NON-MTB – Page 3 – The Ramblings of MTBBill

Florida Canyon in Balboa Park

So I was tube locked for most of the day on Wednesday, but an appointment near Balboa Park gave me about an hour and half to squeeze in a quick ride in Florida Canyon. Florida Canyon is part of Balboa Park and the canyon has trails on both sides of Florida Drive which goes down the middle of the canyon. I have only ridden here once before about 13 years ago. Besides that there is not much mileage out here I had forgotten my other aversion to this place. I was obvisously overdue for a refresher.

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While this place is very short on miles, the fact that it is bascally in downtown gives it huge bonus points. The place is pretty and has enough ups, downs and turns to keep a beginner excited.

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Most of the trails are about sidewalk wide and while being solidly in the none technical category they do have some character here and there. These trails are much better than the homogenized decomposed granite sidewalks that are so prevalent among most of the city and county created pathways/roads that they try to pass off as “trails”.

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There are some more narrower singletracks here and there. The picture above is of one of the trails on the east side of the canyon. Now I am routinely prone to taking the trail less traveled to try and figure out an area’s trail system and today was one of those days. While over on the east side of the canyon just south of Morley Field (highlighted in yellow below) I spotted a few exceptionally narrow looking trails that seemed to not see much action so I flicked the handlebars and headed off down the second one I came across. Turns out I was quite wrong about the whole not seeing much action assessment. Less than 40 feet down the trail I hear somebody coughing off in the bushes in a manner that seems like they are trying to get someones attention. I thought it wierd but kept on rolling. Around the next corner I see some things that well (a) Ought to happen behind closed doors (b) Joe Public should not have to see in a public park (c) Just can’t be unseen! Everybody (Straight, Gay, Trannies, Furries, etc…) has to get their freak on but come on! I should have to type in some keystrokes like C: <INSERT> ### into my computer to see some shit like that on an idle Wednesday afternoon. I was certainly motivated get out of this section of “social ” trails at this point so I give some extra gusto to the pedals. These little trails seemed more like a maze and this point and two turns later I encounter a very stylishly dressed man in surprising uncomfortable looking shoes strolling along this little trail towards me. (Don’t ask me why I noticed the shoes, I just did okay. I have been paying more attention to peoples shoes ever since I saw Shawshank Redemption. We should all be slightly suspicious of people wearing inappropriate shoes.) He was a cordial fellow who wanted to chat while I figured out how to get around him with the minium of greetings exchanged. The guy seemed to pick up on the fact that Homee don’t play that pretty quickly and I was soon on my way again. A handful of seconds later I popped back onto the main trail to notice another well dressed fellow reading a book while sitting on a log seat and another guy just sort of standing around. Weird!

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I then remembered why I had not been back over here in over a decade. Morley Field is a “Cruising” spot for gay guys looking to hook up for casual sex in the bushes. To each his own but the Public Service Announcement for this trail system is

“Stay on the Designated Trails in Florida Canyon”

Once I was back the main trail and checking out the rest of the trails I could not help but chuckle as dinner plans for the evening had already been made with my girlfriend.

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We had dinner at Hilcrest Brewing Company where they not only have good food but good beers as well. Their pizzas are awesome and we had a tough time deciding between the “BBQueer Chicken” or the “Meatpacker”. The Meatpacker won the coin toss and it went well my girlfriends “Hoppy Endings” IPA and my “Pearl Necklace” Pale Ale. It was a very memorable bike ride with plenty of laughs and snickers afterwards.

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.

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.

Aliso and Wood Canyons

Bill O’Neil and I met for a cruise through Aliso and Wood Canyon Park in Laguna Hills of Orange County today. My last ride out here was cut short due to a mechnical so today was really my first time seeing the majority of the trails in some number of years. I found it amazingly depressing how bad some of the trails have been widened with go-arounds that seemed to be at nearly every minor obstacle. The Cholla trail for example is just a complete mess compared to a handful of years ago. I wish people could just check their ego and get off and walk the stuff they can’t ride instead of making or taking the go-arounds. (I know preaching to the choir here)

Here is a shot at the top of the Rock-It trail. Plenty of go-arounds here as well. This was a mighty fun descent (following the original lines). Once down Rock-It we worked our way over to Mathis. My memory of the steepness and length of this climb has been dulled over the years. It was quite vividly refreshed today as it took quite a bit of gruntage to get my Intense UZZI up this climb.

Once up to the top of Mathis we continued up along the ridge fireroad to “Top of the World” This was a good place to take a breather and enjoy the views of the Pacifc and Laguna Beach. From here we went back down to Mathis and picked up the “Car Wreck” trail.

This was my first time on this trail and it was quite a bit of fun. I managed to not get any pictures taken of the technical bits. The picture above is just after all of the technical bits along with the namesake remains of an old vehicle. This trail feeds right into the Oak Grove Trail. A pretty section of trail.

The next trail we hit up was the Dripping Cave trail. There were some nice tree lined bits as well as some short grunt working climbing in the direction we were going.

