Nobel Canyon, Mount Laguna, San Diego County, California

Believe it or not San Diego does have Mountains. I lived there for a few years and thought nothing more of playing in the ocean, what mountains? Not until I used my long arms and broad shoulders to show a friend what surfing was like did I get turned onto mountain biking by my friend with calves oddly similar to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s in Conan the Barbarian did I find out about Mount Laguna. Located at 6,000 feet above sea level in a forest of Jeffrey pines sits Mount Laguna, there’s even snow for a few months in the winter, who knew? Mount Laguna is located about one hour east of San Diego traveling along interstate eight in the Laguna Mountains on the eastern edge of the Cleveland National Forest. Mount Laguna is quaint, comprised of a general store, cozy lodge and cabins, greasy spoon restaurant, Billy Bob post office, and car camping campgrounds abutting the Pacific Rim Trail.

Within the Laguna Mountains lays the royal by name “Noble Canyon” single track trail. Nobel Canyon is comprised of moderate to forearm rock pounding single track with seat adjustments needed every few miles. I just say screw it and keep my seat all the way down on this down hill ride. Until they make a handle bar lever for an adjustable seat, keeping the seat lowered is easier than getting off your bike to make adjustments every few minutes. Nobel Canyon is a beautiful ride traversing three different ecosystems, bambi style alpine meadows with Chester chipmunk oak trees giving way to skin scraping scrub which is the local chaparral descending into dry sauna gnat infested desert ambiance. Keeping this in mind you can find weather at the top of the mountain requiring a jacket and at the bottom of the mountain you’ll be sweating with your shirt off enjoying the opportunity to sun tan. My Conan friend apparently had a bone to pick with me after I almost got him drowned in six foot surf. He never once mentioned to me on this ride that I might want to consider walking certain sections. Keeping in mind when I first went down Nobel Canyon I was fairly green albeit an athlete with some skills but green non-the-less when it came to mountain biking. Note to first timers: Nobel canyon has some gnarly sections feel free to walk these parts. Needless to say I did not get this warning and by the time the three hour round trip was over let’s just say I was bruised, battered, and limping. My Conan friend offered to drive my cars back home I looked so messed up. He on the other hand was boulder hopping, flying through the air up cliff faces and down them, cruising over treacherously technical terrain, and generally screaming with joy most of the trip.

Some people opt to take two cars to Mount Laguna. Obviously parking one at the bottom and driving to the top via Sunrise Highway with the other. We did not. We started at the lower trailhead just outside of Pine Valley down Old Highway 80 and Pine Creek Road at the Pine Creek Picnic Area. Starting at the bottom of the mountain you travel for a good hour and a half up and up a patch work paved gravel jeep road called Deer Creek Road and Laguna Meadows Road. For those uninitiated to hill climbing, let me just warn you that this up hill climb will drain your energy, requires several stops if not flat out walks, and will make you worthless for the fun down hill single track of Nobel Canyon so make sure you bring lots of water and some sort of high energy quick food. I like an apple and a sneakers candy bar when I get to the top. And again, it can be hot as hell at the bottom and darn right freezing up top so bring layers during the few winter months.

Once you reach the forest of the upper Laguna Mountain, the fun starts. Nobel Canyon begins with some frolicking kind single track through the alpine forest with gentle climbs and drops good for peddling hard and jumping around. Not long into it the official hour and a half long decent begins with lots of quick silky sections of packed fast dirt no rocks. Twenty minutes or so you’ll roll past a gate a notice a gradual change in the terrain. Hear things start to warm up with technical skills needed over rocky terrain, sharp switchbacks, and brush that scrapes away at your legs. Along this up one third of the trail you’ll encounter narrow rocky terrain as well as friendly fast sections, just keep your seat down as drops and sharp turns can come at you unexpectedly. The middle third of the trail has some technical aspects adjacent to steep drops into an unfriendly ravines. The flora and fauna changes drastically so stopping once in a while is a good thing if you’re into that type of thing. About halfway down there is series of very technical trail which looks like a moonscape. Rocks and ruts completely cover the trail and I for one walk some of these sections. That said, Conan charges down these sections with the skill of a mountain goat navigating sheer cliff faces. At one point in the trail there are some large boulders off to the left side shortly after you go over a stream. If you are like Conan then feel free to do what he does and boulder hop around are just peddle hard and jump off some of these obstructions. I tried this and not going fast enough or pulling up hard enough, did a nose dive flailing right over the handle bars as my from tire hit first at a nasty angle. The bottom third of Nobel is dry desert style riding with occasionally rocky patches so keep an eye out. There is also a nice lush valley where you cross what on what some days in winter and spring can be considered more of a rushing river than a creek. Eventually about an hour and a half from the top and three hours later you arrive back at the bottom.

Finally thoughts on this ride, if you’re in San Diego then go for it. Of the several rides I have done in San Diego County Nobel Canyon is one of the best. Not only does it offer the technical ride a challenge, I have seen some hot shots with full protective gear on doing Nobel, but it also offers the intermediate a good place to learn technical skills. This is not a trail I would recommend for a beginner because I don’t think it would be fun for a beginner, to much work and no play make Jack a dull boy. However, it is beautiful, covers a lot of ground, changing scenery, and fantastic views. Nobel Canyon definitely lives up to its name and helps to put San Diego County on the mountain biking map.

