Trails – Page 25 – The Ramblings of MTBBill

Wednesday Stoke in Alpine

Wednesday Stoke ride was going off again this week with great weather out in Alpine. Due to my own discombobulations at the trailhead, I started climbing about 10 minutes after Steve and Evan did. I tried to tell myself to just do my normal climb but I did not listen and decided to make a go of catching them by “rest rock”. I was making pretty good time hustling up the mountain but unfortunately for me it was unsustainable and about 2/3rds of the way up I cracked and went into cardio meltdown. I was bit of an energyless mess for the rest of the climb and the start of the descent.

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Calm winds = excellent flying conditions

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Evan on the 911 roll

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Steve got himself a flat on the descent which gave us some time to enough someof the great light of the “magic hour”

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It was the day before Valentines Day so Steve was practicing his puckering up skills!

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After the flat tire delay it was back to downhill funnage!

The Killing of Iron Mountain

Here is a special contribution from a long time riding friend of my mine. Iron Mountain is (rapidly heading towards the “was”) a classicly technically challenging hike/ride in San Diego County). People enjoyed this trail because it was hard. Once again we have well intended but misguided people in charge listening to the vocal minority of the trail users who want to “say” they did something hard without “doing” something that is hard. There are plenty of sterile dirt sidewalks being touted as trails in the city of Poway. The city has plans for additional trails, how about putting the sparse resources they have to making new trails instead of screwing of the ones we already have.

The Killing of Iron Mountain

by: Steve Gordenker

Mark and I had a chance to get up to Iron Mountain, yesterday. We witnessed firsthand, the latest round of “Trail maintenance”, by Poway parks and recreation trails manager, Bob Hahn. Recall if you will, last year, I spoke in front of Poway’s city council, sat in on parks and trails planning meetings, wrote letters, and emails, and made phone calls to city council members and the Mayor.

What a complete, colossal waste of my time.

The slow death of Iron mountain continues, at the hand of Bob Hahn.

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This is towards the top, at the “Hemotoma” area. Large swath of granite removed.

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Wheelchair accessable.

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Ironic, no?

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They dismantled the Iron Meatball.

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Two military guys were hiking down Iron from the top. This poor guy slipped on the loose, powdery mess that Bob Hahn’s butchers left when they removed large portions of granite. He rolled his ankle badly and was unable to put any weight on it. With no way to walk out, his buddy had no choice, but to carry him out on his back. They were 2.5 miles up at this point.

Thank you, again, Bob Hahn, for making Iron Mountain a “safer” outdoor hiking experience, by completely obliterating all of that dangerous grippy granite.

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Another iconic section of trail at the top , sanitized for your protection.

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Yet another switchback section cleaned and smoothed out by Bob Hahn’s wrecking crew.

Video Tinker Time in Alpine

This past week I made a long overdue appearance at Steve’s Wednesday Stoke ride in Alpine. The weather was great which made the climb up to the top go pretty well.

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I was playing with both my Digital SLR camera as well my GoPro Hero 3 today. This was the second outing with thing so I doing quite a bit of tinkering with mountings and camera setup.

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One of the angles I really like was using the roll bar mount near the bottom of the downtube to view the front tire action. One downside to the roll bar mount was I needed use one of the extender arms on the mount to get the angle right. No matter how hard I tightened the the knob for teh extender arm. It would still sag down after some hard compressions like a landing or bigger chunk. I will have figure out some kind of secondary support strap or something to use this angle much.

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My Canon 7D DSLR can also shoot HD video so I played around with shooting video with it. It will be interesting to show how the whole video editing workflow is going to pan out with multiple formats and frame rates going into a single project.

I also used the seat post/handlebar mount for a rear facing shot. I did not use an extender arm for this mount as the angle looked good.

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The “good” angle was based on the seat post being up. Once I started going downhill and play in the chunk I lowered the seatpost and found that I was unable to get the camera angled up enough for my liking with too much of tire being in the frame and not enough view behind to keep from chopping off the head of a rider behind me.

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For the main run back down the trail I had the side mount for the helmet on. The trail conditions were pretty freaking awesome that begged you to stay off the brakes.

GoPro HD3 Shakedown Ride

Early this week I got out for a lunch time ride out at La Costa. The weather was nice and you good see Catalina and San Clemente Islands out on the horizon. IMAG0442

I got a GoPro Hero3 HD Black Edition for Christmas and it was high time that I tested it out. Other than some futzing with it on the couch this was my first time rolling with camera. I decided to go for a side mount on the helmet for this test. I slapped the curved sticky mount on about the right looking spot and stuck it on. I was also using the double hinged adapter that came with the kit. The kit also came with a WiFi remote but I did not even break that out on this test. Instead I used the GoPro app on that I installed on my Android phone to control the camera. The cool thing I like about the app is that it allows you to preview the angle you have setup instead of guessing or having to buy LCD accessory for the GoPro. Right off the bat I’m rather impressed with the video quality and I’m sure it could be made a bit better some some of the advanced settings I have not tinkered with yet. Of course there is no way to get image stablization with this setup but overall this thing is nice enough that and maybe another one are going to make it into the video equipment stable. Oh yeah…tighening down those little adjustment knobs is highly recommended. Here is a short completely non-fancy clip.