We farted around a bit at the at actual dripping cave

Some of it was just downright photo posing. It was right about this time we thought we heard the sound of tiny bubbles trying to escape from finely crafted brown glass bottled far off in the distance. We set out to investigate the sound and found the offending bubbles (in my truck). Ballast Point’s Sculpin IPA and Mission Brewing’s Dark Seas Russian Imperial Stout were tasty accompaniments to post-ride chit-chat. Another NON-Bad day to be on a bike.

Daley Ranch Hack-O-Rama Ride

Being sick sucks! I have had a lingering cough/congestion for going on two weeks now they is really getting annoying. My get well plan is based on schedule of copious amounts of NyQuil, Vitamin C, Cascadian Hops and English Two-Row Barley. I have found it works quite well for either improving ones symptoms or reducing ones attention to the symptoms.

I have been getting in some rides but not to either the length or intensity that I would care to do. I have been feeling better for the last few days so I decided to do a larger loop out at Daley Ranch today. There is plenty of climbing to do out in this area so there would a good bit of effort-per-mile here.

It was a great day to be out and about and I was not the only one with the idea. The parking lot was packed and there looked to be lots of folks out who were obvisously trying to keep to thier New Year’s resolutions. That is all great for people wishing to improve themselves but I think there should be a federal regulation banning the manufacture of Spandex apparel in sizes greater than 18. Ladies, if your waist/arse is measured at 325/85R17 or greater then maybe a nice cottton baggie short and fluffy blouse would be a good starting point. It is like dudes in Speedos (in the US) if you ain’t sporting six-pack abs and could make a living in the adult film industry stick to board shorts cause nobody want to see that kinda stuff!

Post tramatic apparel viewing stress aside I had an alright ride despite not being 100%. I had plans for doing a 23 mile ride out here, but the hack-o-rama was taking it toll and I snipped off the last segment to make it an 18 miler. It was still a good day to be on a bike.

La Costa Stroll

Rancho La Costa Preserve is really close to Casa Del Bill so it is often on the menu you when I only have time for a quick fix of dirt. Despite its close proximity it had been sometime since I last rode out here. It seems like Elfin Forest, Lake Calvera or Daley Ranch had been getting more play as of late.

Some nice new trail markers can be found throughout the trail system.

Strolling up the switchbacks trail

Flag at the top. There was some drama a couple months ago as the flag up here (which was put up with permission of the land manger) kept getting stolen by some unpatriotic Jack Ass. It is awesome that we live in a country where even the idiots are free to express thier views in any manner they are willing to accept the consequences for. Too bad the Jack Ass was also a monumental coward as I’m quite certain the general public would have expressed themselves in a manner that he would not enjoyed. I’m thinking getting your ass whooped with a flag pole is adequeate consequence.

Dumbassness aside the trails were in fairly good shape and fun as always. Vista Del Mar Trail goodness above.

Tuesday Spin at PQ

Tuesday, I opted for spin through Penasquitos Canyon with the hardtail. After riding the UZZI around for that last while, the hardtail felt like a flatland rocketsled out a PQ. It felt really good carry a good grip of speed under your own power without the assistance gravity. I knew I was going to be riding the following day, but I could not help myself, I rode like I was not going to ride the next month.

Of course that was all fine and dandy until about 3/4th of the way the ride, my body reminded me that I’m at least a couple dozen jelly doughnuts and a growler full of Imperial Stout shy of being “In Shape”. It was just about this time that I ran into one of my friends out on the trail. There must be some kind of quantum physics formula that shows that if you meet a friend on the trail and your legs are at least medium rare on the “cooked” scale, said friend will be a hammerhead who will crush your punie little girly man legs into jello. (Make sure to read it with the “Hanz and Franz” accent)

So there was no cool down cruiser back to the trailhead for me. I was able to hold on (for the most part) and I felt good, good and worked over, back at the truck. It good afternoon ride on a bike.

WEBSITE NOTE: My PQ page is way way out of date. With all the crap with the “Tunnels”, Del Mar Mesa, and the destruction of “Intestines”, I have opted to staying out of that politically charged mess (at least from the website perspective). If the dust ever settles I will update will update the page then.

Feeling Blue about Trucks and Bikes

The last couple handful of months have been a bummer on the Truck and Bike front.

Last summer my beloved Intense 6.6 was stolen. I knew that bike so well and it was one hell of a capable rig for get out and about and even the occasional launching. In the last month it has actually been seen in Kelso, Washington (where it was stolen) being ridden by some “crackhead”. There is hope for it recovery as the locals are on the lookout.

Then about two months ago, my Tacoma was totalled when a bonehead thought that the red arrow on a left-hand turn was a suggestion. Man I loved that truck as I had it just the way I wanted it. A leveling lift, onboard air system, hidden off-road lights, In-Cab 115VAC and a tricked out infotainment system.

So while I was in Washington for six weeks all the insurance stuff was settled out and I was online shopping for a replacment Tacoma. I pretty much wanted the same truck I had before. Double Cab 4×4 with the Tow package and either the TRD Sport or Off-Road package. It also had to be in good shape and have descent miles on it. I found plenty in the category but hitting the price mark was the tough part as I was not interested in having a truck payment. Cash is king and the day after I got back from Washington I was able score a killer deal on a truck that meet all of my specs.