Cuyamaca Rancho State Park Mountain Bike Trail - San Diego County, California

Just east of San Diego is an astonishing feat of nature in an area called Cuyamaca Rancho State Park with over 26,000 acres of oak woodland forest, mixed with a smattering of pines and charming meadows with playful creeks. There are over 100 miles of trails which offer hikers, bikers, and equestrians ample stomping grounds. Within the Park are two great places for mountain bikers to establish base camp and spend the night, one of which is called Paso Picacho camp, which is nestled between Stonewall Peak elevation 5,700’, and Cuyamaca Peak elevation 6,512’, both peaks present spectacular views of the deserts to the east, the coast to the west, and Lake Cuyamaca at the base. The other campground which I prefer is Green Valley because it has a refreshing stream that runs through camp replete with waterfalls. Both camps are great base camps because you can start your ride to anywhere in the park from either one of them. Cuyamaca is just a maze of trails and if you are like me then you will want to mountain bike as much of the 100 miles of trails as possible. Cuyamaca is in fact so popular with mountain bikers that they have annual bike events held there. The popularity of the place does have its draw backs though as you shall soon see, some riders are caught off guard by the beauty and relative ease of the trails succumbing to hell bent egos of tearing the trails up.

On a beautiful rainy day three of us went to ride in Cuyamaca, conveniently, just 50 miles east of San Diego off sports car blistering highway 79. We parked at the day use Green Valley campground and saddled up for a three hour tour along Cuyamaca peak and around middle peak via several kind fire roads.

Dennis my good friend and normal riding partner who always wakes me up early on the weekends considers himself to have the balance of a cat and likes smoking cigarettes. He brought his friend Willie who just bought a used mountain bike and was itching to get to try it in the Cuyamacas, he had never done any serious riding. Cuyamaca is almost all intermediate to beginner riding; the trails are wide fire roads and not very technical. They are however fun and fast. More of the technical riding can be done on the hiking trails throughout the park which I often go on and fake ignorance if stopped, so far no problems. This could be a debate for another time that I would like to get into with any dire hard hiker protective of his precious trail if that is the problem or is he just worried I might come careening down a hill and hit him?

On this particular wet rainy day with the green horn Willie along, I opted to stick to the regular designated mountain bike trails, in this instance Fern Flat, Azalea Springs, and Middle Peak fire roads. The trail along Cuyamaca Peak and Middle Peak is a vast woodland forest with the occasional pleasant out looking vista. This is the type of playground where at one point going down hill a buck snorted fiercely at me, yes I did fear for my life, and pranced right along side of me for a good 50 yards then cut right in front of me and disappeared into the woods; fun stuff, even for the animals apparently. I have yet to run into the elusive Mountain Lion but there are plenty of posted warnings and several reported human stalking and killings. Yes indeed fun stuff.

I enjoy all kinds of inclement weather so riding in the rain on this day was a treat, first we went along Japacha Spring Creek, then the wide base of Cuyamaca peak. Watching the trinkets of water flow down the trail during a rain storm is amusing and after about an hour we came to a clearing which opens up to middle peak. The trail goes around middle peak and takes about an hour. The fork in the road goes left starting with a down hill or right leading into an uphill.

Dennis and I were doing what we normal do during these easy types of rides and were talking and enjoying nature. Not paying much attention, the green horn Willie, who apparently loves speed, instantly took off left down hill, obviously he wanted to get a feel for his bike on our first downhill of the trip. Keep in mind this is a wet rainy day and he is new to the sport. Dennis and I looked at each other and thought alright lets go, we peddled for a few feet and began our downhill decent.

As we followed after Willie who was now way ahead of us and not just going down hill holding his bike in line like most riders, he was all over the place and oddly, still peddling at a ferocious rate. I start out this section with a few hard turns of the crank but it is steep enough that you pick up speed and follow your line, not Willie. He was well down the hill and still peddling wildly. He had to be crazy I was thinking and wondered if he was so green that he didn’t realize he had free wheel and could stop peddling. Even now I can see him peddling, flying down hill like some speed demon, swerving out of control, careening off the trail, flailing into a sharp ditch, bike and body flying, and Willie going over the handle bars flying like a man shot out of a cannon.

Dennis and I stared at each other in disbelief hoping for the best but expecting the worst. Not that that wasn’t scary enough but when we caught up to him he was not moving but talking and was sprawled out inches from having collided head on with a nice sized boulder. I’ve seen this before, dare devils just missing catastrophe by a mere fraction, perhaps there are angles out there protecting some of us. At the speed he was going hitting that rock most likely would have broken something and possibly put him lights out. Not wanting to think about it, we made sure he was alright and I went back to get his bike about 20 yards back up the hill. Willie starts talking about how he’s fine and we should continue on the ride. I’m still baffled at how nonplussed he is when I pick up his bike and quickly discover that the bike was not so lucky. The front rim majorly bent and will not rotate, along with brakes and levers that need to be adjusted.

