Day 21 Noble Canyon, Ca

I've been looking forward to this for while. Guy's from back home ( Casey and Rob) had been saying this was a must and Pac Man ( my contact in the San Diego area) has been running his mouth about how awesome this trail was. Well.........time to give it a go! and it was go from the get go. (?) Doug was fashionably late when he picked me up on the hwy. Actually he said " The trail head is only 100 feet up the hwy you may as well ride." So i rode the 1.12 mile up the hwy and got ready to hit it. Jeremy was giving his bike a tune up at the trail head and after that we started up the short climb. A really beautiful area for sure. It looked like a fire raged through in the recent past. It was a bit wet in spots from recent rain but not bad at all. Just like home actually. What's up with this So Cal weather. Fog and rain. Anyway.....i was riding my Enduro and it was in it's element for once. There was a lot of flowing sandy singletrack and when it got rocky it was seriously rocky. I was thinking that Terry would really be stoked on this stuff. We had a great time and headed back up for another run. I was feeling strong for some reason and climbed the stuff i wussed out on the first run. And when the rocks started i was feeling good. We happened on some guys the had a flat and didn't have a wrench to take off the bolt on wheel. So i gave 'em mine and said " catch up and you can give it back" We kept going and somewhere Jeremy crashed but was ok fortunately. The guy eventually caught up but i was stopped so it doesn't count. He had the Fox 40 so i figured i should chase him on my litle xc bike. i was right behind him all the way until i blew it on a super tech switchback right before the famed "Stairway to hell" i got back on the saddle and rode the hell section. Not the most stylish but clean. I was stoked. We talked to some cool riders after that and then headed down to finish the ride. Doug dropped me off at the top and i rode a cool 5 mile trail back to camp for dinner. I was out of water but that how it goes sometimes. What a great trail back to camp. Beautiful! A perfect day. More day's like this please.

Fallbrook, Ca Day 18

Rode today with Doug (pac man) on his local trails in Fallbrook. Fun stuff. Some really tech rock sections, and lot’s o’ climbing. I rode the Bianchi and had a loose headset by the end of the ride. It was a challenge riding the SS on the rock sections. It’s hard to keep the momentum. I made a few of the climbs but Doug has turned into a climbing fool.I guess it’s the spin classes. He was riding the rock sections smooth too. It was cool and breezy so once again it felt like home. Without the trees. Great ride and it was good to ride with Doug again.

One more ride with the Simi guys. And pump track too.

March 17 Day 15

Keith picked me up at 7:30 this morning and we headed for the coast. Really foggy all the way there. The trail was called Sycamore Canyon I think. Really great view ’s of the ocean Keith was saying but all I saw was FOG. We met up with Gene again an another guy Steve. Steve had Cannondale like Jamie. Really old. We dropped in the singletrack and ended up on a paved path which we raced down to more singletrack. Great stuff. The climb’s were getting me but not as bad as the day before. I think the fog reminded me of home. The dh sections were super fun. Lot’s of rocks, switchbacks and cool turns. I’m not sure I’ve ever ridden in such thick fog. It was a fun and hard ride. Later in the day Keith and his wife Kristy had us over for dinner. Wow . What a kind gesture. Especially since we have 5 kid’s. The boy’s eat a lot and they don’t stop. Keith had Foosball and the pump track so that was a lot of fun. Gene’s wife and kid’s were there also but Gene was called into work . Too bad. What great people.

March 16 - Day 14

Rolled into Simi Valley about 10 am more or less. It was a great drive from Ojai. Very scenic. Keith P. called about then and said he’d pick me up at 1:00 for the ride. He did and it was good to see him again. We drove to some trail head and met his buddy Gene. I remember him from Moab. Last year he showed me how to use one of the features on my camera. Fun ride. Some dbl track and some singletrack . The descents were really good. Loose, sandy ,rocky and rutted. I stayed upright so it was good. After one decent we ended up on some nationhood road. I was thinking “ We must be close” then we road awhile and climbed up past some big homes and Keith stopped and sat down under a tree. We got out our snacks and kicked back. I thought for a second that “ Maybe Keith or Gene live right around here and we’ll drive back to the trail head. My mind is weird when I’m tired. Then I looked up and we were sitting across from a trail entrance. O well…back to reality. More climbing and a couple of cool decent‘s. A fun ride to be sure. Keith and Gene are great riders and did'nt hassle me when I had to push up some of the steep climbs.

