MAP: The first thing you need to do is swing by a local bike shop or city hall in town and drop $10 to get the 3-pack of maps for the ACFL. These excellent maps are way better than any GPS out here. I have been told that the maps are free at city hall but it is hard to drive by a bike shop with shiny bits in the windows and folks that ride inside. I have stared at more than a few maps over the years and I can assure you these are great maps and coupled with even the slightest bit of common sense and you should have no problems navigating your way through the forest. Overview KML file

On the day I rode Cranberry Lake, the weather forecast gave a 50% chance of showers with the temps in the low 50s. It certainly looked like I was going to get wet that day. A few days before someone said something interesting that stuck in my head. “There is no bad weather, only bad gear.” With that in my head, I packed up my gear and hit the trail. The plan was to take make a big counter-clockwise circle around the area and maximize my riding and sightseeing. Right from the trailhead I was on some cool single tracks that were combinations of loamy buff with some rocks and roots here and there.

Riding in an evergreen forest is just awesome. Believe it or not these are multi-use trails. Yes these twisty and flowing singletracks are open to hikers, equestrians and bicycles. There are even a few in the "Back 40" open to motorcycles. These are community trails and most of them are within the city limits of Anacortes. These are well built, narrow, twisty and ulitmately engaging singletracks. These trails provide a true high quality outdoor experience. The goverment of Anacortes is doing things right providing both a highly quality user experience through the use of enviromentally sensitive and well constructed trails. The community is thorughly engaged in the stewardship of this place and it shows. Anacortes provides a stark contrast to the typical boring and enviromentally insensitve dirt roads being passed off as trails throughout San Diego County. The land managers and agencies of San Diego County could learn a lot from this place.

As the day went on the weather turned for the better and the sun even popped out. I found myself openly giggling while I cruised and twisted through the forest. On several occasions I could not help but to stop, grab a spot on a log and just take it all in. I was one lucky bastard to get to ride killer stuff like this on a business trip. I had decided right then that I would going to to come back here at least once more on this trip as I had only scratched the surface of this trail system.

After finishing up my ride, I drove over to the Whistle Lake area and up to Mt. Erie which is the tallest peak in the ACFL at a little over 1,200 feet. There are some great views of the Strait of Juan De Fuca, the Rosario Strait and the numberous islands across the sound. On this day I even saw a Bald Eagle flying around. There is no legal mountain biking trail coming off the peak of the mountain. The closet one about half-way up the mountain so a climb up the pavement would be great for the views and the excercise you would only get half the downhill reward for your efforts.