Some Noble Canyon and BLT Play Time

Time to catch up on some photos that have tried to get lost over the last few weeks in a smorgasbord of work, holiday parties, family visits and a cross country road trip (non-biking..but some intel was gathered). A few days before I headed out to the east coast to start all of the festivities, I meet up with some of the SDMBA folks and Leslie Kehmeier, IMBA’s Mapping Specialist. Noble Canyon is one of IMBA’s Epics and Leslie while on a Southern California swing wanted to refresh the information of Noble Canyon and check out the trail for herself. Mark (SDMBA’s USFS Liason and Board Member) had put together all of the logistics together for the ride and a great day out in this awesome area soon followed..

The route that was put together for the day was a point-to-point route from Red Tail Roost in the Big Laguna Recreation Area, down into the Big Laguna Meadow proper and then onward to drop Noble Canyon.

Leslie is an avid photographer and was sporting a DSLR along with a couple of lens. I know first hand what a pain carrying that gear can be sometimes and she was carrying around more stuff that I normally do. Here is Leslie getting some monkey action on to get the shot on the Gatos Ravine trail. Some of the pictures in this post are from Leslie.

Los Gatos near the top

Big Laguna Meadow has brown up for the winter but it is certainly still pretty. At the time of this posting, the meadow is most likely covered in snow.

Mark working the “Stairway to Hell”

A shot by Leslie of me on “Stairway to Hell”

Leslie working through the chunk of “Extra Credit”

Mark riding the “Roman Wall” near the bottom of the trail.

Back to playing in Alpine

With my various travels over the late summer and fall I have not spent too much time riding in the usual SoCal spots. Home was home base long enough last week to allow for a bit of playtime out at one of the usual haunts in Alpine, Anderson Truck Trail.

The weather was pretty freaking awesome for December with perfect temps and great winter afternoon light.

I always find it interesting how the rocks look bigger upon my first return out here after some time away from the place. I was quite happy to stick to two-wheels-on-the-ground play for the day. Whenever I ride while on work trips I make a point to not push my technical limits as the last thing I want to do is have to make a phone call to tell my boss and tell him he needs to fly someone halfway around the planet to take over for me because I jacked myself up out on the trails. All this riding well within my limits makes jumping back into the pushing your limits in the technical arena a bit of a mental adjustment.

Steve of course was up to his usual airbourne antics.

Brian was sporting some air time himself.

With the shorter days we finished up the ride with a only a handfull of minutes of daylight left in the day. It was nice to be back on some local tech stuff and catch up with some friends I had not seen in quite some time. I am pleased to report that the beers at Alpine Beer Company still are mighty tasty.

San Clemente Single Tracking

So after getting back from Japan on Monday, I got in some quality time with my youngest son Jake on Tuesday and Wednesday. The boy has been growing like a weed and was in need of resizing/refreshing some of his hockey gear. HockeyGiant.com has a large store in Anaheim so a shopping outing was added to the day’s to-do list. The San Clemente Single Tracks (aka “The Weedpatch”) was right along the way so a pit stop in order. There a couple of ways to get into the area and we parked off of Cristianitos Road. This is real popular place for the local surfers hitting up Trestles to park so we looked like the odd men out without a surfboard in tow when we headed out.

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We had not started out our morning planning on going for a ride so I had made the breakfast equivalent of a extra large all-meat pizza comprised of eggs, toasts, grits (the real all-natural stone ground stuff) and copious amounts of thick-cut applewood smoked bacon. (Just for the record, all-meat pizza itself a breakfast food group!) While breakfast had been mighty tasty we were still pretty stuffed when we started pedaling. Jake had kicked my ass on the climbs during our last outing but that was not the case today. My youngest buck soon learned that one of the skill sets that Dad honed while obtaining his official old guy qualifications was the ability climb hills with a belly full of bacon.

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One nice thing about this area is that even when you are climbing there are plenty undulations here and there that break most of the climbs up. Bacon burps on the climbs and smiles on the descents was the theme on this outing. I always enjoy all the flowing swooping goodness out in this area. The trails conditions were also good out today. My favorite time out here is in the spring when everthing is green but there was nothing to complain about with it today.

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We did about a 15 miles of trails out here before loading up the bikes and continuing on up to Anaheim to beat up on Dad’s wallet at the hockey store. Another good day out a bike made even better by spending it with one of my boys.

Playtime on Mount Eboshi, Japan

Last weekend I was able to squeeze some time off from my work here in Japan to get in some mountain biking on Mount Eboshi near the city of Sasebo in the southern part of Japan. The weather was pretty freaking awesome.

Nearly all of the climb was done on narrow mountain pavement roads which had some pretty steep bits. There was some mighty pretty roadside views along the way to the top.

Once I got up to the peak of Eboshi I was treated to nice views of the Sasebo City below.