Obviously the ride is over and we decide to turn back much to Willies dismay, I think he was trying to man up and didn’t want to ruin the rest of our ride, out of the question, I’m not going any further into the forest with Willie in this condition we must get back to civilization. In order to get Willies bike in some kind of working condition we disassemble the front brake taking off the front tire and hammer away on the rim trying to bend it back to some semblance of straight. This technique does not work well but we do manage to get the wheel to go around without getting stuck on the front brake. Now the hour to get back takes two hours of slow riding through the rain but tragedy has been averted so all is well that ends well.

Lessons learned; any senior rider in a group with a green horn or for that matter any rider not familiar with the terrain, has a responsibility to the pack. I believe the experienced rider should keep a fairly constant dialogue about the trail and trail safety. When we came to the fork in the road I should have minutes before talked about it and had us all stop and at that point talked about the trail and certainly instructed Willie to follow Dennis or myself. I can still see Willie just screaming out of control down that hill and of all things constantly peddling when he was clearly out of control. When I saw him go flying over his handle bars will nilly, I seriously thought he was going to be messed up. And when I saw how close he was to hitting a serious rock obstruction I think we all realized how lucky he was. So all experienced rides keep your group informed and don’t let any green horns lead the pack even if they have a new bike. It’s similar to someone getting a new sports car they think they need to floor it and speed around.

Needless to say, Willie never fixed his mountain bike; he sold it and joined the Army.

Snow Summit Downhill Mountain Bike Ride in Big Bear California

My Son invited me to go with him and some friends to Snow Summit Ski Resort in The mountains of Southern California to do some mountain biking. For $20.00 you can buy an all day lift ticket to bring you, and your bike up to the top, then you pick your trail and make your way down. We got in 6 runs for the day, including one flat tire repair (mine), and we rode to Carl’s Jr. and had lunch. Snow Summit has some arrangement with the U.S. forest service to allow mountain biking in the area, but no riding on any of their ski runs. They do have some rules however.

Any one of the following four factors will disqualify a bike from being transported on the chair:

1. Bikes must be less than 35 pounds.
2. Designated tire size must be less than 2.5.
3. Front shock must have less than 6 inches of travel.
4. Bikes must have three chain rings unless they are single speed.

We rode a variety of bikes, from an Intense 29r, to a KHS hard tail.

Since this was my first time there I didn’t know what to expect, I have ridden a motorcycle in the area on several occasions and enjoyed the single track trails, water crossings and the mountain terrain, but on a mountain bike, this was a first time for me. Don’t get me wrong, I am no stranger to 2 wheeled riding, I am 50 years old, raced BMX with my boys, when i was 35 until I was 40, I got to number 5 in the ABA in our area in my class. I raced District 37 Gran Prix series on my Honda CR 500 When i was 41 to 44, got 1st place in the Beginner senior open class my first year, I bought The GT RTS3 when it first came out, sweet full suspension bike, had to have it, but they have come along way since then. Blah blah blah.  Read more

Tamarancho Loop (Fairfax, Marin, CA)

A perfect destination in Marin County for intermediate and advance mountain bikers looking for fun and challenging singletracks. This awesome 10-mile singletrack loop starts in Fairfax and is located in the hills above Fairfax. The route offers fun rolling hills with tight switchbacks, some steep climbs and downhills, riding through wood forests, creek crossings and rock gardens. The trail head starts at Iron Spring Road in Fairfax. The Alchemist trail will take you to the lollypop shape loop intersection. The loop can be ridden clockwise or counter clockwise. I think clockwise is more fun because you get to go downhill on some technical rock sections, but if you like challenging climbing then counter clockwise is a must. You get climbing and descending both ways.

If you decide to go clockwise like I almost always do, you will get to Serpentine, Wagon Wheel and B-17 Trails. B-17 Extension goes out to the ridge near White Hills where you can admire a great view of the Bay Area and Mt. Tam. By going out to the ridge you can also connect to a brand new singletrack called Porcupine Trail with super fast switchbacks. Porcupine will take you down to Fairfax behind the White Hills Middle School. But if you rather stay on the Tamarancho loop for additional singletrack you can descend Porcupine only to Sir Francis Drake Blvd and then go back up on Porcupine to return to B-17 Extension. The next trails are Broken Dam and Goldman. At the end of Goldman you will be back at the trail junction with Alchemist trail that will take you back to Iron Springs Road.

The Tamarancho loop takes about 2-3 hours for an advance rider, and about an additional hour if you decide to add the Purcupine trail out and back.

The land where Tamarancho is located is property of the Boy Scouts of America. To ride those trails you should get a $5 day pass that can be purchased on-line or at the local Fairfax bike store Sunshine Bicycles. Funds go toward the land lease and trail maintenance.

If you like beer and want to try a local brew, a visit to Iron Springs Brewery is a must. It is located in the heart of Fairfax 

Related Links:

Mountain Biking Marin
Tamarancho Stats
Women’s Bike Clinic