EISPIRATEN

Hi guys. Been away for a while. Just wanted to vent and say how much I miss the SG’s. It’s probably been hot as hell down there as always, and you probably have lots of sweat flies as well as those damn little biting flies that have become more common, but I miss it so. I wanna ride my bike to the summit of Baldy. I wanna hike from South Mt Hawkins to Baden Powell and back. I kinda wanna climb crags on East Twin again, sorta (feet still hurt). I wanna ride up 39 to EF RD to GMR and down into Glendora at night again like I usually do. I wanna scramble up Kimchi Ridge again and look at the city lights from Ontario Peak. I wanna do all of Cucamonga Canyon as an overnight canyoneering trip with a few friends and have a party bivy, cause I still have only done lower CCyn. I almost even miss hiking east fork and hearing cholos with shitty music blaring out of cheap Amazon Bluetooth speakers hiking shirtless leaving trash behind and yelling a lot.

I’ll be back soon. Oregon is odd. You can’t pump your own gas here. I don’t get it. The people are nice. Never seen so many white people before. Gonna sample their Mexican food today, and I have low expectations. Lotta water! Food grows everywhere. Cheap to live here, too. Still not my home mountains, where I know every pebble and sapling and goddamn spiky poisonous plant.

Cheers

Let us know when you get back. I have ideas. If you do ride up to Baldy, you should bomb down Register Ridge, just to say you did.

I’ll probably be back around the end of September, and very broke. I wanna get out.

Yeah I’ll piss everyone off and my shattered body will be carted out by SAR, leaving my bike frame embedded in a huge pine.

RE: night rides...did Loma Alta Park->Chaney->Mt Lowe->Wilson Rd->Toll Rd->Alta Dena->Loma Alta Park last night...peaceful as ever.

RE: big rides... I'm trying to work my way up to my second super-big 'MetroLink Shuttle'. The first was Sun Valley->Acton via train, then up and over Gleason, down Mendenhall Ridge, then Little TJ back to Sun Valley. The new plan is to start at CA-39 station, ride the train to Pasadena, then bike up Mt Lowe->Wilson, some link to Rincon (K-D or Rim trail), then Rincon all the way to CA-39, then down to the station.

I see lots more wildlife at night. I'm up to about 6 bear sightings just in West Fork for the year, with one up by Fenner Saddle a few weeks back. Grey foxes and skunks abound! Haven't seen any cats this year, though.

I still haven’t linked Wilson with Rincon. My buddy Luis and I go up Rincon every so often, and I’ve made it nearly the whole way to Wilson, but I chickened out for some dumb reason. If you’d like a partner for that, I’d be interested. I don’t have a mountain bike built yet (just frame and parts lying around), so I’d be on a gravel cross whatever bike with 40mm tires. Slow on downhills but ok otherwise.

That’s a lotta bear! I like seeing the foxes, their eyes glowing at the edges of the roads. And the night hawks flying low. Saw a bobcat on the closed part of 39 recently.

Would be nice to do a night ride during the full moon, with the view of LA to the south.

Taco wrote: I still haven’t linked Wilson with Rincon. My buddy Luis and I go up Rincon every so often, and I’ve made it nearly the whole way to Wilson, but I chickened out for some dumb reason. If you’d like a partner for that, I’d be interested. I don’t have a mountain bike built yet (just frame and parts lying around), so I’d be on a gravel cross whatever bike with 40mm tires. Slow on downhills but ok otherwise.

That’s a lotta bear! I like seeing the foxes, their eyes glowing at the edges of the roads. And the night hawks flying low. Saw a bobcat on the closed part of 39 recently.

Would be nice to do a night ride during the full moon, with the view of LA to the south.

Going up Wilson from Rincon would not be pleasant. Kenyon-Devore and Rim trails are not conducive to climbing. Best to just head to Red Box and finish on the Wilson Road. The worst bit of climbing Rincon westward is that last switchback past Camp Happy Helmet. Seems to drag on and on.

I'll keep you in mind when the plan gets solidified. Gonna wait for cooler weather. Also, gravel bike will be much faster than my full-squish on the flats and climbs. I've got some MTB parts, but mostly older stuff. If you need parts, let me know...I have friends that also have 'parts depots'.

RE: views to the south - the best I've had so far was out the Clamshell Road where it traverses the Monrovia Peak massif out to it's south ridge.

That section of trails up to Wilson is one I haven’t done. I’ve gone down into the canyon and up to Redbox (west to east) once before after our last decent winter. Nice place. Lotta downed trees and stuff then.

Ooooohhhh I love parts depots. Got one of my own growing.

Cheers Tom

I just moved a week ago and I already feel your pain! Parts of Oregon are pretty nice though, I lived there for a few years. The gas thing is indeed odd/stupid.

Got any interesting adventures you can do where you’re at now?

Hopefully! I've got a list of places to check out, but haven't really had time to research and dig into it yet, much less actually get outside.