.   I walked some more until the trail got pretty tame in comparision to the rest the trail.   I made a point of going very gingerly as I did not want to elevate my heart anymore than needed.    On the way back we came across a few hikers who gave some quite truthful responses like “Holy S#$T” and Oh My F#$king God!

Once off the trail, I got my chamois off as I knew I would otherwise have it on for a long and end up with a bad case of monkeybutt.    JD got me to the ER straight away.   This was the first time I had the term “Though and Through” used outside of a CSI show on TV.   Both the upper and lower lips where lacerated in that manner with the lower getting the worst of it.    I walked out of the ER four hours after arriving with 19 stitches (some inside and some out) and a hankering for a smoothie!

Jerry thankfully had taken a catnap while waiting for me and he drove back to Orange County so I would only have to deal with about an hour of driving from the OC down to North County San Diego.  It was way freaking late when I got home.  Even though the Novacaine of long since worn off, a good portion of my face was disturbingly still numb.

After some stitchwork

It has been a few days since the crash.  I had thought about posting earlier about this but was just not feeling up to it.  The good news is that I can tell the nerves are starting to heal and the feeling is starting to come back into most of the area.  The bad news is ……The feeling is coming back into the area!   The inside of the left side of my mouth feels like a have a cold sore the size of a quarter and few of the bits of spare change.

I’m already shopping for a full-face helmet for my technical trail excursions. :-)

-Bill

More SoMo Fun

What a great day we had on South Mountain today.   We started at the Pima Canyon trailhead and climbed the Mormon Loop to National and took that up to the Buena Vista trailhead.  There was plenty of green on the mountain.

Catcus Flower 

 From there we took the Geronimo trail down off the mountain.   What an awesome bit of technical singletrack that sees far less traffic than National.  We then did a quick bit of street riding over to the Mormon and started a very technical and brutal climb back up the mountain.  It was an excellent series of slogging, sessioning, and bike-a-biking.   From there we took National back down to the Pima Canyon.  

Greg

After some quick showers we were off for some Italian food and libations.   Good Stuff !   

-Bill

Opening Day in AZ

So I was up O-dark:30 this morning on my way to hookup with Jerry for a burn out to Phoenix.   By 1PM we had made I-10 rip and were hooking up with Kevin and Greg for a quick fternoon jaunt on South Mountain.   I’m in the middle of enjoying evening barley wine so just a couple of words and pics. 

 SoMo

 Upper National

Greg

 Greg on Upper National

Garage

My kind of Garage

More to Follow….

-Bill

Setting up for an Intense Weekend

6.^ 

I have finally kicked most of this crud out of my system and I’m getting jazzed about heading out to Arizona for the weekend to visit with some friends and hit up some trail goodness out there.  I’m going to “Intensify” my longer-traveled bike stables here in the near future so the fellows at Intense hooked me up with a bling bling sled for the weekend so I made a little visit up to Temecula.   I’ll be kicking this 6.6 around for the weekend.  This bike is a beauty!

6.6

I did not have a lot of time today, so I hit up one of my local rides, the La Costa Preserve, after picking up the bike.   I went up Switchback, down NASCAR, up Vista Del Mar and down NASCAR again.   I spent a bit of time dialing in the suspension.   My first impression is pretty freaking awesome.   I had to sum up that first impression in five words or less it would be:

 Climbs Well,  Descents Great!

I feel it out more over the weekend, stay tuned.

-Bill

Being Sick Sucks!

Being Sick Sucks.   At little over a week ago I started fighting off a cold/crud and well I lost the fight.  By Tuesday I was good and jacked up with a cold/flu.   This is such an awesome time of year to being ridng and being sidelined just sucks.   I missed out on a really cool sounding 50+ mile epic ride this weekend around Otay Mountain that includes a good chunk of my ride out there a couple of weeks ago.   I woke up feeling “okay” this morning so I tried to get in a bit of riding at Lake Calvera which is ride I can do right from my house.   I quickly rediscovered that feeling “okay” on the couch does not equate to being okay to exercise.   I was a hacking, coughing, phlem hurling mess as soon as I hit the first climb.    I cut my normal loop out here short and retreated to home for more cough syrup, comfort food and couch time.     

 Steve at Calvera Lake
I did take one picture on the ride today.  The rider is Steve, a local rider who I met for the first time today.  Ironically he was suffering from “The Plague” just like I was.  I’m glad to know I’m not the only one suffering.  For all my fellow knobby tired brothers and sisters suffering from the crud, best wishes for a speedy recovery.

I have some out-of-town plans for next weekend so I better finally kick this crud this week.