Santa Cruz Day 8

Went down to Santa Cruz today and met up with Paul M. and about 4 others. John from San Ramon went also. I really put my head on the chopping block today. And they chopped. Over and over and over. The single track was some of the best I've seen. Redwood trees, Sandy sections, riding across rail road trestles and even some tech hwy crossings. Paul M. is a machine and the other riders were really riding well. It's all fuzzy right now, but one memorable decent was super steep, kinda dh race style with med drops and a cool step up. The climb out up the road hurt. The final decent was really fun. Rocky and lot's of flow. Thanks to Paul for letting me tag along and to John for the ride (half way) I'll be back here for sure

One more time

Day 6 and as I'm waiting for Sat so i can ride with some people, i figured i should take one of the kid's back to where i rode on Monday. So i loaded up Otto's Specialized ht and my SS and we're gone. Found the trail head again with no problem and a few of the trails even. Rode some others and got turned around a bit. Still fun though. Otto was riding through the rocks really well. He fell down once when he went into rock garden too hot. He'll learn. A fun time and he's learning well.

It's good to be beaten down.

It's day 3 and we're in Sacramento, Ca. Elk Grove to be exact. Today i got beat down by riding with MTB John out of San Ramon. We rode these trails in Fairfield called Rockville Hills. (i think) I was on my SS, thinking that if i ride it more often than not i can get my fitness up to where it was last Summer. I thought i was gonna puke. I'm running a 32x20 so i figured that would be better than the 32x16 i had been running. I was right.These trails were so fun! Skinny single track, with tons of embedded rocks. This one section called "the rock garden" was a real challenge. John climbed it really smooth. We got some cool video coming back down. I was rolling the SS down some sketchy lines and thought i was done for. The Single Track was fast and fun. Rolling,Rolling,Rolling. No Hikers,Horses or Hikers. John's a great rider and it was a fun ride. Thanks for the trail tour man.

Memories

As we prepare to take off on this trip I've been thinking of people i need to see. Today i went and had coffee w/ Rich who was the vocalist of the band i used to be in. Rich and i have probably more memories than either of us realize, but when we're together it all comes back in a big way baby. After i had two four shot lattes and a double it all stated coming together. The stupid one liners,things my Mom said to us, stuff we did while we travelled the country in our band and all the crazy days when we lived in downtown Portland. Wondering the streets,sleeping behind dumptsters on tour, and endlessly hanging out in coffee shops. We could write a book, and it might even sell. I met Rich in '86, when he was going to Bible College. He signed up to help with my youth group and it was all down hill from there. It turned out he was as big as idiot as me ( or bigger) so we formed a friendship that will last forever. Whenever i see him we just start babbling like it was yesterday. Like no time has passed. After i started freaking out from all the coffee another memorable guy showed up. Kerrin. (i may have spelled that wrong) I remember meeting him like in '88 maybe, and he was a cool guy. One of the first things Rich told me about him was when a security guard hassled him about a knife he had on his boot. He took the guard down to the ground and said "Now what are you gonna do?" but you know how stories are. Either way he's a serious guy and still is. It was good seeing both of them today and when (or if) we return to the Portland area i hope to be seeing more of these guys.

Thanks for all the coffee and all the memories.

My last Oregon ride. (for a while)

I did my last ride for who knows how long with the guys I've been riding with for around 4 years. It was a good time and we sessioned the E.T. jump for a while. I love that one. Faster the better. It was my 2nd ride on the Cliff Cat and I'm liking it for sure. I'm going to switch the monster for the shiver and then she'll be good. A highlite of the day was when a guy cased a jump bigtime a tore the cleats off his shoes. They were still in the pedals. That was so funny. Why was he freeriding with clipless pedals? I don't know. On our last run we did a non stunt trail. DH single track with good flow. I was in the lead and East Coast Eric was chasing with everyone else behind. I really felt on the edge. Drifting some of the corners in the mud. It was good. When it came to the steep part there was a lot of down branches and a few trees. We had just went through a short rock section when i really opened her up. It was a long straight away so i was really going fast when i clipped a pedal on a rock. Wow! i hadn't flew off the bike so far in a while. Face first into rocks and branches. When i figured out i was ok Eric and i started really cracking up. Where's my helmet cam when i need it. Just about tore my pedal off though. Great day as usual.

and thanks to Jamie,Terry,Casey,Eric, Jim, and the other guys for riding hard. I'll be back.

Geting down to the wire

This was most likely the 2nd to the last weekend that I'll be riding around here for a long while. We're planning on leaving for our trip the first weekend in March and it's coming up fast. Anyway....hit up Falls city and the trails we're great until the rain hit. Conditions changed quick. Fooled around at Basic training for a bit then headed to the top. Some of the jumps we're under construction but it was still a good ride down. Saw some of the new stunts that are being built and they look good. Mtn Rider and Rosser were sessioning a cool skinny to log ride, so that was fun to watch. I need my derailuer too much to mess around on that. Flying J rode my Cliff Cat since both his bikes are broke ( Norco= snapped chain stay and demo being replaced by Specialized) Fun and wet day.