The new MBB Mobile. A 2007 Tacoma Double Cab 4×4 with the TRD Off-Road and Tow Packages. It even had a brand new set of BFG AT on it (My favorite all-terrian tires)

I had thought about a camper shell with my old truck but never got one. I’m still not sure wither I’m a shell guy or not but I going to see if it will work out or not. I can always take it off.

You may have noticed I have have a new website supporter/partner up on the site, BikeBling.com. Recently they have moved to huge place in Escondido and have a ton of goodies in the story. For users of my site you will periodically see MountainBikeBill promotional codes for BikeBling that are good for a discount on online purchases. A regular good for me – good for you relationship.

Part of the good for me relationship was that when I got back from Washington there was a brand new steed waiting for me. A well equipped Intense Uzzi.

A brand new set of SpinergyXyclone Enduro wheels were waiting back a Casa Del Bill to bring the build to its ready for launch state. Considering this rig has a 7″ travel coil fork up front and a coil shock givng 7.5″ in back this rig weighs in at a respectable 35lbs 6 ounces. This rig is built well above my skill level so it should be fun to see what kind of “trouble” I can get myself into with this beauty.

Closeup of the “Works Blue” finish that Intense did on this. The finish is slightly translucent which allows the weld mark to show through giving the finish a marbelized look that I think rocks.

Now the color of the bike was picked out long before I brought the truck and the color was pretty low on the criteria in the selection process. It is however pretty uncanny how the bike and truck are pretty much a spot on match. One thing is for certain they both need to be taken out and gotten dirty! I’m feeling pretty damn good about feeling blue!

Views Off The Bike From The “Away From Home Office”

So I have wrapped up my work project in Everett Washington. It took a bit longer than expected and I’m glad to be back home. I did get in some tasty miles of singletrack during my stay but between the work, weather and a nasty bit of crud I had for a while, I did not get my dirt fix as often as I would have liked. So why do we ride our bikes? Geez there will be just about as many answers to that question as there are folks who decide to through a leg over a bike in the first place. I believe that is part of what mountainbiking so special in the first place. One pursuit with countless permutations of living life and generally having a good time.

One of those “answers” for me is seeing beautiful scenery and the occasional critter or two. I was extremely fortunate to score a pretty awesome place to stay during my visit. It was a quint little beach house on Possession Sound that simply was fantastic from an experience standpoint. It made coming home from the “office” everyday seem like a mini-vacation. When the weather was cooperating there was some incredible views to be had right from the dinner table and deck. By the end of the first week I had adopted a routine getting up a couple hours earlier than I really need to just to enjoy the views and a few relaxing cups of coffee before starting my day. In the evening the place just begged you to crack open a bottle of one of the Pacific Northwest’s tasty microbrews. The views were often a daily dose of “answers” if you will.

Whales…..Yes I said whales. Whales were a common sight right out the front windows. A few gray whales liked to come into the shallows and feed on whatever tasty critters where on the bottom here. They would swim sideways and use their tails to stir up the bottom and then spin around and scoop up and filter out all of the tasty snacks.

They would work down the shoreline and eventually head back out to deeper water and off to the wherever the next buffet spot was located.

They made plenty of noise with all of their activity and sometimes the sounds be the first thing that would draw my attention their “visit”. Seeing these majestic critters was certainly a life enriching experience.

The tidal shift is pretty dramatic in this area. The lines of “puddles” you see in the photo above are the divots created by the whales when they are feeding at high tide. They are typically 6-8 feet long each.

It was quite a trip to walk out onto the beach at low tide and meander around where the whales were at less than 24 hours ago.

Even when there were no critters close by, the views were often of the quality that many us pedal for miles to seek out.

I kept my camera nearby all the time as you never knew what was going to pop up on the beach at any moment. This pair of otters were in hurry to get their take-out order home before it got warm.

So while I did not get in as many miles as I would have liked on this trip, I got of wealth of “answers” that I typically only find along quite singletrack of the backcountry.

The MBB Mobile is Dead!

So this past Tuesday morning on my way to work some dumbass in a 1986 Chevy Astro Van decided the red-arrow was a suggestion and decided to make a left hand turn across three lanes of traffic that had the green light. Mr Dumbass left me with with no options and I clocked hit at about 30 degrees from head on at about 50 mph. My truck pivots along the front of the van and slides sideways out the intersection and into a large metal pole that holds up all the signals light and thens proceeds to come to a rest about 30 feet past the intersection in the bike lane.

There might be a few of the W

Hmmm the drive shaft looks a little out of place.

It might buff out 🙂

That rear wheel does not look to be pointing in the right directions.

The good news was that I had barely a scratch on me and got away with just a concussion. It could have been a lot worse. Damn that was good truck that I all tweaked out for road trips. I plan on getting another one pretty much just like it. Doctor’s orders are no mountain biking for two weeks. I might have enough to catch up on some things with the rest of the website.