I went down the backside of Eboshi and linked up with a network of trails that are typically fun and often challenging. The crappy rental bike I had made some of the technical bits even more sporty. The clunk-a-clunk fork mades some sections downright scary. (Clunk a clunk is the sound it make everytime you go over a rock of any size)

I had forgotten just how many bannana spiders were out and about on these trails. I can not fully express the invigoration that occurs when you go through one of thier webs and the spider plants squarely in the middle of your face. There are harmless but I find that my mind fails to properly communicate that to my body as I seem to be incapable of not wigging out when one of these spiders takes and unplanned ride on my nose while I’m cruising down the trail.

I came around a bend in the trail and thought I was witnessing the start of the Zombie Apocalypse! That is one crazy looking root.

This is part of the trail. Actually I’m standing at a trail junction. The trail I was on actually goes off to the right (not shown here). It is not until you goe about 40-50 yards down this rock/creek bed until the other “trail” gets back onto dirt again.

Once you get back on the dirt you are treated to a narrow singletrack craved into the side of the very steep hillside that goes on for about a mile. Above is one of the few spots where the thick foilage opens up to show civilization below. After this trail I hit up another handful of trails before zipping back down the mountain and calling it a day. A mighty fine way to spend an afternoon on a bike.

Yumihari Sunset

I finished up work yesterday with a couple of hours of daylight left so I decided to make get in some two-wheeled excercise by way of climbing Mount Yumihari. It was cloudy misty rainy a couple of days ago when I first when up to the top so the prospects of taking in a sunny day’s sunset seemed pretty interesting.

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I made okay time up the mountain and had some nice light left in the day. Here is looking to the east at the center of the city.

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To the west is the 99 Islands National Park.

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The sun about to set. I forgot to bring along the dinky little light that came with my rent-a-wreck so I opted to not take one of the trails back down the mountain and instead took the skinny mountain road back down into town. Not long after I was enjoying some mighty tasty sushi for dinner that cost just a small fraction of what I would pay for that kind of quality back in the states. Not a bad way to spend a few hours after work.

Farewell to a friend and Quality Time

A wad of short blonde hair going in 27 different directionsu nearly buried under a pillow was all that could be seen of youngest son, Jake’s this past Sunday at 6:30AM when I went to wake him up. 13 year old boys are not fond of this time in the morning and he fully looked the part of a coma rattled teenager when I rousted him out of dreamland. We were headed out to Laguna Mountains for a different kind of bike ride.

A few week ago a good friend of mine Cliff Walker made an unscheduled dismount from the ride of life. I can’t use the word “close” and “dear” without feeling some sense of guilt. Cliff had lots of friends who were much more involved with his day-to-day life than I. Cliff was one of my “MTB Buds”. One of those friends that you primarily assoicate with while mountain biking. We have done a couple of road trips and races together as well as many rides and some epics together. A solid good person you just a joy to be around.

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Jake and I were headed to the Laguna Mountains to join some of Cliffs other friends for a memorial ride. Twenty-nine riders gathered up to take a spin around Big Laguna Meadow and honor Cliff’s Life.

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The ride was timed to end at about the same time that some of his family and no biking friends could gather up as well to celebrate Cliffs life. The gathering swelled to over 70 people who sit under the shade of the meadow’s pine trees to share and tell stories about how Cliff had touched each of thier lifes in some way. Cliff had a very diverse group of friends and the stories about Cliff I had never before really showed just how impressive a life he lived and how he had touched so many people’s life in a positve way.

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There was more than a couple of stories that included Cliff’s perpencity to be the first person up the hill. More than a few of us recalled getting up to the top of the hill to find Cliff walking around in circles looking under the various bushes and behind the trees. Once we questioned Cliff would look at you with this devilish smirk and reply “I dropped a hammer have you seen it?” It was always good for a laugh and the celebration of his life gathering was no different. A special thanks goes out to Chip Brent for making the celebration event happen.

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Afterwards, Jake was down for just a father/son ride. The memorial ride was just along the meadow and he had not down some of the other trails in the area before. We decided to add Wooded Hills and Los Gatos Ravine into the mix. A pretty significant event happened on the Wooded Hills climb. Jake was riding strong and then you decided to see how quick he could go. I saw him lift the pace and I was having a tough time matching it. It was not long before kicked up the pace enough more.

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I saw the half-sly turn his head to see how far back I was. That was his moment. The moment when a Son knows he is beating his Dad something. Not just something, but his Dad’s thing. He knew he had me and he was not letting up. I knew he had me too, I was not going to catch him, the best I could do give a good showing for second place. I was weird mix of pride in my Son and a relevation that I’m slacking. Sure I could make excuses and rationalize things like the fact I weigh about 90lbs more than he does and I did a respectable climb after a couple of beers at the celebration but no matter who you slice it my son kicked my ass up that hill. I got to the top about 45 seconds behind Jake and he was already off the bike with his helmet off and was hoofing and puffing. After a bunch of praise from me, he looked a me with a very smirky look on his face and calmly said, “Yeah, I dropped a hammer. Did you see it?”

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